I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to
use for the blocks and what glue to use?

In article ,
william kossack wrote:

I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to
use for the blocks and what glue to use?

In the days before chucks became popular and available (and less likely
to rip your fingers off than metalworking chucks) it was the usual
method, and it still works at a nice price.

Wood: What have you got that's cheap and available? Use it.

Glue - elmers or titebond with a sheet of paper in the middle. Some
regulars here also use hot glue (glue gun type), without paper, and it
seems to work for them. The paper joint requires two flat faces, and has
the ability to be easily split off with a knife blade rapped into the
joint line (and you can even clean up and re-use the glue block). Then
you can rechuck with a jam chuck or hot glue (or a mechanical chuck with
cole jaws, or a longworth chuck) and clean up the foot. In the old days
(as in ignorant youngster with a lathe) I resigned myself to flat feet,
and carefully sanded the bottom flat to remove the remains of paper and
glue. It worked.

Some folks just turn the whole block off, and therefore don't concern
themselves with making the joint easily splittable. Suit yourself.

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by

William
I use glue blocks a lot on face plate work. In my case that means up to 18"
but usually no more than 14". I seldom use a chuck in face plate work and
then only because some one asks me to show them how. For glue I use standard
or heavy duty hot glue from a craft gun, whichever glue is on sale when I
run out. The wood used is generally hard wood, likely maple or cherry and
sometimes ash. What I do to get it is to cut about 4" off the end of a log
to eliminate end cracks before turning. Then that 4" slab is cut on the band
saw to leave flat boards that I dry for a while. Any cracked ones are fire
wood and the rest are stacked for eventual glue blocks or what have you. On
my site are instructions for making a glue block from a slab of wood by
tapping it. The page on finishing bowls shows the blocks in action.

--
God bless and safe turning
Darrell Feltmate
Truro, NS Canada
www.aroundthewoods.com

"william kossack" wrote in message
news
I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to use
for the blocks and what glue to use?

Basswood or aspen here, when I use 'em. Avoid woods with distinct annual
rings and the tendency to split along them. Not the regular SPF 2x, that's
for sure.

I use regular wood glue if dry, CA if damp. Make yourself a taper fit and
keep the center mark on the opposite side to help with centering and
clamping on the lathe. I won't turn until next day with standard wood glue.
CA, if you spritz one face with the accelerator prior to mating, can be used
after five-ten minutes.

Thing about using glue blocks for bowls is it encourages cutting from
behind, which is awkward when working around the headstock, and can lead to
taking some bad choices/chances with your tool angles.

It's one of the things a chuck does so well and easily that I have found
myself making the glue block so that it can be gripped by the chuck! Easier
to work around the headstock that way, too.

George wrote:

I have found
myself making the glue block so that it can be gripped by the chuck!
Easier
to work around the headstock that way, too.

I do the same. In fact, I have a supply of oak/maple/unknown wood
dunnage around that I turn round into large cylinders and keep around
just for that. Enough of rapping the knuckles on the chuck I say, and a
couple of inches that I can just part off gives me clearance I am more
comfortable with. I cut the correct dovetail on the cylinder on the
lathe, then tak it to the miter saw and cut the length I want to have a
perfectly smooth and square face on which to glue my next victim.

Here's a good tip I got a long time ago. Since no matter how you
wiggle, adjust, or threaten you piece if you want to rechuck it, it
will never line up or rebalance correctly. However, I started
numbering with a pencil the corresponding area of the glue block to
match the jaws of my chuck and this has helped a lot. It works too on
your piece if you are not using a glue block.

When I made earrings this year as Christmas presents, I took small
pieces of 2X2 and simply glued my pieces of odds and ends on the end of
them with 5 minute epoxy. So the little pieces of whatnot that I had
from my pen making days of 6 -7 years ago were turned quite small very
easily as I now had the clearance I needed to work them small. I put
the glue on the piece, then just used a squeeze clamp to hold them in
place, and the after a few hours just turned the disks for earrings in
1/8" thicknesses by holding the cylinder in the chuck and using a 1/16"
parting tool. I was surprised, a piece of ebony I had yielded about 5
sets of earrings. I sanded, finished, and then parted off the pieces
in just minutes.

If you will glue your odds and ends onto a small piece of wood then
chuck up the wood, you will find no piece of wood is safe, no matter
how small! So tiny pieces of burl, an odd configuration, you name it,
it can be a smart looking piece of jewelry or a decoration on an
ornament etc (like an ornament top).

