Because I am cheap!

Re: Because I am cheap!

David Walser

Tom -- Any angle iron isn't the right kind of steel. You can buy tool steels, starting with high-carbon steel on up, but, typically, you'd need the ability to temper and harden the steel. There are some good books on making your own tools available on Amazon. Perhaps someone can chime in with a recommendation.

If all you want is a larger skew, you might see if someone in your club has a large skew (or scraper) gathering dust that they'd be willing to sell. I think more people have bought Alan Lacer skews than actually use them.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Dick Coers

I definitely make some of my own devices like boring bars, but actual chisels is not one of them. I feel it's a false economy if you use the same quality steel. It takes a real effort to cut a tang out of a thick blank. HSS can take a lot of heat, but running a cutoff wheel in it for an hour may not be good. Definitely can't water quench in fear of introducing small fractures. If you buy one without a handle, you aren't paying much for them to put a tang and grind the bevel. If you buy a lesser quality steel, then it will be cheaper. But it won't be the same tool.

Angle iron is not a good choice for a tool rest. More than one turner has gotten a finger trapped in the angle when a tool slips back a little to much while in the wood. Woodcraft sold them for a while, then made an improved model with a piece of acrylic glued in to fill between the two angle iron legs. Not sure if they even sell them any longer.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Dave Belser

I routinely make my own scrapers.

Buy 01 tool steel from any of the common suppliers (MSC, Granger, Enco - there are many). I don't really understand the comments about dificulty cutting a tang or shaping. It's really pretty easy with a proper vertical metal cutting bandsaw. Additional shaping of the tool can be done on your coarse grinder wheel. Do all the shaping before hardening.

I will use a 3/4 X 1/4" blank and not bother with cutting a tang.

Oil quench and you are good to go - no need for annealing, turning tools really don't (shouldn't) take the kind of abuse where brittleness is an issue. Only harden the cutting end and the tang will be fine.

Mind you the largest I've worked with is 1" by 1/4" (or maybe 3/8") and 1/2" X 1/2"

The biggest issue is that you will need a good torch for the oil quench. You can get by with a couple of MAP cans for smaller tools, but it takes a while. Last time I did it I used Acetylene and it was quick and easy. Use a magnet to determine when it's hot enough - the magnet won't stick when it's time to quench.

I do this for scrapers because I can then make them any shape I want.

With all that said, I do agree that for more complicated tool profiles (pretty much anything with a flute) - It's not really worth the effort. Buy un-handled and make your own handles.

A skew is kinda borderline - you can easily make something as good as the cheaper commodity tools that sell for ~ $40 or so. But if you are going big - buy the ready to go steal from someone like Doug Thompson and you will likely be happier in the long run.

There is not a huge amount of savings making your own but there is the satisfaction of doing it and the ability to make exactly the shape or profile you want.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Leo Cuellar

Hi Tom,

Many will disagree, but, if you really want to make the skew, a truck leaf spring isn't too bad a choice for the raw material, the thicker the better, in the 3/8th to 1/2" range. You would be best off if you have access to a plasma cutter for cutting the blank as doing it with an angle grinder can take a while. You will also need access to a forge or large oxy/acetylene torch to take the curve out of the steel, and re-temper. If your nephew is good with a torch, he could cut the blank out with that. You might want to cut some extra blanks in various shapes to make some scrapers if you don't have any. I've also used the leaf spring steel to make a few tool rests as well. It can be a lot of work, but, also kind of fun.

Happy New Year!

Leo

Re: Because I am cheap!

John K Jordan

>>>I also want to make a few tool rests. Thinking of 1 ... out of a 1" bar.

If you mean a 1" round bar I personally wouldn't waste the steel and the time. I highly dislike toolrests with round supports unless they are quite small. I bought a very nicely made modular system from Best Wood Tools with a 3/4" round support and I won't use it. For me it puts the support point for the tool too far from the wood. A 1" round bar would be worse. I made one for one of my mini lathes from 5/8" round and I didn't even like that.

