Discussion - Future of Woodturning Tools & Directions

[Scott]

I was having a discussion with a prominent business the other day about how we (woodturners) achieve the end results using the tools at our disposal. I had noticed an emergence of tungsten tipped tools and wondered if these type of tools were going to replace the more traditional woodturning tool, i.e. gouges and skews. Does it matter how we achieve the end result using whatever tool at our disposal?

[I_wanna_Shed]

Good question Scott, I'm sure you will get a varied amount of responses.

My point of view is this, and I apply it to all forms of woodworking:

My time is very limited. Between work and commuting, uni study, working after hours, and early next year our first baby - my time for 'things I want to do' is extremely limited. Unfortunately I don't have much time for the shed. With this in mind, when I do get the time I want to get in there, make what I want, and get out.

Don't get me wrong, I love spending the time thinking, designing, making jigs, etc, but if there is a quicker way to do something, I want to do it. As an example, a Domino let me build a few things that had been 'on hold' for years. Similiar to what Scott has put down, this is by no means a 'traditional' tool or joint, but it let me finish some projects which otherwise would still be in pieces.

I respect people who have the time and skill to master hand tools and hand cut joinery, and good on them. But it ain't for me at this stage.

Look at it this way. Having a non-traditional tool allowed me to finish some projects, and ultimately retain my interest in woodwork. If it wasn't for this, I may well could have stopped woodworking all together and taken up another hobby. Instead, I will continue on with this while at the same time can feel my desire for traditional tools building. From this view, its keeping me in the hobby, and I'm sure modern tools such as the tungsten bit turning tools will attract a whole heap of people into the hobby and industry - good for everyone.

Nathan.

[brendan stemp]

It's a bit like the internal combustion engine that fundamentally hasn't altered in design for over 100 years. Turning tools haven't changed much over the centuries, with the only significant advancement being with HSS. I can't see the TC being much of an alternative. Sure, there have been some inroads made into TC turning tools but they simply aren't as good as HSS for most turning applications. I have a few TC tools but only use then on really hard stuff. From my reading you cant get as keen an edge on TC compared to HSS so HSS will be the choice of most turners, given where metal technology is at, for a while to come.

[BobL]

I agree with BS, I simply can't see TC tools making even as much difference to Turning as HSS tool made over carbon steels.

[chuck1]

I think with most trends the tungsten will take off, I used to work in a woodturning factory we had a shop with tools etc and the boss taught lesson on weekends. some students would see the arsenal of chisels gouge and scrapers we had on the wall in workshop and they would want to buy exactly what we had! I tried to explain that they were better off waiting to see what they were making at home before spending $ 1000's as some of our collection were for one off jobs that we might not use again but they saw we had one and so should they!
having said that I am looking into getting some or at least 1 tungsten tool soon for bowl work and deep hollowing still weighting up am I going to use it enough to warrant the purchase!
when it comes to between Centre turning thought 9.5 times out of 10 ill do it with my old faithful HSS kit of skew chisels and gouges!

[RETIRED]

I was having a discussion with a prominent business the other day about how we (woodturners) achieve the end results using the tools at our disposal. I had noticed an emergence of tungsten tipped tools and wondered if these type of tools were going to replace the more traditional woodturning tool, i.e. gouges and skews. Does it matter how we achieve the end result using whatever tool at our disposal?
Depends on whether you want to be a Woodturner or patternmaker?:wink:

[Skew ChiDAMN!!]

TC works well for scrapers, but I don't believe it has any advantages (instead I believe it has disadvantages) when it comes to cutting tools such as gouges, skews, etc.

Furthermore, while HSS made for major improvements in both cutting AND scraping tools when compared to carbon steel, we still have a variety of gouges, scrapers, skews etc. rather than a "one tool does all." And for some jobs I still prefer a good quality CS gouge to modern HSS, such as for finishing cuts! :rolleyes:

So, I seriously doubt that TC will replace existing tools... instead it's just another string in our bow when it comes to choosing the right tool for the job at hand.

