Today I started to build my ring lathe attachment.
Pictures will be coming soon. I ordered 1/4" bearing
rod to use for my cutting bits. I wanted solid carbide
but no one was selling any on E-bay. E-bay is my main
store for parts. I'm hoping bearing rod will work.
I also bought 36" of oil harden 1/4" drill rod but that
wont be here till Aug. I have made cutting tools out of
drill rod before.
Does anyone have experience one what is the best wood for making rings?
What wood has the tightest grain of something that wont come flying apart?
Would it be better to cut rings from a cookie or flat cut?
Thanks for any reply's.
Probably most of the hardwoods would have a nice tight grain to them. Had an old woodworker who used multi-ply plywood from Lowes. He didn't complain about tearout and his works were spectacular. Probably used ultra-sharp chisels. You might want to troll the Ringmaster lathe site to see if there are any samples/photos there or one of the woodworking forums. I looked at adding one of those to my 12" lathe and the price is way out of my budget. Also, you could stabilize some wood with wood hardeners and see what that gets you.
There's always going to be an area of short grain no matter how the wood is oriented. If you you used a cookie cut blank it would all be short grain so probably best to avoid that. Burl wood would be interesting and have no particular grain orientation. Dense tight-grained woods like hard maple or exotics like purple heart would work well. Laminating your own blanks could be good and let's you strengthen the short-grain. Savannadan's suggestion about wood hardener is a good idea. CA glue can be used as a hardener and a finish.
You're always making something interesting, K. I'm waiting to see how your piranha turns out. Those are very useful, especially for somebody like you that's always fabricating something.
I found that I had some drill rod hiding away. So I milled some bits.
After trying them I think I need a negative rake. It's kind of grabby.
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This is what I started out with.
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I turned it upside down and mounted a slide flat bar to it.
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Built an arbor for the head stock.
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Bolted a chunk of walnut to it.
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I made a second flat plate slider for the top.
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Tried cutting a couple rings.
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I can see that I need to really change my angle much steeper to get the top ring
to sit right on the lower ring.
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I don't think wood is a good material to use for the crank pulley on an engine. ;)
Shopsmith sold a Ringmaster attachment and have the manual available in a free .pdf download. It has a parts list diagram that could be helpful. To get the rings to stack and match requires a specific angle of cut depending on the thickness of the board blank. For example, a 3/4" blank takes a 22.6 degree cutting angle. This makes rings with a straight tapered side. To make curved sides, Shopsmith has a free video online called Ringmaster 3 Making curved cuts. My unit has two knives, you feed from one side about half the thickness and then reverse the feed and cut off with the other knife eliminating tearout. The manual also shows a glue up jig. My knives were ground from 0.200 square stock to 0.075 thick with about a 5 degree side clearance and 15 degree rake. I have cut soft maple with success. Ringmaster offers a setting jig for different thickness but it's a bit pricey. With some thought and some trig I might figure it out but that requires an attention span longer than mine.
Also, the unit has an index plate to gauge the ring wall thickness to 0.250.
Keep at it, you're doing great.
Also here are the suggested cutting angles for different thicknesses of wood.
1/4" - 51.3 deg
5/16 - 45.2
3/8 - 40.1
7/16 - 36
1/2 - 32
9/16 - 29.1
5/8 - 26.7
11/16 - 24.6
3/4 - 22.6
13/16 - 21
7/8 - 19.7
These are for straight tapered sides.
Cutting curved sides gets more involved, something that I haven't tried yet.
I don't think drill rod or O-1 is the right material for your cutters. It will get hot and loose its edge quickly. Plus it has to be hardened and tempered. I use lots of it, but all for cold work.
A better solution is HSS cutting bars for the metal lathe. It comes 2 1/2" long and a whole range of sizes. I cut the sticks in half to make two cutters. I stock up on it at auctions where it goes for near nothing.
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On the right is a little tool I made to shape cutters. One end is for 3/16" and the other for 1/4". First I shape the cutter portion than reverse the bit in the holder. Put it in a drill and hold to a grinder to round it over to fit. On the left is a hollowing tool with the bit in place. I used to drill and tap the tools for a grub screw to hold the bit in place but I've started using superglue to hold the bit. I was surprised that it worked so well. When the bit gets used up just heat the end and the bit falls out ready for a new one.
Thanks for all the info.
The cutting angles should help me a lot.
Ok.... ?
What am I doing wrong ? I am using 3/4" boards. So the scale say 22.6 degrees.
My ring are not even close to coming out right.
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This was at 22.6.
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This picture is 35 degrees.
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I'm now up to 45 degrees and the rings still don't come out even.
I'll just keep plugging away to I find the magic number.
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The 22.6 set for 3/4 comes from the manual and seems to be very close. The wall thickness as advanced on the index plate is 0.250 + or -. The assembly is mounted on two rods parallel to the wood blank. It looks like you are advancing the cut on the cross slide at an angle. That may not make a difference. I'd have to think about that. Here a two pictures showing the setup.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/13140/20170725_195151.jpg?easyrotate_cache=1501027518)
This is the index plate to advance for ring thickness.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/13140/20170725_195201.jpg?easyrotate_cache=1501027482)
The guide rods are parallel to the work piece and the whole assembly slides toward the arbor. Check the ring sides with a protractor to see how close to 22 angle they are - might be a start.