Just a few thoughts...

Robert

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 07:43:04 -0700, william kossack
wrote:

I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to
use for the blocks and what glue to use?

Ok, I'm gonna get flamed for this, but I make my glue blocks out of scraps of
3/4" plywood... they work fine and turn/sand well..
Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

First off, I am very new to this and I am self taught. I also am using a
Jet minilathe and my largest bowl is about 5" so far.

I have been using glue blocks because I am not ready to invest money into
chucks yet so I use screws into a 1x4 pine scrap glued to my work piece. I
have sanded off flat bottoms on the finished piece using the belt sander but
have lately been trying to get in with the gouge to make better looking
bottoms. First one came out perfect with just a little dimple in the
middle. Haven't been able to do it since. I might ought to consider using
a 2x4 instead so I can get a little more room to work on the bottom.

One advantage is that the screws are located in your glue block and if don't
dig into your glue block, you don't catch the screws with your parting tool.
DAMHIKT.

And I use regular Elmer's yellow glue. Having already taken a pretty good
hit in the nose, I'm a little leery of the idea of hot melt glue, paper
glued between the piece and the glue block, and double sided tape. I want a
solid joint there.
--

Steven, age 5, discussing the relative merits of supper and chocolate
milkshakes
"You would understand me better if you were 5 years old."


"william kossack" wrote in message
news
I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to use
for the blocks and what glue to use?

Hello William,

I have enough chucks with a wide enough range of jaws, that I seldom use a glue
block; however, on those occasions when I do, I follow this procedu

1. Mount the wood between centers and turn the outside of the bowl including a
foot making sure that the foot is smooth and sqaure across except for the little
nub where the tail center is located. Do not remove this little nub, you'll want
the center point later.

2. Mount the waste wood, generally a hardwood scrap of some type, onto a
faceplate and true up the surface. Then I turn a recess of 1/16" to 1/8" deep
that the tenon of the bowl will just fit into snuggly.

3. Glue the bowl blank into the waste block with a good glue such as Titebond
II, I've never had a Titebond II glue joint fail so I use it almost exclusively.
On wet wood you will need some other glue, like CA or Gorilla glue.

4. Clamp the bowl to the waste block in the lathe using the tailstock as a
clamp, 24 hours is the safest period to wait, but you can remove the clamp and
set the glued up assembly aside after about an hour, but don't turn for several
hours.

5. If you fitted the tenon on the bowl blank snuggly to the waste block, the
bowl should run true and the outside will only need sanding. Hollow the bowl and
finish the inside.

6. Part off the waste block just enough to free the foot of your bowl.

7. Reverse chuck the bowl to turn the foot. You can use a disk of wood like
plywood mounted to a faceplate as a backing plate. Cut a recess in the disk to
match the rim of your bowl and hold the bowl into the recess with the tail
center. Finish turn the foot. Then use a knife or chisel to pare away the little
center nub. You can use many other forms of reverse chucking as well, but this
is the least expensive and very positive.

Good luck,

Fred Holder
http://www.fholder.com

In article , william kossack says...

I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to
use for the blocks and what glue to use?

wrote in message
oups.com...
Here's a good tip I got a long time ago. Since no matter how you
wiggle, adjust, or threaten you piece if you want to rechuck it, it
will never line up or rebalance correctly. However, I started
numbering with a pencil the corresponding area of the glue block to
match the jaws of my chuck and this has helped a lot. It works too on
your piece if you are not using a glue block.


You using a smooth set of jaws? That's the reason I love my dovetails, in
or out; they _always_ line up properly. If you have 'em use the smooth jaws
and make your tenon or recess just a tad bit bigger than the first point of
circularity on the jaws. They snug and draw real nicely to the reference
face that way.

Last piece I turned from the beech was just a tad small, so I did a triple
shuffle, cutting outside on my pin jaws and making a 50mm tenon, reversing
to hollow, leaving the 25mm hole in the pillar, then reversing again to a
25mm recess, with the piece at its lightest. Pretty much had to, because I
had a couple radial checks that would have been curtains if I had tried to
hollow on the 25 alone.

"william kossack" wrote in message
news
I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to use
for the blocks and what glue to use?

