US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

Fred Holder

>Which wood will work for hand chasing depends upon the threads per inch chaser you are using. For example, hard maple will hold an 8 tpi thread fairly well, but the threads will crumble with a finer thread. If you are making threads for little boxes, however, 8 tpi is a bit course. Normally, chasers with 16 tpi to 20 tpi are commonly used for the normal things that turners make. For this size thread, the woods in America that hold a good thread are: Osage Orange and Desert Ironwood. There may be some others that I just haven't tried.

As you go up in the coarsness of the thread, most of the harder woods will hold a thread.

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

Jorge Castaneda ~ Downeast Maine

>Guy,

I have not turned threads myself, but I have seen threaded boxes and urns made of rock maple, mesquite, persimmon and osage orange.

Jorge

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

RonZ

>I have used maple successfully but I used super thin CA glue as a fortifier, a technique I learned from Bonnie Klein.

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

George Balock

>Guy,

I would probably reccomend Osage Orange also. It is a very hard wood that takes detail well. I would laso think dry honey locust would take a thread.

George

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

George Balock

>BTW Guy are you doing a demo stateside? If so, Where?

George

Re: US woods suitable for hand chasing threads

John Trant (Baltimore/WashDC)

>There are lots of fine grain, hard woods which will take a thread. I have found that mineral oil is critical for forming threads in softer maples like red, silver, and big leaf. Use it just like cutting threads in metal. Cherry works well also. However, I like to add an insert of exotic oil woods for cutting threads in my most formal boxes.

John