A protractor is what I was using. The degree on my slide table is saying around 60 degrees when
the protractor is at 22.6. The slide table is marked on both sides and both sides read the same.
This wont be a problem after I find my magic number. I was just wondering why there is such a
difference. If you can cut a ring and your protractor says 22.6 then why is my ring coming out
close at 45 ? I'll let you know tomorrow what my number is for my 3/4" board.
This is the protractor I'm using and the way I'm using it to check.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/39553/angle.jpg?easyrotate_cache=1501033823)
Ok, I dug out the project notebook that came with the lathe. It appears that size does matter. The angles are based on 0.250 wall thickness. I quote from the book:
"The index plate determines the wall thickness and diameter of each ring. This is its primary function. Proper use of the index plate will produce duplicate rings from different species of wood, this permits exact duplication of any shape.
To cut rings with a double thickness wall follow this procedure: Cut two pieces of wood, when cutting the first one you will skip every odd numbered hole on the index plate, cut the second piece of wood skipping every even numbered hole. When you stack the rings, alternate rings from the two pieces of wood. This will yield double thickness rings which will stack perfectly without changing the angle at which you would normally cut that thickness of wood."
I"ll have too sleep on that one.
It took 47 degrees on he protractor to get mine to come out flush.
The slide table said 37 degrees.
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Fantastic. Now the fun begins.
I just watched a video of a young lad who made a round bowl by first making what looked like cutting board halves and then cutting the slices on his bandsaw. He then assembled the rings. Used a forstner bit for the whole in the bottom which made it convenient for his chuck jaws. It was quite a large bowl. He had a mishap with the gouge digging in and broke part of the bowl off. Fortunately it was in the first ring segment and he was able to turn that off and complete the bowl. He didn't say what his dimensions and cutting angle(s) were. He had to move his lathe head stock to the end to accommodate turning a large bowl. Turned out beautiful.
I'd say "bearing rod" will be really brittle. I buy little boxes of High Speed Steel blanks from Harbor Freight for my hollow form cutters. https://www.harborfreight.com/5-piece-m2-high-speed-steel-mini-tool-bits-for-metalworking-lathes-40641.html
Are you heat treating your cutters after milling? If you Google "bowl from a board", you'll get lots of design help.
Quote from: low_48 on July 27, 2017, 12:01:49 AM
I'd say "bearing rod" will be really brittle. I buy little boxes of High Speed Steel blanks from Harbor Freight for my hollow form cutters. https://www.harborfreight.com/5-piece-m2-high-speed-steel-mini-tool-bits-for-metalworking-lathes-40641.html
Are you heat treating your cutters after milling? If you Google "bowl from a board", you'll get lots of design help.
I got my bearing rod. I was very disappointed. It was not as near as hard as the drill rod.
I do heat treat the drill rod after I shape it. So far the drill rod is working good.
I got some HHS steel coming. I will let everyone know how that works.
I'm getting better...
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I found out why the reading was different from my protractor to my slide table.
On the protractor I need to start at 90 and count backwards to get it to read
the same as the slide table. I'm wishing the protractor started at zero in the
middle instead of at the ends. 35 deg. is where I'm now cutting at.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/39553/protractor_2.jpg?easyrotate_cache=1501262135)
Looking great. I have a sycamore that's been down for sometime and hopefully it's spalted and not rotten. I would love to make an urn with some.
Quote from: JV on July 28, 2017, 03:46:25 PM
Looking great. I have a sycamore that's been down for sometime and hopefully it's spalted and not rotten. I would love to make an urn with some.
Don't forget to post us some pictures...
I'm still playing...
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I used an old cans of varnish that I bought. It said on the can opened in May 1989
and was called Damar Varnish. I never heard if it before and it looked and smelled funny.
So I googled it and found that it's special varnish for oil paintings. It turned out OK.
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Looks like you have a good start on Christmas gifts. Have fun.
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Amazing. Do you ever sleep? :)
Quote from: Magicman on August 17, 2017, 09:10:03 AM
Amazing. Do you ever sleep? :)
About 4 hours a night. And that's the truth.
Walnut and Maple...
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Uck.... Sanding....
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Some oil and I bet it will shine.
After reading this thread, I realized an old wooden vase I had was made with the ring method. When I looked inside I could see where the glue was oozing out of the joints. I can't remember what I paid for this thing but I'm sure it was under $10. It needs refinished. Gary
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Looks like He is no longer with us...
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/jconline/obituary.aspx?pid=160396599
A nice write up. I'm honored to have a piece of his work. Thanks for the link. Gary
Obituary is for a Donald O. Haley.
Oops! I am no longer honored! Gary
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Very nice piece. I need to get back on my lathe and do some more.
You're the MAN, K, Nice work
Good work on the lathe and on the wood part too.