Until I made a screw chuck, a glue block is about all I had used. I use
whatever wood(simple 2 x 4 or 2 x 6 works well) is handy and use a hot glue
gun. Get the larger style (not the tiny one) and get slow setting glue.
Allow the glue gun to warm up ten minutes or so. Otherwise the glue will set
too quick and the bowl or whatever will wobble. Stand to one side of the
blank as you switch the lathe on. If it looks like it is snugly fitting on
the glue block and not bouncing around , start turning.
Good Luck Lyndell

George wrote:

You using a smooth set of jaws? That's the reason I love my
dovetails, in
or out; they _always_ line up properly.

I use pin jaws, dovetail jaws, and extended dovetail jaws on two
different VicMarc chucks I have. Maybe I should have been more
specific about this.

When the piece is off the chuck, depending on how green it is, how
humid it is, what kind of wood it is, etc, etc, the wood will move and
change shape unless it is some kind of kiln dried hardwood. I have had
pieces of persimmon LITERALLY crack open on the lathe from when I went
in for lunch and came back. Same with different other "found woods"
that I turn from swaps at the club meetings.

I almost always turn green wood, and if I am roughing one out and take
if off for a few days, no matter what your drying procedures are, the
wood will move, and it will be out of balance. The drier the wood is,
the less this should be a problem.

Indexing your chuck jaws will give you two things: letting your jaws
find their prevous seating with the parially crushed fibers having an
imprint for jaw faces to follow for alignment purposes, and second, the
opportunity for the jaws to have a similar from the pressure you exert
when tightening the chuck in the existing imprints, rather than cutting
new ones. The old imprints were cut into the wood and they reflect the
density of the wood, etc, which gives the amount of bite you get when
tightening the jaws. Many times a close inspection on some of the
curlier woods I turn will show that one side has deep imprints while
the other has amost none.

That's the reason I love my dovetails, in
or out; they _always_ line up properly. If you have 'em use the smooth
jaws
and make your tenon or recess just a tad bit bigger than the first
point of
circularity on the jaws. They snug and draw real nicely to the
reference
face that way.

Understood. However, I am not talented enough to exert exactly the
same amount of pressure on the chuck key every single time on each
piece of wood. When I started using this chuck I tore a bowl apart
using the dovetails, and twisted tenons beyond usefulness when
tightening overzealously. So the chuck holds just fine whether using a
dovetail recess or a tenon or "spigot".

But my wrists are not sensitive enough to be able to discern from one
day to the next if I am turning at 55:1 or 57:1 to get exactly the same
amount of holding pressure. Sometimes I really clamp down, sometimes I
barely exert enough pressure to hold the piece, other times I just
forget how hard I clamped it.

And as another thought, I think it depends on how accurate you want
things to be in regards to what you are doing. When I am cutting
something small (like the 3/16 ebony inserts on my curly maple
earrings) I want every edge I can get. Even grasping the short tenon I
glue them to can change its balance when off and on the chuck again by
1/32 or so. And with 1/32 off center, that give a total of 1/16
eccentricity which will goof me up if I have already cut the diameter
of the piece to size for use.

When I am turning bowls or vases, I do it as a matter of habit. But if
they have been under the shed for 6 months after roughing out, and for
some of the pieces, just overnight, it really doesn't matter as they
will be plenty out round and balance from drying and the released
tensions in the wood.

But for me, and I do understand YMMV, I will take a second where I can
to help me along a little easier.

I also do the same thing with my faceplates. I have taken a small
metal file and put a notch into the metal so I can line up glue blocks
to near perfect balance when remounting, and for then again, "X" marks
the spot on the project to line up the faceplate when remounting. This
will make a huge difference in getting your piece back on correctly.

Annnnd.... you guessed it. I also do it with my spur drive.
Remounting a spindle turning on the spur is a snap for almost perfect
balance when you put it back on exactly the way it came off.

Just things to think about...

Robert

In article et,
"Lyndell Thompson" wrote:

Until I made a screw chuck, a glue block is about all I had used. I use
whatever wood(simple 2 x 4 or 2 x 6 works well) is handy and use a hot glue
gun. Get the larger style (not the tiny one) and get slow setting glue.
Allow the glue gun to warm up ten minutes or so. Otherwise the glue will set
too quick and the bowl or whatever will wobble. Stand to one side of the
blank as you switch the lathe on. If it looks like it is snugly fitting on
the glue block and not bouncing around , start turning.

OK, I'll join the fray... I use glue blocks and 5-minute epoxy for
smaller pieces, and always when turning stone or bone. You can shoot me,
but I use 8 or 12/4 kiln-dried flat lumber Hard Maple.

