https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 9:36:09 AM UTC-5, Greg Guarino wrote:
I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?

I suppose you know.... Got a wood vise? Or find a way to clamp your board vertically, to more easily cut with the saber saw.

Also, might want to make a few/several radial cuts, before rough cutting the arc.

Sonny

On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 1:39:34 PM UTC-4, Leon wrote:
On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

In my case, I will definitely be using a router. I doubt that I could approach the accuracy I'll get with a router with any other method that is currently available to me. The question is should I make a template or make myself a circle jig.

The template I certainly know how to do. I was curious to see if anyone here used a "jig" - as you mention, just a piece of ply with a couple of holes in it. I may give that a shot. Do I understand you correctly that you do not even cut out the curve roughly beforehand? You make the entire cut with the router, getting deeper with each pass? I do have a plunge router, but I had not considered that.

On Tue, 2 Apr 2019 19:43:19 -0700 (PDT), Greg Guarino
wrote:

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 1:39:34 PM UTC-4, Leon wrote:
On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

In my case, I will definitely be using a router. I doubt that I could approach the accuracy I'll get with a router with any other method that is currently available to me. The question is should I make a template or make myself a circle jig.

The template I certainly know how to do. I was curious to see if anyone here used a "jig" - as you mention, just a piece of ply with a couple of holes in it. I may give that a shot. Do I understand you correctly that you do not even cut out the curve roughly beforehand? You make the entire cut with the router, getting deeper with each pass? I do have a plunge router, but I had not considered that.

If you can make a template then why not just cut the curve the same
way you would have cut the template?

Personally if I didn't have the tools I have, I'd make a spline, use
it to draw the curve, rough it out with a jigsaw (or coping saw if I
didn't have a jigsaw), and smooth it down with a sanding spline. This
isn't one of those deals where you have to have absolute precision, as
long as it's a smooth curve nobody's going to notice if it isn't a
perfect arc of a circle.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 10:57:04 PM UTC-4, J. Clarke wrote:
On Tue, 2 Apr 2019 19:43:19 -0700 (PDT), Greg Guarino
wrote:

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 1:39:34 PM UTC-4, Leon wrote:
On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

In my case, I will definitely be using a router. I doubt that I could approach the accuracy I'll get with a router with any other method that is currently available to me. The question is should I make a template or make myself a circle jig.

The template I certainly know how to do. I was curious to see if anyone here used a "jig" - as you mention, just a piece of ply with a couple of holes in it. I may give that a shot. Do I understand you correctly that you do not even cut out the curve roughly beforehand? You make the entire cut with the router, getting deeper with each pass? I do have a plunge router, but I had not considered that.

If you can make a template then why not just cut the curve the same
way you would have cut the template?

You have a point, I guess. When I have done this before I was making multiple identical pieces. I still think I could "fair" a 1/4" MDF template to the curve more easily than 3/4" oak though.

Personally if I didn't have the tools I have, I'd make a spline, use
it to draw the curve, rough it out with a jigsaw (or coping saw if I
didn't have a jigsaw), and smooth it down with a sanding spline. This
isn't one of those deals where you have to have absolute precision, as
long as it's a smooth curve nobody's going to notice if it isn't a
perfect arc of a circle.

On Wed, 3 Apr 2019 04:57:04 -0700 (PDT), Greg Guarino
wrote:

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 10:57:04 PM UTC-4, J. Clarke wrote:
On Tue, 2 Apr 2019 19:43:19 -0700 (PDT), Greg Guarino
wrote:

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 1:39:34 PM UTC-4, Leon wrote:
On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

In my case, I will definitely be using a router. I doubt that I could approach the accuracy I'll get with a router with any other method that is currently available to me. The question is should I make a template or make myself a circle jig.

The template I certainly know how to do. I was curious to see if anyone here used a "jig" - as you mention, just a piece of ply with a couple of holes in it. I may give that a shot. Do I understand you correctly that you do not even cut out the curve roughly beforehand? You make the entire cut with the router, getting deeper with each pass? I do have a plunge router, but I had not considered that.

If you can make a template then why not just cut the curve the same
way you would have cut the template?

You have a point, I guess. When I have done this before I was making multiple identical pieces. I still think I could "fair" a 1/4" MDF template to the curve more easily than 3/4" oak though.

Yes, and when you slip and screw it up, you won't cry as much over
ruined MDF. You can probably repair it well enough to continue using
it as a template, too.

On 4/2/2019 9:43 PM, Greg Guarino wrote:
On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 1:39:34 PM UTC-4, Leon wrote:
On 4/2/2019 9:36 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?


I have a piece of plywood that I attach my router on to and I pivot the
router and plywood piece as you are mentioning. Just make the cut in
3~4 passes.

