--Novice turner here. I'm in the process of making a carriage for a
scale model of an old muzzle loading cannon. I bought the thing at a
swapmeet and it came with a "carriage" made of bandsawn Doug Fir 2x8: a
really ugly thing! I've found plans of gun carriages on the web (best
drawings: USS Constitution) and I'm freelancing one from an agglomeration of
ideas. For the wheels I'm starting by laminating two hunks of 3/4 oak, with
the grain turned 90 deg from one piece to the other, to yield a rough blank
that's 1-1/2" thick and about 3-1/2" dia. I plan to use a compass
to lay out center, i.d., o.d., then bore out the center of each, put each
roughly bandsawn piece on a mandrel and turn them to final o.d. This o.d. will
eventually be 'shod' with a steel 'tire', similar to the ones in this photo:
http://www.buytheworld.com/prod8336-...3_8_Scale.html
--But turning oak, well, my one or two attempts at turning scrap
pieces came out pretty dreadful so I'm curious to learn the do's now that I
seem to have mastered the dont's, heh. If it's more or less an impossible
task I'm thinking I might get more uniform o.d.s by using a sanding disk on
the rotating rough laminations. Any suggestions appreciated!

--
"Steamboat Ed" Haas : There's never a tachikoma
Hacking the Trailing Edge! : around when I need one!
www.nmpproducts.com
---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

It is relatively difficult to turn oak face-plate style. It tends to
splinter, and you'll be hitting the endgrain twice in each revolution...
four times with your plan of laminating the pieces perpendicular to each
other. Oak is much easier to turn between centers, and this is the way it's
used in furniture, etc.



If you want to turn the wheels, carefully cutting them out and sanding them
to size on the lathe sounds like a plan. If you make a circle-cutting jig
for your bandsaw and cut slowly, you can get very close to the finished
size, minimizing the sanding.



You might also want to consider using a router to get your wheels true. A
router with a long baseplate, pinned to the blank through the axle hole,
would cut pretty close circle... but, of course, you'd have to contend with
the changing grain directions as you worked around the circumference.



I'd personally go with the bandsaw/sanding...

"steamer" wrote in message
...
--Novice turner here. I'm in the process of making a carriage for a
scale model of an old muzzle loading cannon. I bought the thing at a
swapmeet and it came with a "carriage" made of bandsawn Doug Fir 2x8: a
really ugly thing! I've found plans of gun carriages on the web (best
drawings: USS Constitution) and I'm freelancing one from an agglomeration
of
ideas. For the wheels I'm starting by laminating two hunks of 3/4 oak,
with
the grain turned 90 deg from one piece to the other, to yield a rough
blank
that's 1-1/2" thick and about 3-1/2" dia. I plan to use a compass
to lay out center, i.d., o.d., then bore out the center of each, put each
roughly bandsawn piece on a mandrel and turn them to final o.d. This o.d.
will
eventually be 'shod' with a steel 'tire', similar to the ones in this
photo:
http://www.buytheworld.com/prod8336-...3_8_Scale.html
--But turning oak, well, my one or two attempts at turning scrap
pieces came out pretty dreadful so I'm curious to learn the do's now that
I
seem to have mastered the dont's, heh. If it's more or less an impossible
task I'm thinking I might get more uniform o.d.s by using a sanding disk
on
the rotating rough laminations. Any suggestions appreciated!

--
"Steamboat Ed" Haas : There's never a tachikoma
Hacking the Trailing Edge! : around when I need one!
www.nmpproducts.com
---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

"Michael Latcha" wrote in message
. ..
It is relatively difficult to turn oak face-plate style. It tends to
splinter, and you'll be hitting the endgrain twice in each revolution...
four times with your plan of laminating the pieces perpendicular to each
other. Oak is much easier to turn between centers, and this is the way
it's used in furniture, etc.
eventually be 'shod' with a steel 'tire', similar to the ones in this
photo:
http://www.buytheworld.com/prod8336-...3_8_Scale.html
--But turning oak, well, my one or two attempts at turning scrap
pieces came out pretty dreadful so I'm curious to learn the do's now that
I
seem to have mastered the dont's, heh.

Of course you turn oak faceplate-style, so far as the edges go, by cutting
across the fibers, not into the grain. You can hurt yourself doing that
kind of cut. Oak allows you to hog thick, finish thin the same as always.
It's the same as turning a bead or parting off a piece in spindle
orientation. Not that you need worry much about smooth if you're going to
sweat iron rims on them. Facing can be done with a scraper, if you care
to, but since you don't really need to be more than close enough to fit the
tire, I'd just peel for perpendicular and close to thickness and let it go.
Not as if the originals were finished, after all. If you're going to smooth
'em, close but over and block plane my choice.