As to the hot glue, Ken Bullock, a bowl turner from Canada who used to
frequent the group, melted his hot glue in an electric skillet/fryer.
One can find these at thrift stores and yard sales for a couple bucks -
just drop in a bunch of sticks and let 'em melt. Once the glue is
melted, dip the end of one of the pieces of the wood in the pool of hot
glue and stick it to the other piece. Allow it to cool and off you go.
The advantages of this method are that: it applies a lot of glue all at
once as opposed to running the risk of the first line you run out of the
glue gun cooling before the last line is completed; and it completely
covers the surfaces with an even coating.

As I recall, Ken was using this method for all of his bowls, big and
small.

--
Owen Lowe

Northwest Woodturners
Pacific Northwest Woodturning Guild
___
Tips fer Turnin': Place a sign, easily seen as you switch on your lathe, warning you to remove any and all rings from your fingers. Called degloving, extended hardware can grab your ring and rip it off your finger. A pic for the strong of stomach: www.itim.nsw.gov.au/go/objectid/2A3AC703-1321-1C29-70B067DC88E16BFC/index.cfm

Besides, rings can easily mar the surface of a turning as you check for finished smoothness.

In article ,
"Scratch Ankle" wrote:

One advantage is that the screws are located in your glue block and if don't
dig into your glue block, you don't catch the screws with your parting tool.
DAMHIKT.

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too close a
cut with a tool?

--
Owen Lowe

Northwest Woodturners
Pacific Northwest Woodturning Guild
___
Tips fer Turnin': Place a sign, easily seen as you switch on your lathe, warning you to remove any and all rings from your fingers. Called degloving, extended hardware can grab your ring and rip it off your finger. A pic for the strong of stomach: www.itim.nsw.gov.au/go/objectid/2A3AC703-1321-1C29-70B067DC88E16BFC/index.cfm

Besides, rings can easily mar the surface of a turning as you check for finished smoothness.

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too close
a
cut with a tool?

Sure... absolutely. Just tiny ones, but those haven't happened in a
while since I started adding glue blocks to make a tenon.

But I still get a "tiny nick" now and again from the chuck (not the
other way around!) when I get to watching the tools and the shavings
and not my fingers.

The last "tiny nick" I got was when I was sanding too close to the jaws
and they were opened really wide and I caught my thumbnail in the jaw.
Well... not really. It didn't actually "catch". The jaw just took
off about a third of my thumbnail in one little tick.
Man did that hurt!

But Owen... I WAS degloved! ;^)

Robert

P.S.: Still love that awful pic, and then the additional understated
caution that your ring could "mar" your project surface. Looking at
your pic, how about a bucket of blood on your project?
Youch!

Owen Lowe wrote:

In article ,
"Scratch Ankle" wrote:

One advantage is that the screws are located in your glue block and
if don't dig into your glue block, you don't catch the screws with
your parting tool. DAMHIKT.

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too close
a cut with a tool?


Got a nick in one of my thumbs from getting it too close to the chuck, does
that count?

That's when I put the little rainbow sweat band on it.

wrote:

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too
close a
cut with a tool?

Sure... absolutely. Just tiny ones, but those haven't happened in a
while since I started adding glue blocks to make a tenon.

But I still get a "tiny nick" now and again from the chuck (not the
other way around!) when I get to watching the tools and the shavings
and not my fingers.

The last "tiny nick" I got was when I was sanding too close to the
jaws and they were opened really wide and I caught my thumbnail in
the jaw.
Well... not really. It didn't actually "catch". The jaw just took
off about a third of my thumbnail in one little tick.
Man did that hurt!

But Owen... I WAS degloved! ;^)

Robert

P.S.: Still love that awful pic, and then the additional understated
caution that your ring could "mar" your project surface. Looking at
your pic, how about a bucket of blood on your project?
Youch!



Back when I used to tune all of my own cars, I never considered the
tuneup complete until I had barked one or more knuckles. Or, on the
Chrysler Slant-6, burned myself changing the oil filter from the top.
Then they computerized everything. Now I only bark my knuckles, or worse,
changing the plug on the rototiller - last time it was 5 stitches and a
bloody sweatshirt. 'And this stain right here ...'

wrote in message
ups.com...
I almost always turn green wood, and if I am roughing one out and take
if off for a few days, no matter what your drying procedures are, the
wood will move, and it will be out of balance. The drier the wood is,
the less this should be a problem.