When I have a ellipse type arc I print the ark at full scale on
Sketchup, tape the pieces together, glue the drawing to the board and
cut out with either a band saw or jig saw. Then smooth with a spindle
sander.

In my case, I will definitely be using a router. I doubt that I could approach the accuracy I'll get with a router with any other method that is currently available to me. The question is should I make a template or make myself a circle jig.

Make a circle jig if your arc has a continuously same radius, IOW not an
ellipse. Sorry if I was unclear on that.




The template I certainly know how to do. I was curious to see if anyone here used a "jig" - as you mention, just a piece of ply with a couple of holes in it. I may give that a shot. Do I understand you correctly that you do not even cut out the curve roughly beforehand? You make the entire cut with the router, getting deeper with each pass? I do have a plunge router, but I had not considered that.

Yex, I do not cut close to the line, I let the router take a full width
cut and go deeper with each pass.

On Wednesday, April 3, 2019 at 11:22:27 AM UTC-4, Leon wrote:


Yex, I do not cut close to the line, I let the router take a full width
cut and go deeper with each pass.

What size bit do you typically use? And another ignorant question: As the bit will have wood on both sides, which direction do you move the router? I'm going to guess that it doesn't matter, but that I should keep it consistent.

On 4/5/2019 6:30 AM, Greg Guarino wrote:
On Wednesday, April 3, 2019 at 11:22:27 AM UTC-4, Leon wrote:


Yex, I do not cut close to the line, I let the router take a full width
cut and go deeper with each pass.

What size bit do you typically use? And another ignorant question: As the bit will have wood on both sides, which direction do you move the router? I'm going to guess that it doesn't matter, but that I should keep it consistent.


IIRC I used a 1/2" bit. I went counter clockwise for a lazy Susan piece
that I did a couple of years ago. In your case I would go clockwise.
You typically want the bit to be cutting away from the piece you want to
keep.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 9:36:09 AM UTC-5, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?
Are you cutting an opening or a table top? How this is approached will be very different, depending on the form. The best thing is the old two nail and a string trick to make the pattern, once you have that refined then transfer, saw and pattern rout. All that assuming you are working on a table top.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 5:02:56 PM UTC-4, Dr. Deb wrote:
On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 9:36:09 AM UTC-5, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?
Are you cutting an opening or a table top? How this is approached will be very different, depending on the form. The best thing is the old two nail and a string trick to make the pattern, once you have that refined then transfer, saw and pattern rout. All that assuming you are working on a table top.

The drawing was in the original post. Here it is:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 7:36:09 AM UTC-7, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

In solid wood, it's easy to kerf near the curve, then... just carve the thing with a wide chisel.
A drawknife is good, too, but chisel is fast, and a spokeshave can finish it just fine.

Minimal tools for this job would be a crosscut saw and wide chisel, and layout is a matter
of string and pencil work. Power tools, while nice, aren't required, unless it were
in plywood; can't chisel that well at all, and the spokeshave will clog badly...

I'd want to consider non-circular curves, too; freeform is a side benefit of leaving
motorized tools shelved.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 6:31:45 PM UTC-4, whit3rd wrote:
On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 7:36:09 AM UTC-7, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

In solid wood, it's easy to kerf near the curve, then... just carve the thing with a wide chisel.
A drawknife is good, too, but chisel is fast, and a spokeshave can finish it just fine.

Minimal tools for this job would be a crosscut saw and wide chisel, and layout is a matter
of string and pencil work. Power tools, while nice, aren't required, unless it were
in plywood; can't chisel that well at all, and the spokeshave will clog badly...

I'd want to consider non-circular curves, too; freeform is a side benefit of leaving
motorized tools shelved.

Wow. I'm afraid that my efforts with chisels would yield a very freeform result indeed. I did however consider non-circular curves (and for that matter, non-curves. Any shape with no concave parts that are smaller than the diameter of my router bit are possible using a template, especially one printed directly from the drawing, as Leon suggested. But I like the simplicity of a true arc.

On Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at 10:36:09 AM UTC-4, Greg Guarino wrote:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdguar...n/photostream/

It will be 34.5" long, with a 32" radius according to Sketchup. I imagine some of you might do it with a band saw and a spindle sander, but that's not an option for me.

I have done pattern routing in the past, with success. But I wonder if with this large a curve it might be easier to whip up a jig with a pivot point 34" from the router bit. I would of course roughly cut out the shape with a sabre saw before routing in either case.

Advice?

How about a long trammel?

Sorry for the lousy image, but the top part of the page might give you
an idea...

https://i.imgur.com/MWhWROV.jpg