If this isn't to be a turning project, rather a cannon project, I would jig
sand it. Involves the same type of circle jig you use on your bandsaw,
designed to slide up next to a disk or belt sander. Eyeball the cut, sand
to round.

Warning, oak is less than pleasant when it starts to heat, so sand coarse!

Michael - you didn't mention the type of oak you plan to use, but your
ease of turning the oak will be directly related to your skill of
sharpening your bowl gouge. A 3/8th bowl gouge with a sharp fingernail
grind will handle the endgrain just fine. Ride the bevel and don't hog
it. I use a diamond hone to keep a sharp edge as soon as the gouge
seems to run a bit rough.
Good luck!

Michael
Just to piggyback on the message regarding sharpening. A sharp tool makes
all the difference in the world. If you are unsure of your sharpening skills
I reccommend a jig. If you do not have one, come on over to my seb site and
make one. It will take you less time than going to the nearest store and
cost about a couple of bucks if you have bit of scrap plywood handy. I
find it makes all the difference in the world.

--
God bless and safe turning
Darrell Feltmate
Truro, NS, Canada
http://aroundthewoods.com
http://roundopinions.blogspot.com
"hwahl" wrote in message
oups.com...

Michael - you didn't mention the type of oak you plan to use, but your
ease of turning the oak will be directly related to your skill of
sharpening your bowl gouge. A 3/8th bowl gouge with a sharp fingernail
grind will handle the endgrain just fine. Ride the bevel and don't hog
it. I use a diamond hone to keep a sharp edge as soon as the gouge
seems to run a bit rough.
Good luck!

"hwahl" wrote in message
oups.com...

Michael - you didn't mention the type of oak you plan to use, but your
ease of turning the oak will be directly related to your skill of
sharpening your bowl gouge. A 3/8th bowl gouge with a sharp fingernail
grind will handle the endgrain just fine. Ride the bevel and don't hog
it. I use a diamond hone to keep a sharp edge as soon as the gouge
seems to run a bit rough.
Good luck!


The gouge will be departing the new circumference at only one point of
tangency, which means a jig is completely unnecessary. You simply find the
sweet spot and follow it across the toolrest. I might add that it's a lot
easier to use a broader profile gouge than a bowl gouge, because the broader
profile will allow you to brace the gouge nearly perpendicular to the rest.
Most bowl gouge advocates end up resting the gouge more or less beside the
rest to get the same attack profile as the broader radius gouge gives with
much better support. Not that you can't do it with a small radius gouge
held the same as a broad radius, but your sweet spot is correspondingly
smaller, and if the angle of the grind steepens as you depart the nose, as a
lot of jigs are programmed to do, the steeper bevel angle, coupled with the
cylindrical form of the gouge and the human versus mechanical support of the
rest makes it more likely that you can begin end-grain pickup even to the
point of a roll and catch.

Broad gouge with a bit too much nose, but a constant angle grind.
http://personalpages.tds.net/~upgeor...e-to-Shape.jpg

Bowl gouge used as most advocate. Were it not for the shorter wings and the
support of the bright secondary area on the rest, it would be much more
prone to dip and dig.
http://personalpages.tds.net/~upgeor...Bowl-Gouge.jpg

Note that the broader gouge is skewed to the rear and rotated slightly into
the cut to give a broader bevel reference and less ridging. Also examine
the shavings in the first picture, which are thicker at the leading edge of
the cut and feathered thin where the gouge exits the wood, a harbinger of a
smoother surface.

Then there's the additional safety for the turner of being behind the tool,
out of the throw zone with the push versus pull cut.

I'm not sure how turning oak got to be my project, or how I suddenly forgot
how to sharpen a bowl gouge, but here is the original post from Ed Haas with
my original answer... every bit if which I still agree with.

-----------------------------------------------------------

It is relatively difficult to turn oak face-plate style. It tends to
splinter, and you'll be hitting the endgrain twice in each revolution...
four times with your plan of laminating the pieces perpendicular to each
other. Oak is much easier to turn between centers, and this is the way it's
used in furniture, etc.

If you want to turn the wheels, carefully cutting them out and sanding them
to size on the lathe sounds like a plan. If you make a circle-cutting jig
for your bandsaw and cut slowly, you can get very close to the finished
size, minimizing the sanding.