Indexing your chuck jaws will give you two things: letting your jaws
find their prevous seating with the parially crushed fibers having an
imprint for jaw faces to follow for alignment purposes, and second, the
opportunity for the jaws to have a similar from the pressure you exert
when tightening the chuck in the existing imprints, rather than cutting
new ones. The old imprints were cut into the wood and they reflect the
density of the wood, etc, which gives the amount of bite you get when
tightening the jaws. Many times a close inspection on some of the
curlier woods I turn will show that one side has deep imprints while
the other has amost none.

Green wood will move when drying, of course, but there's no need to do
anything more than snug when mounting to jaws, so making the attachment
points a resonable match for them means no imprints, and no problem
determining when they're seated - shake the piece. Makes reasonably dry or
short-term remounts a cinch. A heavy hand hurts here.

As to marking, perhaps I'm lucky, as the jaws are numbered on my chucks,
even the ones I had to fit and number when KMS sent a mismatch, so
circularity guaranteed when installed properly. Not that it's circularity
that primarily counts in referencing. That's primarily a matter of
shoulder. I can remember we used to reference mark work that was mounted to
the old cast faceplates, because they never were quite true on the faces.
The machined ones I have now are, but the cast crap Teknatool furnishes with
the 3000 is little more than a poor joke.

Seems the old Delta dual threads had two leads, and you marked one to know
where to start it on the spindle, too.

one of my reasons for thinking of using glue blocks is to save exotic
wood.

Another is a constant problem of not getting a good tenon angle. I'm
debating getting one of the dovetail chisels to help get the angle right
when I cut a tenon. Any comments on them?

For example, I was turning a chunk of olive wood and the tenon was not
the right angle or size. It popped out of the chuck about 6 times while
turning.

william kossack wrote:
I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to
use for the blocks and what glue to use?

It popped out of the chuck about 6 times while turning.

Now that makes turning exciting!

You can make yourself a little jig to make sure you are cutting the
dovetail correctly in just a minute or two.

Take a handy piece of wood that is about 1/4 inch thick (lath, old
paint stirrer) and cut the angle on it at the end that matches the
dovetail on your chuck. Cut the angle with your jig saw, coping saw,
whatever and fit it perfectly to the jaws, making sure you get the
angle correct as well as the depth to sit on the shoulders of the jaws.
With a large piece, the dovetails will pull it down onto the shoulders
for a more secure fit and as George pointed out, will actually pull it
down snugly onto the chuck.

Now all you have to do is cut the width of the piece to match the
clearance needed on your jaws, probably somewhere around 2/4 of an inch
(check yours) from the tip of jig (outside corner of the dovtail that
corresponds to the outside of your jaws) to the width needed across
this point to get your jaws securely inside the dovetail. You have
your jig.

Depending on how much of the dovetail is going or staying on the final
piece depends on how I cut the dovetail. In this discussion, on a glue
block, you cut the dovetail very quickly with a plain parting tool.
The dovetail tools work OK, but if you are cutting a large dovetail
(like for a bowl) and you have a hard piece of wood you can spend a
long time getting your dovetail cut.

Try this: after trueing up the surface to receive the dovetail, mark
the outside of the dovetail with a pencil on the piece. Choose your
tool - the parting tool, or the DFOT (Darrell Feltmate Oland Tool) and
cut on the inside of your pencil line to the depth of the shoulder on
your new dovetail jig. (I give the edge to the DFOT on this one, but I
use the sharpest one on hand).

Cut out about 2/3 the width needed to get jaw clearance, working your
way towards the center. When you are satisfied and your groove is cut
with a flat bottom, grab your new jig. Hold the jig with tip against
your wood, just like you were going to use it to cut the dovetail.
Take your weapon of choice and set your tool next to it, copying the
angle needed to match the angle on the jig (the angle of your jaws) and
then just push the tool in to cut the angle. This time, cut to the
left of the line, away from the center. Check for angle and depth with
your jig, and when you are satisfied, you are finished.

With a little practice, you will cut perfect dovetails every time.
Then after a while, you probably won't need the jig.

Let me know here if any of this was unclear.

Robert

Disclaimer: This post is in exact reference to turning "a chunk", to
address the poster's exact question. I am aware that many (including
myself) cut very shallow 1/8" or so dovetails on small pieces, or
pieces that are close to balance/true/round. But I also figure in my
case that if we are talking about dovetailing a glue block (or in his
case, "a chunk") that the more holding surface you have, the better off
you are. I have never had a piece come off the lathe that had the full
dovetail cut down to the shoulders.

