Hello everyone!! I’m currently very new to wood turning, I bought a wood lathe about a week ago. I’m innately very ambitious, with that characteristic I was ‘all in’. But I hit a slight problem I didn’t have a chuck nor a live center, nor did i have any proper tools. I STILL have those same problems. Haha. I know I dont necessarily need a chuck or live center. But the problem with that is I have a want to turn smaller pieces of wood. Do anyone have any suggestions, Ideas, options, advice!?… like I said I have little to next to nothing but a bare bones wood lathe. ..the obvious solution would be to purchase these components but I’m in a very difficult financial situation and have little to no funds at the moment. Yes, I’m employed, yes I work extremely hard 6-7 days a week , yes I do what ever it takes to make ends meet! ..again I would greatly appreciate with much gratitude if I could get some good advice, suggestions, options, ideas! Don’t be timid I have a open mind approach to almost everything I encountered! Thank you guys!
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- Thread starter Andrew Adolphson
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Hello everyone!! I’m currently very new to wood turning, I bought a wood lathe about a week ago. I’m innately very ambitious, with that characteristic I was ‘all in’. But I hit a slight problem I didn’t have a chuck nor a live center, nor did i have any proper tools. I STILL have those same problems. Haha. I know I dont necessarily need a chuck or live center. But the problem with that is I have a want to turn smaller pieces of wood. Do anyone have any suggestions, Ideas, options, advice!?… like I said I have little to next to nothing but a bare bones wood lathe. ..the obvious solution would be to purchase these components but I’m in a very difficult financial situation and have little to no funds at the moment. Yes, I’m employed, yes I work extremely hard 6-7 days a week , yes I do what ever it takes to make ends meet! ..again I would greatly appreciate with much gratitude if I could get some good advice, suggestions, options, ideas! Don’t be timid I have a open mind approach to almost everything I encounter!!
Thank you guys again in advance for you time and turning knowledge and wisdom!
Thank you guys again in advance for you time and turning knowledge and wisdom!
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2004
- Messages
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- Location
- Lakeland, Florida
- Website
- www.hockenberywoodturning.com
welcome to what I hope will be a great adventure. Enthusiasm is a key ingredient for success as a turner.
Contact a local chapter of the AAW.
Presque Isle Woodturners are in Erie. chapters Often have resources for new members.
Mentoring etc.
our club occasionally has tools available for members at little or no cost.
Members often loan tools to other members to try.
www.woodturner.org
Contact a local chapter of the AAW.
Presque Isle Woodturners are in Erie. chapters Often have resources for new members.
Mentoring etc.
our club occasionally has tools available for members at little or no cost.
Members often loan tools to other members to try.
Chapter Public Profile
www.woodturner.org
You do need a face plate, chuck or spur drive to turn the work piece in the headstock along with a live center in the tail stock. Any set of turning tools will get you started turning some wood, you can start practicing on some scrap pieces of pine lumber which is easy to turn. When you purchase a lathe it comes with a Morse taper in the headstock and tailstock you need to get the correct accessories to match these bores, the headstock also has a specific size of thread pitch for the face plate and chuck to mount onto your lathe. You need to find the same thread pitch size of face plate and when you order a chuck you need to make sure you get a chuck with that thread pitch or and insert that matches your head stock thread pitch size. Decide what you want to turn on the lathe and get the accessories needed to make those items, you have plenty of time to find other accessories when you need them for other projects when you expand your skill sets.
Welcome to the forum! What make/model lathe did you pick up? Not all lathes are the same size and require different size/pitch threads. Are you wanting to learn to turn spindles, boxes or bowls? Youtube is full of videos for beginners. Most everything I do gets turned by my bowl gouge (bowls) and spindle gouge (for spindles and boxes, outsides). Gouges can be entry level, like a set of (6?) cheapies from harbor freight or single gouges ($100-200 and more). Regardless of what you pick up, cheap or spendy, you must also have a way to sharpen them, Sharpening is an art upon itself. Like mentioned, if you can find a club/mentor, you will be years ahead in your turning. Don't forget about saftey! Pieces of wood flying off the lathe, whether from the gouge - a catch, or wood flying from the lathe due to a multitude of problems. As a minimum, a good mask, dispoable type if you can't afford an expensive face mask/breather system, wood dust can be a bad thing. Along with a face shield, they are not very expensive from hardware stores. Just make sure it's impact resistant. I've been hit in the face by wood, it hurts! No long sleeves or gloves... those chucks can/will grab and will do some damage. You said smaller pieces, you talking pens? I believe that's a different size of gouges/tools. If so, there's lots of pen turners here to help you along as well as youtube. A warning about that, anybody can post a video on there, watch but take what you watch with a grain of salt, don't take it as gospel. Search on here, there are lots of folks (AAW and pro's) that post how-to videos, most I trust to tell you how it safely is.
Welcome aboard. you can do small projects with a faceplate or combo of faceplate and glue block. As to live center you can get some as low as $15 but mind you they are cheaply built. You also might want to look for a local turning club . Sometime you can pick up extra equipment from members or they may know where you can find some cheap.
My first thought is that you should make use of forum member and expert turner Bill Blasic, who also lives in Erie. Look him up on the forum and start a 'conversation'. He writes a lot of tool reviews and he may have some lying around that manufacturers sent him to try out which he'd let you borrow.
I'll second the advice to get a local mentor. I made several false starts over the years until I hooked up with the local AAW Club. I found many people willing to share their talents.
Hello, I bought a wood lathe not too long ago and I’ve been very eager to start turning. I’m looking for turning chisels, I have been able to go out and buy new ones due to my lack of funds at the moment. I’m seeing if anyone has even one or two chisels they don’t use anymore that theyd sell for cheap ! I’d be happy with anything really! I sincerely appreciate everyone’s time thank you!
Find your nearest club. Best source for 'cheap' tools, and mentors.
robo hippy
robo hippy
Bill Blasic lives in your town and has 19 of everything. He writes for turning magazines and the manufacturers send him stuff to try out, so he often has stuff he isn't using. Look him up on here if you don't already know him and ask directly. He's pretty generous. P.S. If you're just starting out, he'd be a terrific mentor.
CraigsList might provide access to some used tools at a decent price. All you need are 2 or 3 tools in your arsenal to get started with turning. You can always add more tools as your needs and skills grow. Ebay also lists used turning tool sets at a bargain on occasion.
An additional avenue which may be worth exploring is to try to identify if there are any cabinetry or other timber based businesses that have offcuts they normally discard which you could use for turning
I live in the Uk. and at one point in time I was able to obtain free wood from a business which made cabinetry for high end hotels in Central London and public buildings It may be worth trying to identify similar companies are based near your location
I was on one occasion also given a small slab of walnut by a friend which had be obtained it from the Bentley motor manufacturer
I live in the Uk. and at one point in time I was able to obtain free wood from a business which made cabinetry for high end hotels in Central London and public buildings It may be worth trying to identify similar companies are based near your location
I was on one occasion also given a small slab of walnut by a friend which had be obtained it from the Bentley motor manufacturer
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