I have a wood lathe, but turning 15 inch spindles as thin as 1/8" and 3/16"
is well beyond my capability.
And so is turning 5/16" shafts 30 inches long.
If anyone does do this successfully I'd very much like to see pictures of
their setup!

Doug


"Prometheus" wrote in message
...
On 3 May 2005 21:23:02 -0500, "DougVL" wrote:

I've been looking for ways to make small dowels. Well, really they'll be
knitting needles and arrows.
I'm still hoping to find a jig design that I like for cutting dowels from
square stock. Until then, I rip squares and plane them fairly close to
round in a long v-block. Knitting needle diameters range from about 1/8
inch to 3/8 inch. Knitting needles would be 8 to 15 inches long. Arrows
have less size variability, about 5/16 to 3/8 inch diameter and 30
inches
long.

While I'm sure it's fully possible to do this with another method, I
would think your best bet would be to get yourself a cheap mini-lathe
(or an expensive one, depending on your budget for this) and turn the
square stock between centers. You can rough something like that out
in about 20 seconds, and then make a jig to hold a piece of sandpaper
that stretches the length of the piece parallel to the centers for
your finish. Works good for other stuff as well, and I've seen them
for as little as $70 recently. I couldn't tell you how well a $70
lathe works, but I'm sure it makes the parts spin around, and if all
you're making is dowels, that might be enough.

If you don't want to buy a lathe, but have a drill press, you could
mounting the piece vertically and setting up something to take the
stock off evenly while it turns- but make sure to support the bottom
of the dowel somehow (maybe with a tip of a nail driven through a
board set on the base) so that it doesn't come flying off on you.

Aut inveniam viam aut faciam