"Lobby Dosser" wrote in message
news1IBf.2115$AV.942@trnddc07...
wrote:

SNIP .........
Back when I used to tune all of my own cars, I never considered the
tuneup complete until I had barked one or more knuckles. Or, on the
Chrysler Slant-6, burned myself changing the oil filter from the top.
Then they computerized everything. Now I only bark my knuckles, or worse,
changing the plug on the rototiller - last time it was 5 stitches and a
bloody sweatshirt. 'And this stain right here ...'

==========================
LD,
Just remember not to work on the tines while it's running!! {:-)

Ken Moon
Webberville, TX.

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 17:08:29 -0500, "Scratch Ankle"
wrote:


And I use regular Elmer's yellow glue. Having already taken a pretty good
hit in the nose, I'm a little leery of the idea of hot melt glue, paper
glued between the piece and the glue block, and double sided tape. I want a
solid joint there.

I can tell you from long experience that a good bond with yellow glue and
grocery bag paper isn't going to break loose on your lathe... I use a chisel and
mallet to separate the suckers..

Something that's worked well for me is to make my turning block longer than most
are.. by a few inches... that lets me turn the glued portion of the block along
with the bowl and maintain a good shape.form without worrying about hitting the
screws... also, using a steady rest or the tailstock with a friction chuck, you
can turn almost all of the bowl bottom round before you have to part off...

I used to make "multi-stage" glue blocks... a 3/4" plywood round with
countersunk holes so I could bolt it on with the nuts behind the faceplate, and
the "actual" glue block, which was glued between the plywood and the bowl
bottom... the block would be used up on each bowl but the plywood was (and still
is) reusable..
Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 22:57:32 -0800, Owen Lowe wrote:

In article ,
"Scratch Ankle" wrote:

One advantage is that the screws are located in your glue block and if don't
dig into your glue block, you don't catch the screws with your parting tool.
DAMHIKT.

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too close a
cut with a tool?

you use tough tools, dude!!

I get nicks in my tools from the chuck...

OTOH, the outer jaw edges are always nice and shiny from the sanding disk
hitting them.. *g*


Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 01:23:35 GMT, "Lyndell Thompson"
wrote:


"william kossack" wrote in message
news
I talked to a turner recently that always uses glue blocks when turning.

Thinking about it I'm going to give it a try but I wonder what wood to use
for the blocks and what glue to use?

Until I made a screw chuck, a glue block is about all I had used. I use
whatever wood(simple 2 x 4 or 2 x 6 works well) is handy and use a hot glue
gun. Get the larger style (not the tiny one) and get slow setting glue.
Allow the glue gun to warm up ten minutes or so. Otherwise the glue will set
too quick and the bowl or whatever will wobble. Stand to one side of the
blank as you switch the lathe on. If it looks like it is snugly fitting on
the glue block and not bouncing around , start turning.
Good Luck Lyndell


Lyndell... if you like glue guns, I can recommend this one:

http://www.pennstateind.com/store/gg100.html

we liked the one that I got for my wife so much that we got a few extras last
order... hard to beat the speed and ease for $10!
Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

On 24 Jan 2006 22:07:59 -0800, wrote:

George wrote:

You using a smooth set of jaws? That's the reason I love my
dovetails, in
or out; they _always_ line up properly.

I use pin jaws, dovetail jaws, and extended dovetail jaws on two
different VicMarc chucks I have. Maybe I should have been more
specific about this.

When the piece is off the chuck, depending on how green it is, how
humid it is, what kind of wood it is, etc, etc, the wood will move and
change shape unless it is some kind of kiln dried hardwood. I have had
pieces of persimmon LITERALLY crack open on the lathe from when I went
in for lunch and came back. Same with different other "found woods"
that I turn from swaps at the club meetings.

I almost always turn green wood, and if I am roughing one out and take
if off for a few days, no matter what your drying procedures are, the
wood will move, and it will be out of balance. The drier the wood is,
the less this should be a problem.

Indexing your chuck jaws will give you two things: letting your jaws
find their prevous seating with the parially crushed fibers having an
imprint for jaw faces to follow for alignment purposes, and second, the
opportunity for the jaws to have a similar from the pressure you exert
when tightening the chuck in the existing imprints, rather than cutting
new ones. The old imprints were cut into the wood and they reflect the
density of the wood, etc, which gives the amount of bite you get when
tightening the jaws. Many times a close inspection on some of the
curlier woods I turn will show that one side has deep imprints while
the other has amost none.