If you were not so cheap you would buy a Robust rest and never look back. Being cheap, you can make one very similar with a 1/4" hardened top rod tack welded to the top of a support. I have one made like this and it's good.

Note that a big round bar might be OK if I liked to turn a lot of huge things.

JKJ

Re: Because I am cheap!

Dick Coers

So if you buy a metal cutting bandsaw and an oxy/acetylene rig, you can make cheaper tools? Sweet!

First leaf spring scraper I made, snapped off

Dick Coers

Luckily no shrapnel. Maybe that influences my feelings of buying quality steel with the proper hardening!

We all need excuses....

Dave Belser

to buy more tools!

Actually I joined a makerspace - it's awesome to have access to tools that I don't necessarily want to own. I'd strongly recommend it.

Regarding the vertical metal bandsaw - You can do everything you need to with a hacksaw, it just takes longer. The first round of scrapers I made I cut and ground by hand. Heated them with two cans of MAP gas.

But your point is correct. If you personally own the tools, you can probably afford to buy turning tools and not make your own.

If you don't own the tools, there is a good chance that someone in your turning club would be happy to help you out.

-D

Re: First leaf spring scraper I made, snapped off

Leo Cuellar

Bummer! Which cutting method did you use to make your blank, and from what make of vehicle?

Currently my blanks come from a late 60's Dodge 1 ton stack. No breakage, but, I have stalled my lathe with them.

Re: Because I am cheap!

John C Lucas

I disagree about the round bar putting the tool too far out. You cant ride on the bevel of the tool so you have to move the tool.rest far enough from the work so the tool.is riding on the shaft. When you do that with a Robust rest for example you will notice that the fulcrum point is exactly the same as the fulcrum point on a 3/4"round bar. I used to think the same thing until i carefullu observed.how ea h tool is used.

A nealing tools after hardeni g is extremely easy.. just stick them i. The oven at 325 degrees for 1/2 hour per quarter in h of thickness and then just tur. The oven off and let it cool. Takes the brittleness out of files or any other steel that has been hardened. Lea es the steel hard enough to hold a keen edge.

Lawn mower blaxes are good steel but can be hard to work unless you have a forge.

Making a skew

John C Lucas

Ive made.a.bunch of skews over the years. Quite easy to make with high Carbon steel. The problem is even when properly heat treated it just doesnt hold an edge that long. The best thing is to buy pre hardened High Speed Steel but then the problem is shaping hardened steel. For my money i would purchase an unhandled.skew from Doug Thompson. Seems expensive at first but you will use that tool for many many years maki g it well worth the money.

Re: Because I am cheap!

John K Jordan

>>>I disagree about the round bar putting the tool too far out.

I'll bring you my modular Best Wood Tools 3/4" bars then if you can use them. They are very well made, of course.

He said he was going to make the tool rest from 1" bar. I think the usefulness depends on what you turn. I wouldn't want to use a 1" round bar for detail on a top using a 1/4" spindle gouge.

To me, one big advantage of the Robust rest, especially the low profile models, is fitting my left hand and fingers in the curve close to the support bar. A student here found she could slide her left forearm in the 14" Robust rest for good control when cutting the wings on a squarish platter.

This shows just the top of the short tool rest I used for years for small things. It would be extremely easy to make - It's just a flat on a piece of 1/2" thick steel welded at a slight angle to a tool post rod.

Dick, I bought a plasma cutter to save cutting with the oxy/acetylene although the torch is still great for heating for bending (or cutting through a railroad rail).

As for cutting flat steel, one of my favorite methods is to use a Milwaukee bimetal blade in a reciprocating saw - it's amazing how well that blade cuts angle iron and steel plate.

