• January Turning Challenge: Thin-Stemmed Something! (click here for details)
  • Conversations are now Direct Messages (click here for details)
  • Congratulations to Gabriel Hoff for "Spalted Beech Round Bottom Box" being selected as Turning of the Week for January 6, 2024 (click here for details)
  • Welcome new registering member. Your username must be your real First and Last name (for example: John Doe). "Screen names" and "handles" are not allowed and your registration will be deleted if you don't use your real name. Also, do not use all caps nor all lower case.

tool rests Hard or soft

Richn

Richn

Joined
Jul 7, 2007
Messages
16
Likes
0
Location
Gilbertsville, PA
I'm thinking of experimenting with the Hardened round toolrests such as the ones from Bestwoods. I have used the traditional cast steel toolrests for years, and find it annoying when I start to get the nicks and bumps in the rest. Because of this the hardened toolrests are now attractive. So I want to throw it out there and fester up an opinion or two.

Are the hardeded tool rests good?
Due to the fact that they are round inhibit close work, compared to the wedge shaped traditional style?

Look forward to your responses.

Rich
 
I have several of the Bestwoods toolrests and like them a lot. The only drawback from a round rest is that in certain situations, like a shear cut with an Ellsworth gouge, you are further away from the work and it is not as controllable.
 
I'm a big proponent of close rests. The ones that I have are cast, but since I cut with an overhand grip and rarely scrape, they generally don't get palpable nicks, only barely visible ones.

That rest is best that reaches toward the work. Soft preferred, because it won't take a grinder to smooth a nick if you get one, only a file. Reparability over durability for me.
 
Tool Rests

Steve Worcester said:
I have several of the Bestwoods toolrests and like them a lot. The only drawback from a round rest is that in certain situations, like a shear cut with an Ellsworth gouge, you are further away from the work and it is not as controllable.
Click to expand...

To my way of thinking it is far more important to be able to position the rest properly, as Steve says, than the type of steel. One rest I own rareley gets used because it will not close the wood to the small distances I require. It is my only hardened steel rest. All the rest are cast, require minor manintenance and work perfectly. Corrective maintenance is one of those necessary evils that gives you an appreciation for the ancillary equipment we use. A couple minutes polishing a rest gives us a chance to slow down and think. Philip
 
MichaelMouse said:
... Soft preferred, because it won't take a grinder to smooth a nick if you get one, only a file. Repairability over durability for me.
Click to expand...

That's got my vote. If something's got to give I want it to be my tool rest, not the tool
 
I've got 5/16" steel rod on the tops of my Oneway toolrests. I put them on there with PC7 epoxy. They are not HSS, but the are not as susceptible to nicks as the stock toolrests. I wish they were hardened. On hardened rests, the tool glides so much more smoothly.
After shopping around, checking out pros and cons of toolrests, I think the Robust Rests are probably the best in the country. Other opinions may differ, of course. 🙂
 
I used to think that I would not like the round rests because the fulcrum point is too far from the wood. In reality this only comes into play with small tools. My spindle gouges and bowl gouges have a bevel that is long enough that you can't have the tool rest too close or you might be on the bevel. I should say that I grind a secondary lower bevel which extends this bevel area. On the skew the bevel is usually someway far away as well. I'm not talking far here but on a 3/4" bar the pivot point is still only 3/8" away from the wood and the bevel of my bowl gouge and spindle gouge is just about that far depening on how you place the tool on the work.
For pull cuts the pivot point can sometimes be a little far away but I lower the tool rest a lot and the force is going down the shaft rather than across it so it doesn't seem to matter if the tool is overhanging that much.
The reason I grind the secondary bevel is to reduce any burnishing from the sharp corner of the heel of the bevel and to reduce the amount of steel that has to be ground away when sharpening. This makes honing the tool quicker and sharpening on the wheel is quicker as well.
 
Tool Rests

I personally don't care for the round tool rests simply because they don't have the 'finger groove' found in most cast rests. For repeat spindle turning, the finger is a must for me. Watch out for certain brands when it comes to 'hardened' round rests; the modular tool rests by Sorby are soft enough you can easily cut them with a hacksaw, but are advertised as hardened steel. If you know how to weld, the round rests are cheap, fast, and really easy to make from m2 rods.

Cheers!
 
KEW said:
I don't follow you. How do you envision the tool giving with a hardened tool rest?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

I don't recognize the confusion but, then again, I often suffer from blurred vision when I do the composition.
My point was that I don't use or recommend the hardened tool rest. MM said softer is better, meaning that the softer tool rest allows it to take up some of the energy from impact between the tool and the rest. If the tool rest is hardened, the energy from any impacts between two hardened surfaces tends to equalize, thereby increasing the possibility of tool damage that is either equal to or greater than to damage to the tool rest.
 
Cold rolled steel

Weld (special welding rod), silver soilder, or braize a 1/4 or 3/8 round bar of cold rolled steel to your cast iron toolrest. The cold rolled steel is harder and the cast iron is vibration deadening. If you want to spend some money, get a piece of hardened alloy welding rod; take the outer flux off of it;then weld it to your cast iron tool rest. You have the best of hardness and the best of vibration dampening.
 
Cast iron has a lower coefficient of kinetic friction than steel, as well as a looser lattice to eat vibration. Doubt any of us would feel the difference. Of course a half inch round rod would automatically place your fulcrum a quarter inch farther away from the surface at centerline than a straight-edged one.

A relieved rest gets you closer to the work above center on convex shapes and below center when hollowing a bowl. That's where I like to cut, because a momentary handle drop is less likely to hit the wood, while a close interval prevents the tool from tipping under.