[Scott]

Depends on whether you want to be a Woodturner or patternmaker?:wink:

I only wanted to provoke a discussion, but if you could explain, that'd be great ;)

[RETIRED]

Skew pretty well summed it up.

At the moment Carbide is only used to make tools that scrape (hence pattern makers) but that could change.

It took woodturners 40-50 years after metal turners had used them to adopt HSS tools.

As for not being as sharp as HSS or HC that is debatable, as each can be sharpened to the same level but they take longer with more specialised equipment to achieve the edge.

[powderpost]

AS a tradesman carpenter of a bit ago, all my tools had handles. Now days all the carpenter's tools have triggers. Could this possibly happen to turning? Automatic and copy lathes did change the hand turning trade, so who knows what is in the future. Where will the silicon chip take wood turning? :oo:

Jim

[FenceFurniture]

AS a tradesman carpenter of a bit ago, all my tools had handles. Now days all the carpenter's tools have triggers. Could this possibly happen to turning? Automatic and copy lathes did change the hand turning trade, so who knows what is in the future. Where will the silicon chip take wood turning? :oo:

JimBut there's be a much higher ratio of Pro:amateur capenters than the same for woodturners (i.e. trigger demand for carpenters would be much higher than for turners)

[Paul39]

I do mostly bowls, and tool handles for my own use. The best finish comes from a slicing action rather than a scraping action. Until the carbide tools are changed to have strength while ground very thin, as in a skew or spindle gouge, The high speed steel and powder metal tools will have the advantage. The unsupported thin edge breaks off.

I have an Easy Finisher with the round carbide tip that I use for hollowing while I support the bowl with the tail center. I can run the round tip from the bottom up the side to the rim while holding the tool parallel to the bed.

It is a scraper, and gives a rougher finish than a bowl gouge. I have been resharpening the "never needs sharpening" tip for about two years on a diamond plate. It does make a significant difference.

After pulling the tail center back and turning off the spigot I finish the bowl with a bowl gouge or a spindle gouge rolled over on its side to slice off the timber as a skew does on a spindle.

On some recent growth dry black walnut, the Easy Finisher made two quadrants of smooth and two quadrants of 1/4 inch furry grain. On dry locust, which approaches some of your hard AU timber, it is smoother all around. On softer timber it is fur all around.

I have some old carbon steel tools, that when freshly sharpened and honed make cleaner finishing cuts than anything else I have. Crown, Thompson, Henry Taylor, etc. Of course they stay razor sharp for a shorter time than the high speed steels.

[robo hippy]

Okay, I love scrapers. I have been experimenting with the Tantung and Stellite materials. Both can be sharpened on standard grinding wheels, and have much better edge durability than HSS or even the V10 steels. Scrapers, like gouges can do both scraping and shear cuts. That depends mostly on the nose profile. Square nose is very difficult to get a shear cut with, but more ( or C nose, and you can do a bevel rubbing shear cut, or shear scrape. The Tantung has been around for a long time in the woodturning world. Just not well known, but it does an excellent job on Myrtle (california bay laurel) which has interlocking grain, and is rather abrasive. Who knows, I may get more scraper converts.....

robo hippy

[Paul39]

Robo,

I have rolled the Easy Finisher over to about a 45 degree angle and done some shear scraping with it. It is makes a much smoother surface, but is hard to control as there is only the corner of the square shaft on the tool rest.

Someone makes one with the tungsten carbide tip mounted at a 45 at the end of a square shaft so the flat sits on the rest.

I use the two Bedan looking scrapers below for hollowing also. I have a bunch of various home made and acquired tools that are used interchangeably. The smaller was a concrete form stake, the larger a blacksmith made a heavy bench chisel from a square file that I ground for my purposes.

