Hello,
I want to make some wood lathe tools from bars and rods of HSS. Can someone help me with this. I want to start with a skew chisel which I only need to cut a tang for the handle. I’ve seen videos of people using angle grinders for this but I’m sure there’s better ways of doing it.
I’d appreciate any help with this.
Thanks!
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depending on how big you’re talking no need to make a full tang, just using calipers find the absolute closet size hole you can drill to match the stock and have it fit like a glove( round or square stock) just drill a hole in the handle
then lightly heat the “tang”(so the epoxy loses some viscosity as you fill the hole, preventing air gaps in the handle) but basically heat the “tang” with a torch (we’re talking sub 220* nothing crazy) insert into the hole
use 15 minute if possible not 5 minute epoxy to fill all the airspace, let cure
then using a drill bit size that’s 50-60% of the total size of the side of the metal (so half inch square stock 1/4” bit) drill 2-3 pin holes perpendicular to the square face of the metal
then take metal pins( no tapered pins but just constant diameter pins which we have in the big green cabinet of hardware)
then hammer them in place and that handles not going anywhere
Edit* if using round stock just made 3 flat spots on the rod along the tang, and mark the orientation As a red line drawn on the rod to indicate where a perpendicular drill Can be made on the 2-3 flat spots and make sure to measure the distance from tip of the tool so you know where to accurately drill the holes and not have the bit wander like a nomad and then proceed to snap
Yes. That’s what you do after you have shaped your bar/billet into an effective tool.
Well he said chisel so that’s just a minute on the bench grinder and then a couple of the belt to finish, if all the other styles come pre profiled cause cutting a cove bit out of a hss rod blank, i mean the person who has the talent to do that just make an aluminum handle you use locking hex screws and a woodruff key inset with
Once you have the skill set to machine high speed tool steel, making something like taking a 1/2 dado out of an aluminum bar stock using our mill then making it an interference fit for a brass insert! Then using our lathe with I’d image a negative rake insert to mill it all perpendicular to the reference face then boring it out if a long enough boring bar is available then drill and tap 2 screws and use a what are they called keyhole shears I think or keyway pulling shears for the woodruff and done hell even go above and beyond and make it 2 sections that use a threaded collar so you could fine tune the balance by hollowing it to shed weight and to add weight core it with press fit steel plugs to fine tune the feel
Profiling the round bar stock for gouges is definitely going to be more of a challenge than profiling a chisel. The flat bar stock I’m looking at for the chisel is 6mm x 20mm, which I could drill a .75in hole in the handle and fill with epoxy, but if I make the tang slimmer to like 10mm then I shouldn’t even need epoxy. I’ve never seen pins in a lathe handle, usually just a brass or copper ferrule.
I’ve seen people profile gouges from round stock with an angle grinder but that seems less precise . I’d probably have to learn to use the machining mill for that.
Yea the pins are to compensate for the lack of precision!
If you wanted to say round the bottom with an angle grinder and files and leave the top 4” of the tang square you could take the handle use our Mortiser square hole drill bits
drill a 4 inch hole (the maximum depth you can drill with the bits we have) which would make it a perfect fit for the top 4”
then drill the rest of the length drill with a normal bit
that way you’d get that tight fit and it wouldn’t roll!
The bench grinders are messed up. Someone ground Aluminum again. It will be a few weeks till I can get to that.
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I’m not sure what classes or certs I need to make these. It looks like a knife making class would cover most of it, except for the mill used to cut the flute in the gouge.
No I was talking about the ones we use for sharpening in the wood shop my bad should have clarified
That or this place sells any tool blank under the sun that way you could just focus on the cool parts of turning the handle then fitting and profiling it Tools > Wood Turning Tools > Turning Hand Tools > Unhandled Tools — Taylor Toolworks
True, but I already know how to make the handles. It’s the tools I want to learn to make.
This appears to be mostly “blacksmithing” and @coloneldan might be willing to pitch in a tip or 2 on working e.g… drillrod…
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Since I was mentioned in the responses below I thought I’d comment. There are a number of ways to achieve your goal. You can machine the tool in the machine shop. You can remove the material using the stock removal method used to make knives and yes, a angle grinder is one alternative, a metal cutting band saw is another. You might even consider the plasma cutter if you have a number of them to make.
To a blacksmith though we like to heat/forge steel and make it by hammer it into shape. You would use a guillotine fuller to shape the tang and then the KMG metal grinder to put the blade on it. You can also use the same technique to create bowl gouges and other lathe tools.
HSS is another challenge. It is hard and brittle so anytime you forge with it can be difficult to work with. It has to be kept very hot to forge. 1095 knife steel or 4160 spring steel which is high carbon works as does certain stainless steels. These steels are much easier to work with than HSS. Lastly, heat treating HSS is complex compared to other steels and it is not really easy to do unless you have the right equipment.
If it were me, I’d forge a couple from spring steel. It is plentiful and reasonably cheap, too. If you have an old truck spring you’re already good to go.
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Thanks!
I have a bar of O1 tool steel from another project that should work for making a skew chisel.
What classes do I need to take to begin using the machine shop and metal shop?
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You’ll have to get those answers from others. I believe though that you can use the band saw without training but I’d confirm that with the machine shop. As far as the plasma cutter there is a class for it and you have to take a hot safety class, too. If you want to mill it then there is a class for the mill, too.
I’m not the expert though so please wait until someone from those shop responds.
O1 is beautiful steel by the way. Excellent steel for knives or tools, too. It can be blacksmithed and is often.
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So before anyone does it, DO NOT try to cut any hardened high speed steel on any of the band saws. There will be no teeth left on the saw afterwards. The bandsaw blades are made of HSS themselves.
If you want to have an idea of what hardness you have for steel, tool steel, etc use our hardness files located in the machine shop. The files are in the black toolbox, top box upper right drawer. (Either top drawer or one below that) If the file digs into your material, the file is harder that the material. The files go from 40 to 65 Rockwell C scale. The lower the number, the “softer” the material.
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Machine Shop and Metal Shop both have a couple of on-line courses to get started.
“Learn” is under the Member Portal on the main website. Dallas Makerspace: Log in to the site I was logged in when I copied that address…
From the discussion, you’d probably want the Bench Grinder class from Metal Shop. If you’re thinking of using the plasma cutter, then you’d need the Hot Process Safety too. In the Machine Shop, it doesn’t sound like the lathe will be of much use, but you might take the Bridgeport Mill class. Mind you, none of this (except the grinder class) gets you actual access to the machine. Bob Karnaugh teaches the Bridgeport class, and I believe that he keeps track of when someone has taken (and passed) the on-line class so that he can offer the machine-side class. Metal Shop doesn’t have anybody that gets notifications. If you decide you want the Dynatorch/plasma cutter, then you should ask (here in this Category) for a class. All of us who teach have had that experience of putting up a class that nobody signed up for, so we only tend to put up classes when someone is showing interest.
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