The reasons I see for making tools are to get special tools that can't be bought (like maybe a 6" wide skew), having no tool budget, or just wanting to make it yourself (a great reason!). I too recommended earlier (maybe it was on the other forum) to just buy an unhandled skew and turn happily ever after. Someone on another forum recommend buying a big scraper (Benjamin's Best or something) and grinding it into a skew. $20 will get a scraper with a handle already attached.

JKJ

Re: Because I am cheap!

John C Lucas

My low profile Robust rest stays on my lathe. My second favorite is a 5/8 x 9 inch offset estwoodtools round rest. Being round and offset i can rotate the rest 180 degrees which is handy to ha e either the short end or the long end exactly where you need it. Cant do that with other style rests.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Keith Newton

JK, do you need a 6" skew? Back in the old days when shop auctions were attended by other shop owners, rather than online, I would sometimes pick up piles of boxes of bevel edge shaper steel. Sometimes there would be odds and ends of other stuff mixed in. Somewhere out in my shop, there is a pretty good assortment of knife steel that I doubt I'll ever get around to using. While I don't have a long piece 6" wide, I've got half that. One piece I found is 5/16 x 3 x 10", marked Detroit Edge Tool company.

I'd like to know how or why anyone would need a skew that wide!?

Re: Because I am cheap!

John K Jordan

>>>JK, do you need a 6" skew? ... One piece I found is 5/16 x 3 x 10", marked Detroit Edge Tool company. I'd like to know how or why anyone would need a skew that wide!?

No, I don't need a 6" wide skew, I made that up as one reason to make a tool from scratch. It would be fun however to pull one out during a skew demo! John Lucas used an axe as a skew in a demo and it was entertaining.

Now a 3" skew would be handy for the occasional large diameter cylinder. I turned down a 5" cylinder to make a big cylinder/skew mockup for teaching and I had to stay alert using my widest skew at the time, a 1". (curved grind is better than straight grind for this) The mockup is great - I made wooden skew blade out of a 3" wide piece of wood and the combo is especially good for showing the bevel position and edge clearance needed when cutting deep v-grooves.

If you want to sell that 3" wide piece send me an email.

I just bought some 1.5" x 1/8" x 18" lengths of O1 steel (ground) to try my hand at making hand scrapers similar to the StewMac scrapers but different shapes. I've been using the StewMac scrapers more lately and can recommend them but man are they expensive: http://www.stewmac.com/Luthier_Tools/Types_of_Tools/Scrapers/StewMac_Ultimate_Scraper.html

The cost of the steel to make one is about 1/10th as much, less than $3. I'm going to try cutting shapes out with the plasma cutter, machine a bit, grind, then heat treat.

JKJ

Re: Because I am cheap!

Don Orr

Me Too! You have a lot of great suggestions on making your own skew so I'll let that be.

As for tool rests, I have made a few myself. I did several for our club's Jet mini lathes when the originals went missing. I used 3/4" square stock welded to 5/8" round stock with a corner of the square facing up for the tool to ride on. Just regular hot rolled steel available at many hardware dealers. Simple welding job which is good because I am no expert. I have a small MIG welder and it worked well. Ground the steel clean, good joint prep, preheat and Bob's your uncle. I have also done some out of 1" round stock for my big lathe and they work fine as well. Little welder did just fine for a unit that says it maxes out at 1/4". I'm not doing structural welding here. I have no problem with round bar tool rests like John L. My favorite and most used tool rest is made from 3/8" thick x 1.5" wide bar welded to 1" cold rolled rod at about a 45 deg. angle. The post is about an inch off center on the bar and is about 9" long. I also did one recently with a longer post for our club PM 3520B. Great fun and satisfaction to fabricate your own accessories. Give it a shot.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Jorge

Big skews are seldom used, they are nice to learn initially, but in real turner's life a 3/4" or a 1/2" are the to go to it.

My 1/2" is one of the most used tools in my stable.

Re: Because I am cheap!

Dennis in Southern Oregon

You could use it to peel 6” veneer!