280017280018

[robo hippy]

Doug Thompson makes a 'fluteless' gouge, which is half round bar stock. If the carbide tipped, and my tantung and stellite scrapers were on the half round stock, they would work much better as shear scrape tools. I do put a 1/4 round edge on the bottoms of all my scrapers. I am not sure how the half round tools would work for straight scrapers. Fine I guess if you are plunging straight in, but if you are using one edge, they may not work as well.

robo hippy

[oreos40]

ok at first when RH said something about being a turner or a paternmaker I thought that this would open up as a discussion around what tools make a turner a turner and the use of tools that make them not a turner. I am not a traditional turner. I guess I use something more along the lines of a pattern makers lathe. I have however done some exploring in the area of cutting tools. I have been useing carbide cutting tools for over thirty years along with the HSS tooling. Most of the tools available for wood turners in carbide are designed to be scrapers. If they were designed to cut they would be hard to control when turning by hand. I use inserts that are ground for cutting aluminum. They have a relief angle on the back and a dead sharp edge with a chip relief behind the edge as well. I am not saying that cutting with these tools would be impossible to do without a catch but it takes a totally different technique. They will self feed extremely easily. Most of the standard inserts actually have what is called a hone on the edge, blunting the cutting edge to keep it from chipping although this works for metals it wont work with wood. it is true that the grain structure of carbide prevents it from being sharpened to as fine an edge as HSS, but it does function just fine for cutting wood.

[robo hippy]

The carbide materials have changed a lot in the last several years. This new 'micro grained' or 'nano grained' material seems to have the ability to get as sharp as any other steel or cutting material. Problem for cheap guys like me is that it is difficult to sharpen it.

robo hippy

[oreos40]

this is one of the points I was trying to make what is the sharpest possible is a long way passed what most consider sharp The grain of hss is one tenth the size of what the finest grain carbide is capable of today. I would venture to say though that most aren't getting a 1UM edge on their HSS tools. in a comparison even with the proper wheels to sharpen the carbide I think it would be found that the "sharpness" of the edge on either tool would be comparable, as would be the cut.

[rsser]

Great question Scott.

I hang around on forums devoted to other recreations (motorbikes, XC skiing) and some are dominated by gear questions, esp US ones. And the main assumption is that the next innovation will transform their experience.

While I reckon with gear you should buy well and cry once, after that there's a law of diminishing returns.

A basic kit of HSS tools is clearly good enough even for professionals. Recently read a US article written by a production turner who made a living doing spindle pieces with scraping only tools.

I'd like to see a TCT tip that emulated a scraper in dimensions; ie. 6mm or more in thickness and maybe 19mm wide. That could be used in cutting mode (as per a scraper with a ticketed/rolled edge but with less maintenance needed). Expect it would cost a bomb but new-material grind wheels would bring it into the realm of the maintainable.

[robo hippy]

rsser,
What you are describing is known locally as 'The Big Ugly' tool. It has been used by the Oregon Coastal myrtle (california bay laurel) turners for so long, even the old timers (some over 80 years old) don't know who started using them. The traditional tool is 3/4 inch bar stock about 30 inches long. On each end is a cutter of tantung steel, 7/8 inch wide by 1/8 thick and about 3 inches long. It is silver soldered onto the steel bar. One of the guys in the club is helping me do the soldering and he said the new flux material is lousy because of no lead rules. He puts brazing on both pieces of metal (bar and tantung) then brazes them together as you can't flow the brazing compound like the silver sloder. I am not sure about all the technical stuff here because the only thing I can do with metal is grind it. One end of the Big Ugly, is more finger nail grind, and the other end is more ) grind. Sharpen in the morning, turn till lunch time, sharpen again after lunch. Turn till beer-thirty (closing time). Myrtle is fairly abrasive and has inter locking grain. Oh, you wear a heavy leather glove on your 'handle' hand. I have one, and the square bar stock is pretty tipsy if you use it on edge. I make mine from 1 inch by 3/8 inch stock, and 3/4 inch wide by 5/16 inch thick bar stock. This is much more stable. I don't think you can ticket a burr on it, but this stuff sharpens really well on standard aluminum oxide wheels. The tantung comes in 6 inch long strips, and the 1 inch wide strips are about $60. You will get far more mileage out of this $ amount than you will out of a comparable $ amount of the carbide cutters. It does need some support under the cutting edge as the material is fairly brittle. We were talking about the Tantung a year or so ago. Stellite is another comparable material and is the cutter on the Woodcut Coring tool. I have one piece of stellite that I put on some bar stock using JB Weld, a 2 part epoxy that is made for gluing metal to metal, well, for gluing just about anything to anything else. I have yet to fit it to a handle. I should have another You Tube clip up in a few weeks about the fluteless gouge that Doug Thompson makes and I love, and I show one picture of it in there, and will do a story about it eventually.

