Holzapfel lathe vs everything else

[Curt George]

Hello everyone.
As I see it the Holzapfel lathe is the grand farther to all the OT world. even though it is more like a modern steel lathe then , a wood lathe that we know of today.

I own a Legacy Ornamental Mill, (its more or less a router lathe.) It works along the same lines as the Holzapfel lathe, except it uses a router to cut the wood vs/instead of a universal cutting frame , that you see on most OT equipment.

Since I want to compare apple to apples. (so to speak) I would like to know more about the jigs and tools that made the Holtz. lathe the King of the OT world.
Most of the articles that I can find are about the Rose engine lathe. I own 4 of the Holtz. books and have tried to read them all but, if I'm 100% honest, the old English is hard to read, and even harder to understand.
CAN anyone point the way to a source , that I can see and learn form. so I can become a better OT/wood turner?

C.A.G.

P.S. Here are a few pix. of some of my works.

 

[RichColvin]

Curt,

I had a similarly tough time getting started with ornamental turning. That is why I documented what I leaned in the Ornamental Turning Book of Knowledge and have made it available to anyone for free with no ads. That was transferred to the Ornamental Turners Int’l and can be accessed at OrnamentalTurners.info (or https://ornamentalturners.com/wiki/index.php).

On that site is a listing of some great books for ornamental turner (click on Books). I can highly recommend Ornamental Turnery, by Frank Knox. It was written in 1986 so it is very recent and much more readable. Also quite good is Woodturning Wizardry, by T.D. Walshaw. That is also relatively recent, having been written in 1990.

If you want to better understand the Holtzapffel lathes, check out the Plumier Foundation (https://plumier.org/) and John Edward’s web site (http://www.ornamentalturning.co.uk/). Interesting enough: of the ~1,200 lathes which the Holtzapffel company made, only 20 were rose engines.

Rich

 

[Curt George]

Wow! Thank you for all the INFO.
I have talked to John Edwards in the past. Very nice man. I check the Plumier foundation often. but much of your posting is new to me.
Again Thank you.
Hope to talk to you more latter.

C.A.G.

 

[George Stefureac]

Hello Curt,
I live in Brighton just down he road. I recently joined this AAW and came across your post. I owned a few OT lathes. Holstzapffel was and is the most popular but other names Fenn, Evans are equally as good pending on the accessories that came with the lathe. I think Holtz. is popular because the number of their production numbers. I have a Holtzapffel Pedigree by warren ogden you could borrow if interested. The pedigree shows all of the lathes (by number) that Holtzapffel made.

George

 

[Curt George]

Hello George.
Brighton MI? (Wow! what I small world!)
I would very much like to see your lathes if possible.
my E-mail address is curt.george@yahoo.com
It would be very nice to have some more correspondence outside a forum setting.
Thank you .

Happy Thanksgiving.

C.A.G.

 

[Curt George]

These are a few of my Bone (cow bone) handles that I have been making. I would very much like to talk shop.
Have a Great day.
THANKS of your note.
C.A.G.

 

[Pete Boa]

A couple of years late Curt, but there's a machine tool website probably few North American wood workers might know about since it's in the UK. Third column from the left, scroll down until you hit Ornamental Turning. https://www.lathes.co.uk/page21.html There's 9 manufacturers besides the modern MADE Lathe. And some small lathes that aren't for OT. Instrument, clock and watch making are likely and at least loosely intertwined with OT, methods, techniques and equipment with at least some transfers of there individual technology between all of them. Some manufacturers on that website have more than one page and further information about accessories at the bottom of the page. Almost for sure there's many others and western Europe especially that are not shown because the website consists of mostly private owner pictures and information submissions. The London Science Museum also has online pictures of Ornamental Turning lathes and accessories. But imo, not as well documented as they should be.

For any here that might not already know of it? I'd think Holtzapffels most famous piece might be this one. https://collection.sciencemuseumgro.../one-ivory-gothic-clock-tower-travelling-case But Holtzapffel and a few others were late comers to OT since the craft can be dated to at least the early 1500's. Almost without question he was the most successful, well known and prolific of the OT lathe manufacturers. From my perspective, probably the largest advancements in OT lathes and the more complex accessories were due to the continuous technological, machine tool accuracy and improvements over the Industrial Revolution. And finally having the ability to plane or shape almost perfectly flat metal surfaces with a single point tool, combined with Henry Maudslay's invention of the screw cutting lathe around the same time he opened his OT lathe business were maybe the largest two? The vastly better metal production methods, casting and metal purity also helped. Holtszapffel and a few other OT lathe manufacturer's were lucky enough to be in business at the right place and at the right time.