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Balancing wood

John Torchick

John Torchick

Joined
Jan 24, 2010
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Location
Cleveland, Tennessee
OK, good news is that I found a grind that works. Now I'm moving to another piece of wood. I'm having a bit of trouble getting it balanced. It is basically what I would describe as a tri-lobe shape. Have tried at least 6-8 positions on the lathe but get vibration from a bit to a lot. Running at lowest speed for a couple of seconds after a static balance. Using a 60 degree live center in the tailstock and a standard drive center in the headstock- point with four "blades" on it. Need some advice besides get another piece of wood. Thanks.
 
Going to expand on this for clarification. I was putting the piece on the lathe with the end grain at the tailstock/headstock, thinking to turn to round. I took a few minutes and watched Lyle Jamieson's video. He cut a log in half and mounted it with the grain perpendicular to the bed. The cut side was on the headstock and the bark side was on the tailstock. Hope this helps.
 
Bolt the lathe down to the concrete floor, throw some extra bags of sand on the lathe supports, straddle the lathe bed and sit on ways while turning, purchase a bigger lathe, slow the lathe speed down, put some tennis shoes on and chase the lathe around the shop while turning the out of balance piece.

I have an electric chainsaw next to my lathe to cut and trim a large log on the lathe when it is out of balance or has a high point that won't clear the ways. Adapt and overcome is a skill set taught in the military that works in real world situations. You could add weights to the piece or face plate to balance the piece if you don't want to remove wood from the piece to allow the turning.
 
I would like a bigger lathe like an American Beauty but my wife spends our money foolishly on things like food, clothing and shelter. She is safe as I don't have the room for the AB. Our house if built on a wet weather spring so putting holes in the floor aren't an option.
 
John Torchick said:
OK, good news is that I found a grind that works. Now I'm moving to another piece of wood. I'm having a bit of trouble getting it balanced. It is basically what I would describe as a tri-lobe shape. Have tried at least 6-8 positions on the lathe but get vibration from a bit to a lot. Running at lowest speed for a couple of seconds after a static balance. Using a 60 degree live center in the tailstock and a standard drive center in the headstock- point with four "blades" on it. Need some advice besides get another piece of wood. Thanks.
Click to expand...


First if it is a big piece balance for weight. The heavy side will go to the bottom move the tailstock center toward it.
When the piece sort of rotates without one side really dominating it is balanced for weight. Do some roughing to reduce weight. When roughing leave a big space under the tailstock center so it can move around and still leave space to turn your tenon. After removing weight you can either balance the points or if it is really heavy move partway towards balancing the points and remove some more weight.

You can always line up 3 points on the rim or surface of a turning.
Any other point that may be complaner with these 3 is a happy accident because you cannot control lining up more than 3.

In my natural edge bowl from a crotch demo, I show how to line up 3 high spots on the rim so they will be the same height off the table. You can adopt the same process for different forms. fast forward to about 8:10.
The video:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jVoI12Kfug&feature=youtube_gdata
 
Last edited:
hb, I see what you are doing. The tri-lobe shape of the piece would have a big variation in the space between the wood and the rest. Thinking to take the wood back outside, marking it and trimming with the chainsaw to a "sort-of" square shape. Live and learn! BTW, would like to save your video and watch later. Thanks for posting it.
 
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