robo hippy

[robo hippy]

I guess I should have added here that this is a DIY (do it yourself) tool, and from what it would cost to produce them for sale, probably not worth it to manufacture as most would probably prefer to make their own. Probably part of the reason why it is called the Big Ugly. It ain't pretty, but it works.

robo hippy

[NeilS]

At the moment Carbide is only used to make tools that scrape (hence pattern makers) but that could change.



When I look at my brother-in-law's pattern making toolkit his turning tools are almost all negative rake scrapers (http://www.woodworkforums.com/f8/negative-rake-scrapers-131416/). That's the way the trade is/was taught. Precise dimensions, not surface finish, is their aim.

As and others has pointed out, when woodturners use carbide inserts they usually use them in scraping mode. However, the tips can be used in cutting mode, as can be seen when they are used on, for example, cutter heads (http://www.woodmastertools.com/spiral_heads).

I have experimented with using carbide inserts in cutting mode (ie with bevel rubbing) and they work as expected, like a small skew. That's OK if you are spindle turning.

Most bowl turners (until RH converts them) prefer to use a bowl gouge in cutting mode and what they need is a cutting edge formed by a flute profile. As yet carbide tips haven't been readily or economically available in such profiles. I expect this is partly to do with the challenges of pressing and then grinding/polishing the flutes on such profiles, and the high cost of developing the technology to do this weighed up against the relative small volume demand for such a product. Unlike surgical applications of this technology (eg (http://hhco-store.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1259)), I don't expect to see such profiles in carbide at a cost that would be attractive to most woodturners any time soon.

The same probably applies to tantung.

[artful bodger]

Does it matter how we achieve the end result using whatever tool at our disposal?[/QUOTE]

For the sake of argument it does not matter at all, if end result is what we are judging it by. Having said that though, you wouldn't mow the lawn with a pair of scissors?

[rsser]

Thanks Reed for the post about tantung. New to me and good to learn about.

[hughie]

I make the odd tool now and then and have been in the engineering side of things for many years. What I have noticed is that the wood-side of things is way behind engineering by a few decades, although its catching up.

As to the future of wood turning it will go on as it has done for 100's of years if not more absorbing technology as it goes along. As for tungsten and all its derivatives and there are very many. Many of the new fine grade super hard alloys will make it into the wood turning area as they are discovered by woodies as we have seen in the past few years.

To date I have used and use some of these fine grade alloys and the edges to great success on all manner of Aussie hardwoods. OK as Reed has pointed out re-sharpening is not so easy as HSS. But with the arrival of more sophisticated grinding wheels like CBN we can now sharpen our own.

So from my point of view the finer grades work well and the tips are not expensive when you consider the longevity of them.

Tantung [in Australia and I don't know what its made out of ] here is very expensive and it would be best bought direct from the supplier. It is good and holds an edge like you wouldn't believe for along time. Looks much like a standard chunk of HSS and sharpens the same way.