If you're an underhand steady you probably need hardened rests. If you're an overhand, doesn't make much difference. Look at the endgrain oak rest on Roy Underhill's treadle lathe. He added a piece of iron to the long grained pine rest on the pole lathe.
 
I too like the hardened round top tool rests from Robust. Puts you close to the work and has a place to rest your hand. The Best tool rest I have with a 3/4" post, for a Mini Vicmarc must be super glued to keep from coming loose and twisting.
 
nuturner said:
I don't recognize the confusion but, then again, I often suffer from blurred vision when I do the composition.
My point was that I don't use or recommend the hardened tool rest. MM said softer is better, meaning that the softer tool rest allows it to take up some of the energy from impact between the tool and the rest. If the tool rest is hardened, the energy from any impacts between two hardened surfaces tends to equalize, thereby increasing the possibility of tool damage that is either equal to or greater than to damage to the tool rest.
Click to expand...


My confusion is over what actual damage the tool might see. In other words, would the HSS tool bend, break, dent, etc. Is it a particular tool which is vulnerable? If the tool rest had a sharp corner, I would expect it to nick the tool. However, the Robust rest is a 1/4" diameter rod (larger diameter for the others).
In essence, unless you experience damage to your CI rest from using a 1/4" round gouge (Spindle or bowl), I don't follow how a 1/4" hardened rod on the rest would damage a turning tool. I must be missing something!🙁
 
KEW said:
My confusion is over what actual damage the tool might see. In other words, would the HSS tool bend, break, dent, etc. Is it a particular tool which is vulnerable? If the tool rest had a sharp corner, I would expect it to nick the tool. However, the Robust rest is a 1/4" diameter rod (larger diameter for the others).
In essence, unless you experience damage to your CI rest from using a 1/4" round gouge (Spindle or bowl), I don't follow how a 1/4" hardened rod on the rest would damage a turning tool. I must be missing something!🙁
Click to expand...

Good Question Kew

Has anybody ever witnessed damage to a tool because of a hardened tool rest?
 
I'm just finishing up making a set of my own "Robust style" rests using 5" diameter 5/16" wall steel pipe sections. I heat treated sections of 1/4" O-1 drill rod to Rc60+, epoxied the rods to grooves in the top edges, and then tack welded the rods at each end. Waiting for the powder coating to get done.

It's been a fun project to do, and each rest cost me about $5 in materials and an hour's time. Tried them before they went to the paint shop, and was pleased. I have several 1" round rests, straight and curved, but I rarely use them any more because of the issues already mentioned by others.
 
I don't remember who makes them but assume that some of the discussion concerns rests that have the round bar on top of a roughly one inch vertical piece of steel, below this there is a horizontal shelf also about one inch. It has been pointed out that if the tool drops off the end of the round bar while turning, it lands with a lot of force on one's finger, causing injury. I've added a piece of wood to these rests so that a dropping tool will simply push aside one's finger. In the catalogues, these rests now have the addition of something similar. People have suffered injury. If one has these rests, they should be modified.

I don't use them when turning small bowls or boxes as the vertical surface in front of the bowl prevents chips from falling out as one turns, They are more suitable for spindle turning.

Malcolm Smith.
 
Malcolm, those are the Woodcraft toolrests. They have addressed the issue by placing a lucite (or similar clear plastic) insert to fill the space between the top of the rest and the ledge below. I know several people fitted a piece of wood to make the same fix.

http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?familyid=391

Note tool rest is upside down. Scroll down to 12" rest for better perspective.
 
Last edited:
toolrests and banjos

I have these. I like them, but, mine have needed repeated sanding as they start to get rusty. They also keep me too far from the work when I'm doing small or delicate items.

I also find it a bit hard at times to wrap my fingers around the toolrest.

All things considered I think I'd prefer the wedge shape with a round bar at the top (like the Robust) but I'd like to see a shorter height on the wedge so I can get my fingers around it comfortably. I don't have big hands.

As far as Banjos go, are there after market banjos that you can get to replace the POS ones that came with my 2 Jet lathes? They don't lock down tightly and the handle for the bed lock seizes up on me. I keep ripping my knuckles open on the damn screws.😱
 
Truffuls said:
As far as Banjos go, are there after market banjos that you can get to replace the POS ones that came with my 2 Jet lathes?
Click to expand...

I don't know what lathe you have, but Monster Tools makes a replacement T-nut (if you can call it that) for the mini lathes. The Price is 2 for $25 (1 ea. for tailstock and banjo). These are square plates to replace the current disks.

I cannot vouch for them - I haven't tried them. It may help.
 
KEW said:
Malcolm, those are the Woodcraft toolrests. They have addressed the issue by placing a lucite (or similar clear plastic) insert to fill the space between the top of the rest and the ledge below. I know several people fitted a piece of wood to make the same fix.

http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?familyid=391

Note tool rest is upside down. Scroll down to 12" rest for better perspective.
Click to expand...

Thanks Kew. Those are are the rests, or at least are the current version. Again, for safety sake, if anyone has them without the piece added to create a slope for one's finger to slide on, they should add a piece of wood or plastic to make them safe,

Malcolm Smith.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
:cool2:I don't know if this is considered "hard" or "soft", but I use cold rolled steel rests I make myself. I have found that they work better for me than the "cast" rests or "aluminum" rests I have used in the past. For my use I purchase 5/8" rod for the post and 1/2" rod for the rest in the appropriate length. Weld with an inexpesive mig welder and there you go!! Fairly cheap and you get exactly what you need in a manner in a minutes....Works for me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top