You might also want to consider using a router to get your wheels true. A
router with a long baseplate, pinned to the blank through the axle hole,
would cut pretty close circle... but, of course, you'd have to contend with
the changing grain directions as you worked around the circumference.

I'd personally go with the bandsaw/sanding...

"steamer" wrote in message
...
--Novice turner here. I'm in the process of making a carriage for a
scale model of an old muzzle loading cannon. I bought the thing at a
swapmeet and it came with a "carriage" made of bandsawn Doug Fir 2x8: a
really ugly thing! I've found plans of gun carriages on the web (best
drawings: USS Constitution) and I'm freelancing one from an agglomeration
of
ideas. For the wheels I'm starting by laminating two hunks of 3/4 oak,
with
the grain turned 90 deg from one piece to the other, to yield a rough
blank
that's 1-1/2" thick and about 3-1/2" dia. I plan to use a compass
to lay out center, i.d., o.d., then bore out the center of each, put each
roughly bandsawn piece on a mandrel and turn them to final o.d. This o.d.
will
eventually be 'shod' with a steel 'tire', similar to the ones in this
photo:
http://www.buytheworld.com/prod8336-...3_8_Scale.html
--But turning oak, well, my one or two attempts at turning scrap
pieces came out pretty dreadful so I'm curious to learn the do's now that
I
seem to have mastered the dont's, heh. If it's more or less an impossible
task I'm thinking I might get more uniform o.d.s by using a sanding disk
on
the rotating rough laminations. Any suggestions appreciated!

--
"Steamboat Ed" Haas : There's never a tachikoma
Hacking the Trailing Edge! : around when I need one!
www.nmpproducts.com
---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

Michael
Sorry about that. Just following where the thread had gone.
Bahhh (and other sheepish sounds) :-)

--
God bless and safe turning
Darrell Feltmate
Truro, NS, Canada
http://aroundthewoods.com
http://roundopinions.blogspot.com
"Michael Latcha" wrote in message
...
I'm not sure how turning oak got to be my project, or how I suddenly
forgot
how to sharpen a bowl gouge, but here is the original post from Ed Haas
with
my original answer... every bit if which I still agree with.

-----------------------------------------------------------

It is relatively difficult to turn oak face-plate style. It tends to
splinter, and you'll be hitting the endgrain twice in each revolution...
four times with your plan of laminating the pieces perpendicular to each
other. Oak is much easier to turn between centers, and this is the way
it's
used in furniture, etc.

If you want to turn the wheels, carefully cutting them out and sanding
them
to size on the lathe sounds like a plan. If you make a circle-cutting jig
for your bandsaw and cut slowly, you can get very close to the finished
size, minimizing the sanding.

You might also want to consider using a router to get your wheels true. A
router with a long baseplate, pinned to the blank through the axle hole,
would cut pretty close circle... but, of course, you'd have to contend
with
the changing grain directions as you worked around the circumference.

I'd personally go with the bandsaw/sanding...

"steamer" wrote in message
...
--Novice turner here. I'm in the process of making a carriage for a
scale model of an old muzzle loading cannon. I bought the thing at a
swapmeet and it came with a "carriage" made of bandsawn Doug Fir 2x8: a
really ugly thing! I've found plans of gun carriages on the web (best
drawings: USS Constitution) and I'm freelancing one from an
agglomeration
of
ideas. For the wheels I'm starting by laminating two hunks of 3/4 oak,
with
the grain turned 90 deg from one piece to the other, to yield a rough
blank
that's 1-1/2" thick and about 3-1/2" dia. I plan to use a compass
to lay out center, i.d., o.d., then bore out the center of each, put
each
roughly bandsawn piece on a mandrel and turn them to final o.d. This
o.d.
will
eventually be 'shod' with a steel 'tire', similar to the ones in this
photo:

http://www.buytheworld.com/prod8336-...3_8_Scale.html
--But turning oak, well, my one or two attempts at turning scrap
pieces came out pretty dreadful so I'm curious to learn the do's now
that
I
seem to have mastered the dont's, heh. If it's more or less an
impossible
task I'm thinking I might get more uniform o.d.s by using a sanding disk
on
the rotating rough laminations. Any suggestions appreciated!

--
"Steamboat Ed" Haas : There's never a tachikoma
Hacking the Trailing Edge! : around when I need one!
www.nmpproducts.com
---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---