[robo hippy]

I know Tantung is a cast metal, and a bit on the brittle side. Not sure beyond that. I do have grinding skills, but not much metal knowledge beyond that. I shall have to ask after the Stellite to find out more about it.

robo hippy

[jimbur]

It will be a slow process I reckon. I read in one magazine that most turners still have some CS tools and you can pick them out as they don't have dust on them.:D

[Paul39]

I fount this:

Tool Materials - Google Books (http://books.google.com/books?id=Kws7x68r_aUC&pg=PA33&lpg=PA33&dq=composition+of+tantung&source=bl&ots=sGt7s_M4XP&sig=jVOV-4Cr1A8KXDBCWGfYpL32_vo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=dT4MUuTlL4b42AWms4HIBQ&ved=0CDoQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=composition%20of%20tantung&f=false)

Cast Alloy Lathe Tools (http://conradhoffman.com/stellite.htm)

Part of a discussion with Robo Hippy and others from last year:

What is Tantung (copied from a web-site) (http://www.woodcentral.com/woodworking/forum/archives_turning.pl/bid/2001/md/read/id/453194/sbj/what-is-tantung-copied-from-a-web-site/)

I pick up wood of the curb for fire wood and turning. I cut up a lot of lumber with nails, dirt, etc. and dull carbide tipped blades. Just for fun I resharpened one on the white aluminum oxide wheel that I use for lathe tools. It worked OK for my purposes.

One can buy a "green wheel" for sharpening tungsten carbide tools, not too expensive. See:

Amazon.com: 6" Green Grinding Wheel For Sharpening Stump Cutter Teeth: Sports & Outdoors (http://www.amazon.com/Green-Grinding-Wheel-Sharpening-Cutter/dp/B00455WXEC)

I think a good saw shop that does replacement teeth on saw blades could braze a slab of carbide on to a hunk of steel that could be ground to a scraper or bedan tool.

One can buy brazed carbide tooling that looks like this:

http://www.solarbotics.com/assets/images/3006/3006pic_pl.jpg

and use as is or grind to taste. They could be mounted in a piece of pipe & held with a set screw or brazed or even soft soldered.

I bought several of the bottom one in the photo for $3.00 each with a 1/2 inch square shaft at a surplus place. Made in USA even.

I have used the Chinese made ones on my metal cutting lathe. They work fine for my purposes and would do fine for wood.

[Paul39]

It will be a slow process I reckon. I read in one magazine that most turners still have some CS tools and you can pick them out as they don't have dust on them.:D

I find that when you are getting down to that last final shaving cut, that a carbon steel tool sharpened and honed to the nth degree will do it as well or better than anything else I have.

But not as long.

I do have a selection to choose from. Everything from home made mystery metal, through $20 for a set of 8 Chinese, to full retail on a Crown 5/8 inch bowl gouge.

I am partial to the recent Henry Taylor scraper and skew. Not shown.

[Skew ChiDAMN!!]

I find that when you are getting down to that last final shaving cut, that a carbon steel tool sharpened and honed to the nth degree will do it as well or better than anything else I have.

But not as long.

'Sactly!

For those last few clean-up touches what is needed is a sharp tool, not one that can bludgeon thru six inches of wood without seeing the grinder.

Sadly, modern CS tools tend to be made from cheap quality steel which technically just barely falls into "tool grade" category... such as those $20 sets of 8 chaiwanese chisels. Many newcomers to woodturning start off with just such sets and replace them, when and as they can, with better quality tools. Which are typically HSS.

To make things worse, because CS is prone to bluing during sharpening - which, IMHO, is a case of bad sharpening practices and NOT the steel's fault - most beginner's learn a negative bias towards anything labelled CS. :sigh:

In practise, if you can find a good quality 20year old CS chisel AND you can sharpen it properly, then the odds are good that it will become a valued part of your tool set.

I certainly treasure mine! :wink:

[jimbur]

'Sactly!
For those last few clean-up touches what is needed is a sharp tool, not one that can bludgeon thru six inches of wood without seeing the grinder.
In practise, if you can find a good quality 20year old CS chisel AND you can sharpen it properly, then the odds are good that it will become a valued part of your tool set.
I certainly treasure mine! :wink:
Same here. I treasure my Marples. I thought I'd picked up a poor CS gouge but realised the last owner had polished the bluing off! Another grind and it was fine.