That's the reason I love my dovetails, in
or out; they _always_ line up properly. If you have 'em use the smooth
jaws
and make your tenon or recess just a tad bit bigger than the first
point of
circularity on the jaws. They snug and draw real nicely to the
reference
face that way.

Understood. However, I am not talented enough to exert exactly the
same amount of pressure on the chuck key every single time on each
piece of wood. When I started using this chuck I tore a bowl apart
using the dovetails, and twisted tenons beyond usefulness when
tightening overzealously. So the chuck holds just fine whether using a
dovetail recess or a tenon or "spigot".

But my wrists are not sensitive enough to be able to discern from one
day to the next if I am turning at 55:1 or 57:1 to get exactly the same
amount of holding pressure. Sometimes I really clamp down, sometimes I
barely exert enough pressure to hold the piece, other times I just
forget how hard I clamped it.

And as another thought, I think it depends on how accurate you want
things to be in regards to what you are doing. When I am cutting
something small (like the 3/16 ebony inserts on my curly maple
earrings) I want every edge I can get. Even grasping the short tenon I
glue them to can change its balance when off and on the chuck again by
1/32 or so. And with 1/32 off center, that give a total of 1/16
eccentricity which will goof me up if I have already cut the diameter
of the piece to size for use.

When I am turning bowls or vases, I do it as a matter of habit. But if
they have been under the shed for 6 months after roughing out, and for
some of the pieces, just overnight, it really doesn't matter as they
will be plenty out round and balance from drying and the released
tensions in the wood.

But for me, and I do understand YMMV, I will take a second where I can
to help me along a little easier.

I also do the same thing with my faceplates. I have taken a small
metal file and put a notch into the metal so I can line up glue blocks
to near perfect balance when remounting, and for then again, "X" marks
the spot on the project to line up the faceplate when remounting. This
will make a huge difference in getting your piece back on correctly.

Annnnd.... you guessed it. I also do it with my spur drive.
Remounting a spindle turning on the spur is a snap for almost perfect
balance when you put it back on exactly the way it came off.

Just things to think about...

Robert

I find that the more green wood I turn, the more I use a tenon instead of a
recess....

Main 2 reasons are that I hate having to true up the recess after the wood has
moved, and on woods that are prone to cracking I'd rather not be helping the
process by applying pressure from the inside out...

One advantage of the recess though, is if the wood has cracked near the recess,
you can mount it on the chuck, open the jaws until the crack expands a bit, use
CA in the crack and remove the pressure from the chuck and clamp it a few
minutes... works well for me..
Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 07:42:28 -0700, william kossack
wrote:

one of my reasons for thinking of using glue blocks is to save exotic
wood.

Another is a constant problem of not getting a good tenon angle. I'm
debating getting one of the dovetail chisels to help get the angle right
when I cut a tenon. Any comments on them?

For example, I was turning a chunk of olive wood and the tenon was not
the right angle or size. It popped out of the chuck about 6 times while
turning.

Maybe taking an old skew or diamond point and grinding it to the angle you need
for your dovetail?

The Oneway chucks use a straight wall and I find that the $13 mini flat box
scraper from Penn State Ind. works great if I just keep it aligned to the bed
rails..
Mac
https://home.comcast.net/~mac.davis/wood_stuff.htm

"william kossack" wrote in message
. ..
one of my reasons for thinking of using glue blocks is to save exotic
wood.

Another is a constant problem of not getting a good tenon angle. I'm
debating getting one of the dovetail chisels to help get the angle right
when I cut a tenon. Any comments on them?

I ground one of those scrapers from my carbon steel tools to do it. I
"sharpen" by running the top flat on sandpaper. Works fine for recesses.
Tenons just work to a cardboard template. Or you can check and see if your
skew's ground at the right angle.

"mac davis" wrote in message
...
I find that the more green wood I turn, the more I use a tenon instead of
a
recess....

Probably because you don't use the pin-chuck / pillar method, which is a
cinch to remount after drying. I like to use all the thickness I can, so
the recess doesn't take away 3/4 of an inch of bowl depth. For the curious,
that is 3/8 for the tenon and about 3/8 to get the circle large enough to
make one.


Main 2 reasons are that I hate having to true up the recess after the wood
has
moved, and on woods that are prone to cracking I'd rather not be helping
the
process by applying pressure from the inside out...


