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What's the next toy.. errr tool?

Old thread re-awakening again!

I'm suffering from the need of wanting another bowl gouge. I have Thompson tools so might as well work on completing the set right?

In the back of my head I think why not get the 3/8 v bowl gouge.

**Anyone have one or is it a dust collector that never leaves the rack?** I'd forgive it for collecting some dust and only occasionally getting used.

Seems like I've settled on the 1/2 inch for most of my work and pulling the 5/8 out for green wood just because it's fun and fast. The other day I ran into a spot where I thought a smaller bowl gouge would have worked better. Guess I could have got out a skew... NOT.

I have two 3/8" bowl gouges and two 3/8" spindle gouges. The spindle gouge I use on every bowl to form the bevel on the tenon and then again to remove the final nub of the tenon. The 3/8" bowl gouges see action as finishing gouges and in tight spots.
 
Yes , Looking forward to it. What are you using for a blade. Im sure the one that comes with it, is probably not the best.
I will be using it mostly to cut blanks from logs
 
Yes , Looking forward to it. What are you using for a blade. Im sure the one that comes with it, is probably not the best.
I will be using it mostly to cut blanks from logs

Sticking my nose into the conversation: for cutting up log sections into blanks, with my 18" Rikon I use only 1/2" 3tpi Lenox blades for wood up to 12" thick. There are Lenox bandsaw shops all over, one near me, that can make any type, any size. The guy sometimes makes one as I wait but I usually order ahead of time and get 8 or 10 at once.

You may have already seen this but if not and you are interested, I did a video on using the bandsaw to make blanks from log sections. It was for a Zoom pandemic demo. I had to leave out a lot so it's a little short on the details of successful drying.


JKJ
 
I use the Lennox bimetal blades. The big saw has a 1 1/4 wide by teeth at 3/4 inch apart. Best for cutting slabs. My little saw has 1/2 inch with 3 tpi. This one is for cutting circles.

robo hippy
 
My most used tools are the Thompson 3/8 detail and bowl gouges. All of my 3/8 tools -- lots of them -- have only 7-8" handles. None have a 12". My smaller skews also have similarly short handles.
My 5/8ā€ BGā€™s (Thompson/Jamieson, Crown Razor m42 parabolic) have ~12ā€ handles for leverage when roughing stuff out. No 1/2ā€ shaft BG, mine drop down to 3/8ā€, they have ~8ā€ handle, as do all the other tools except a couple of larger scrapers that are a bit longer. Long handles on smaller tools do get in the way.
 
New shop tool?

This is mine, a very recent addition, a Yamaha P525 digital piano.

Why is it good in the shop? So I can stretch and exercise my fingers when taking a break. (Helps with finger cramps that old people sometimes get when holding lathe tools too long) To practice on a whim without walking up the hill to the house. To play loudly, even in the middle of the night, without disturbing the family with the Baldwin in the house. To entertain visitors so they'll give me money. (ha, joke) So I can compose and practice arrangements and variations in private with abandon. The llamas and peacocks next to the shop don't seem to mind.

And yes, I do use a good dust cover.

shop-piano.jpg

I have racks of pro midi keyboards and synthesizers in storage above the garage but they take up too much space. In case no one else has noticed, shop space tends toward limited ...

This is the 3rd one I've tried in the shop and has the best piano action (extremely important) and best sound without spending $4000. For variety, in the little shop office are a guitar, violin, harmonicas, melodica, and cornet. And over 4000 songs on the computer sound system. A shop is good for the life. Music is good for the soul.

Extra musical tidbit, unrelated to the shop: my piano bench in the house is a good conversation piece - it's the actual bench Billy Joel sat on when in concert here in the late '70s.

JKJ
 
it's the actual bench Billy Joel sat on when in concert here in the late '70s.
I must have seen that bench. In college in 1973 in Durham, NC, friend took me to a concert in Raleighā€”said he had heard that this new guy was pretty good. As students we had cheap seats way back in the auditorium where he played, but since only about a dozen people came to the concert, Billy Joel had us all come on stage and sit around him as he played. Cold Spring Harbor was his first album and I think Piano Man was about to come out. It was amazing.
 
I must have seen that bench. In college in 1973 in Durham, NC, friend took me to a concert in Raleighā€”said he had heard that this new guy was pretty good. As students we had cheap seats way back in the auditorium where he played, but since only about a dozen people came to the concert, Billy Joel had us all come on stage and sit around him as he played. Cold Spring Harbor was his first album and I think Piano Man was about to come out. It was amazing.

Very cool! Incredibly amazing and I'm jealous - I wish I could have been a accidental Billy Joel groupie! I was impressed at one of his concerts when he jumped off the stage and ran up and down the central isle interacting with people!

But you may have seen a different bench. If what they told me at the Baldwin store was correct, Joel didn't travel with a bench but rented the one I now have, just for that concert. (It's a concert bench with the height adjustment knobs on either side.) After that, it was "used" so they sold it to me at a discount. I bought a 7' Baldwin grand at the same time so with that and Joel's rental fee I don't think they lost any money! Both the bench and the piano have served me well over nearly the last half century. Prob the best purchase of my life (besides a certain ring, of course!)

Here it is sometime in the '90s. (I and my siblings were raised by parents who strongly believed that music education was just as important as reading, writing, and arithmetic!)

piano_midi_P8051382.jpg
JKJ
 
Well, the next tool ended up being a Jet AFS 1000b air filter. Just got home with it.

They had a good price on them at the local wood store and I had a gift card I'd won from my clubs president challenges that made it an even better price so hopefully cleaner air is in my future.
 
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Just bought a new to me Oneway 2436 from a club member. I didn't realize the difference between it and my old Delta DL 40 that was heavily modified. Very happy with it. The Oneway had less than 150 items turned on it and it shows. I added a 17" bed extension and extra banjo to the outboard side...Cant wait for Christmas vacation when I can spend much of a week on it!
 
Just bought a new to me Oneway 2436 from a club member. I didn't realize the difference between it and my old Delta DL 40 that was heavily modified. Very happy with it. The Oneway had less than 150 items turned on it and it shows. I added a 17" bed extension and extra banjo to the outboard side...Cant wait for Christmas vacation when I can spend much of a week on it!
I'd love to have a one way banjo but I checked the price and got scared,
 
A bigger scraper for the shop.
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Also picked up one of these jackets recommended in the other thread. I like it very much!
61RlDz0ayDL._AC_SX679_.jpg

Also a new play tool. Should be in just before Christmas.
61QcDLI+jkL._AC_SL1500_.jpg
 

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Found a you tube video that I wished I'd seen before I did this bottom. It would probably look different than it does now.

That's with the spiraling wheel, right? Does the tool also come with a star wheel with sharp points?
I just replaced the Sorby Micro spiraling/texturing tool that I gave away a few years go - it came with two sizes of spiraling wheels and one pointed texturing wheel. (I get more use out of the pointed wheels)

I have played some with spiraling wheels, seems like you only get one chance!
texture_IMG_7845e.jpg
If I want spiral texturing on something like, say, a box lid, I feel safer cheating - texture a thin disk then glue it into a recess in the box lid!

Hey, do you know Frank Penta? You can't hang out with Frank without a texturing tool in your pocket - he's a hard-core texturing maniac. šŸ™‚

JKJ
 
I just ordered this:

View attachment 70191

It's something I had on the "someday" list. Recently, though, I can really see how I can put this to use in the shop. My first project will likely be a set of Raptor-like grinder angle jigs.

3D printers are amazing. I watched the technology develop over the decades before I retired when I attended the computer graphics conventions. At first, all printing was stereo lithography in a big tank of liquid - slow, crude, and very expensive! Later, anyone attending could sit down, have a 3D scan made of their face, and go home with a free print!

A few years back my son and I both bought identical Prusa kits (about $700 each) and assembled them. Good way to learn a lot about the internals and save money over an assembled model. I got a lot of good use out of it but in my downsizing I gave it to him and he often runs both at the same time! (He prints anything I need) He also designs and prints incredible ear rings and other jewelry - everyone who sees it wants some!

They are getting so much better and cheaper now. Another son with two boys bought on a year ago, then not long after got a second one that uses multiple filaments for coloring. The boys had two spools of filament when I visited and were printing everything, so I took them about 20 unopened spools - they were SO excited. There are so many ready-to-print models available now for free download, but designing from scratch is not that hard with the software you can get these days.
 
Nothing for turning. Not even something for Windsor chair building, although that might have been slightly more likely to make a list (I have an embarrassing number of drawknives and spokeshaves of various types and sizes -- perhaps a tenon cutter?).
 
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Nothing for turning. Not even something for Windsor chair building, although that might have been slightly more likely to make a list (I have an embarrassing number of drawknives and spokeshapes of various types and sizes -- perhaps a tenon cutter?).
Lexington? Know anybody in Nicholasville? My buddy down there has a large collection of hand tools also.
 
A bigger scraper for the shop.
View attachment 70143
For those of you who want to add a scraper, what I've found is the width of the scraper is less important than the thickness. Indeed, a wide scraper has mechanical leverage advantage for the tool to react to variations in the resistance to the cut, while a narrower scraper is less prone to react to these variations. You see, it's the heft and weight of the scraper that helps steady it when finish cuts are made while holding it at an angle for a shear scrape. For this delicate cut, it's less stable because holding it at a shearing cut angle necessitates that it's contacting the tool rest at a point, rather than a line. Because of this, it's the weight of the steel that helps keep it steady, and the closer the center of mass is to the point it makes contact with the tool rest, the easier it will be to control in your hands. Hold it delicately, so that you can negotiate great curves while the resistance to the cut varies with grain orientation. Let the weight of the tool replace the tendency to use your physical strength, and you can get a superior end result.

Once that knowledge is gained, then forming the burr is a whole 'nuther ballgame! I would suggest new turners learn how to manually form a burr on their scrapers.....rather than to rely on the burr left from grinding. The ground burr is useful for initial and shaping cuts, but the manually formed burr is much more refined, and is capable of producing a better, more refined finishing cut.

=o=
 
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