You must be using some exotic woods or angles. Most bowls are cut with the
sapwood on the outside and are under compression both down and in. Only
cracks you should see are those which were there already.

Now if you cut with heartwood downside, 'nother matter.

In article ,
mac davis wrote:

you use tough tools, dude!!

I get nicks in my tools from the chuck...

Well, yeah, that's part of the experience too.

--
Owen Lowe

Northwest Woodturners
Pacific Northwest Woodturning Guild
___
Tips fer Turnin': Place a sign, easily seen as you switch on your lathe, warning you to remove any and all rings from your fingers. Called degloving, extended hardware can grab your ring and rip it off your finger. A pic for the strong of stomach: www.itim.nsw.gov.au/go/objectid/2A3AC703-1321-1C29-70B067DC88E16BFC/index.cfm

Besides, rings can easily mar the surface of a turning as you check for finished smoothness.

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 08:30:44 -0800, mac davis
wrote:

you use tough tools, dude!!

I get nicks in my tools from the chuck...


And I get nicks in Chuck from everything...wood, jaws, tools,
mosquitos


--
Chuck *#:^)
chaz3913(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
Anti-spam sig: please remove "NO SPAM" from e-mail address to reply.


September 11, 2001 - Never Forget

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On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 19:39:09 GMT, (Chuck) wrote:

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 08:30:44 -0800, mac davis
wrote:

you use tough tools, dude!!

I get nicks in my tools from the chuck...


And I get nicks in Chuck from everything...wood, jaws, tools,
mosquitos

face it dude, you're just plain Chucked..


mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:33:49 -0500, "George" George@least wrote:


Main 2 reasons are that I hate having to true up the recess after the wood
has
moved, and on woods that are prone to cracking I'd rather not be helping
the
process by applying pressure from the inside out...


You must be using some exotic woods or angles. Most bowls are cut with the
sapwood on the outside and are under compression both down and in. Only
cracks you should see are those which were there already.

Now if you cut with heartwood downside, 'nother matter.

Actually, a lot of the stuff I've been turning lately has existing cracks that
need to be glued and clamped before I turn them.. others, mostly soft stuff like
pine & fir, need a deeper recess with a thicker wall, which "wastes" more wood
then a tenon..
Then there's the funnel factor... never made a funnel out of one with a tenon..
lol


mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

Owen Lowe wrote:
In article ,
"Scratch Ankle" wrote:

One advantage is that the screws are located in your glue block and if don't
dig into your glue block, you don't catch the screws with your parting tool.
DAMHIKT.

Anyone else here have nicks in their chuck jaws from taking too close a
cut with a tool?

Um, I don't want to talk about it...

....Kevin
g
--
Kevin Miller
http://www.alaska.net/~atftb
Juneau, Alaska
Registered Linux User No: 307357

In article ,
Kevin Miller wrote:

Um, I don't want to talk about it...

It's good to read you and others admitting to having similar nicks,
Kevin - I thought I might be alone in my carelessness. Thankfully I've
never caught the tool in the space between the jaws! ...yet.

--
Owen Lowe

Northwest Woodturners
Pacific Northwest Woodturning Guild
___
Tips fer Turnin': Place a sign, easily seen as you switch on your lathe, warning you to remove any and all rings from your fingers. Called degloving, extended hardware can grab your ring and rip it off your finger. A pic for the strong of stomach: www.itim.nsw.gov.au/go/objectid/2A3AC703-1321-1C29-70B067DC88E16BFC/index.cfm

Besides, rings can easily mar the surface of a turning as you check for finished smoothness.

Owen Lowe wrote:
In article , Kevin Miller
wrote:

Um, I don't want to talk about it...

It's good to read you and others admitting to having similar nicks,
Kevin - I thought I might be alone in my carelessness. Thankfully
I've never caught the tool in the space between the jaws! ...yet.

Don't know that catching a tool between the jaws is really possible. At
normal (for me anyway) speeds the jaws don't present a hole long enough
for much depth penetration. Plenty of time to ensure I have some edge
regrinding to do though!

Anymore it's rare form me to be cutting near the jaws. I usually try to
figure out how to get at the wood w/o being anywhere near them - i.e.,
reversing bowls, leaving extra wood on things mounted between centers,
etc. But there's always that odd time...

....Kevin
--
Kevin Miller
http://www.alaska.net/~atftb
Juneau, Alaska
Registered Linux User No: 307357