Thread: Pool Cues (Work in Progress).

I'm trying to make the most of the last 2 days of my holidays, so I've been back at work on the rock maple butt.

Pict 1 - Back in the lathe for roughing down.

Pict 2 - Even though my digital camera is about 4-5 years old, it still can make a trimmer spinning at how-ever many thousand rpms, and a lathe turning at 500 rpms look like they were not moving at all. Also note, all you need to turn square wood round when using the trimmer is a dead-centre. The trimmer just eats the wood off !!

Pict 3 - Roughing the cue down

Pict 4 - Shows the crack that occured during glue up (now filled with super glue). Also, this router bit is not the best for turning the cues (I use it for the "milling" process, but I was happy with the way the tool was set up, and since I still have to do the "milling" on the rosewood cue, I don't want to change or move it). You can also see the "off the tool" finish turning with the router gives. While this was done with the carriage travelling at its highest speed, it still only needs a light sand with 400 to get rid of those little grooves. Setting the carriage at a slower speed, and using a different bit in the trimmer gives an even better finish.

To be cont.....

......cont.......

Still working on the rock maple butt.

Pict 1 - Milling off the other 2 sides. Note the duel chucks of the lathe, and the large diameter hole (1 3/4") through the headstock. This is important for doing much of the joint work, butt work, and installing the cue ferrule and tip later on.

Pict 2 - Both sides milled off now. As during this process, the cue was milled, taken out of the lathe, had pieces glued to it, turned round again, and then put back in the lathe, the accuracy of the indexing is now deminished, and is just done by eye. (and a few tricks)

Pict 3 - Padauk cut on bandsaw, sanded on one side, ready for glue up.

Pict 4 - I guess all those cheap clamps come in handy from time to time.

Cheers..........

All play and no cleaning up makes for a very messy workshop.

If anyone ever has a use for lots of unusually coloured shavings, just let me know.......!!

Very tricky business cleaning the workshop. Have to be sure the missus doesen't bust you using a vacuum cleaner.

Seriously though, since the vacuum cleaner is a lot less "bitey" than most of the other machines,....I think its time for a cold one !!

Work continues on the birds eye butt.

Pict 1 - Out of the clamps

Pict 2 and 3 - After sanding off the excess, leaving a core of birds eye wrapped in padauk.

Pict 4 - Time to glue on some strips of wenge

Work continues on the rock maple butt.

It is now a maple core surrounded by solid pieces of padauk. (Pict 1)

Pict 2 - Roughing it down on the lathe.

Pict 3 - You can start to see some of the pattern coming out.

Pict 4 - Workshop all a mess again.

Well, finally work had started on the Australian rosewood butt. Funny, seeing this is the one cue I wanted to build as a gift for someone.

I'm going to call it the "ute borrowers cue". Its to say thanks to someone who owns a ute, that we have borrowed many times.

Pict 1 - In the lathe

Pict 2 - Milled off the sides

Pict 3 - Pieces of sivler ash, ready to be glued on.

Pict 4 - In the clamps (again)

The good news is that this is all the "heavy" machinine work out of the way. I can now remove the router and start work on some of the other bits and pieces.

The bad news is I'm back to the "real" job tommorow, so I will only be able to get a little bit done each night.

Cheers............

Does anyone have a favourite tool that you just seem to loose all the time. My workshop is only small, but this is a very small tool, and I have a knack of loosing it.

I think my record was about 4 months. It finally turned up in a pocket of my track suit pants (it had been through the wash and all). I only found it when the weather turned cold again.

It is used to lock down the cross-slide on the tool carriage.

Purpleheart - I take it you remove the cross-side lock so that it doesn't rattle loose when the cross-slide is in motion. Why don't you weight one side of the t-handle so that it always sits to the bottom when the lock is backed off? Of course if it needs to be completely removed for the cross slide to operate this will not work. How about a spring-clip riveted to the side or the right-end of the lathe to hold it when not in place?
Trevor.

loving every second of the jurney mate.. keep it up

Originally Posted by Gympietech

Purpleheart - I take it you remove the cross-side lock so that it doesn't rattle loose when the cross-slide is in motion. Why don't you weight one side of the t-handle so that it always sits to the bottom when the lock is backed off? Of course if it needs to be completely removed for the cross slide to operate this will not work. How about a spring-clip riveted to the side or the right-end of the lathe to hold it when not in place?
Trevor.

Cool avatar mate.
Thanks also for the suggestions, there probably is some way for me to stop misplacing that little sucker.
Unfortunately, if the little handle was left in place (or fixed in place), it would bash into the tailstock at times. Otherwise I would have glued it in long ago !
Having a spot to put it all the time would be the go though, and it would have to be easy to grab at any moment. You've got me thinking !
You don't know how many times I've gone through the vacuum cleaner just trying to find it again !!

More glueing and clamping.

Pict 1 - Birds eye butt, now with 2 strips of wenge on the padauk. Rosewood butt, with its first 2 strips of ash.

Pict 2 - Same again.

Pict 3 - Ready to glue the next 2 strips of wenge on. (I love the look of this wood !!)

OK, now its time to start work on some of the joint collars for the birds eye butt. The feature accents on this cue will be the padauk, wenge and purpleheart strips, so these are the 3 rings I will try and attach to the joint collar and the shaft collar.

Pict 1 - The parts.

Pict 2 - Face off the rod.

Pict 3 - In the pipe clamp.

Here I have glued some of the offcuts of the strips which were prepared earlier, to the rod I will make the collars out of. I used the wood glue to glue the wood together, but I used "Clear" araldite to glue the wood to the rod.

Time to reflect on how all four cues are progressing.

(See picts 1 and 2).

The Bubinga cue (which should have been the easiest design) is now only slightly oversize. But since I glued the wrong piece of wood to the bottom, there is a place that will never become round, unless I turn the cue down much further, and then it will be too skinny (more like a toothpick, which is slang pool cue talk for a snooker cue) The solution to this problem will be to mill out some of the effected area, and glue some more wood in, probably in a "point" design. I am feeling good about this solution to the problem.

The rock maple cue, now with the butt fully encased in padauk. This was the first cue I did the glue up on, and I think I was out of practice, as I clamped it up a bit too tight, and some of the padauk split. After taking the clamps off, it was discovered this would not be too serious, as the crack would machine out. It was not until I put it between centres on the lathe, did I realise I had probably bent the core in the glue up process, as one side of the cue was throwing out more towards the cutter than the other. This will have the effect of making the pattern come out uneven. I can (hopefully) get around this by re-centreing the cue (this usually takes several attempts), but on a downside, this will make the cue harder to get round again, and skinnier. This will force the design further down the cue, meaning I have to cut the cue off shorter, and then lengthen it again by creating a design I can connect to the very end of the cue. Lets just hope this all doesent happen then, but it is definately a job for weekends, not weeknights.

The rosewood cue, the butt is now encased in the silver ash, and tonight I glued some solid sections of purpleheart on two sides. No problems...YET !!

The birds eye cue, the most ambitious project. The birds eye core, now wrapped in padauk, and then wrapped in wenge. Problem I see is that the nice piece of WA She-Oak I had (which was to be used with the last strips of Purplehart, is not long enough.) This could cause problems when the cue is turned down. I can add more wood to the end of a cue, but if bits are missing in the middle, then I am screwed. I will be doing a bit of thinking about this. Preliminary measurements say its ok, but if I need to re-centre along the way, one side of the cue could miss out. And that would mean a fancy tomato stake........

On a more positive note.

The joint collar for the birds eye cue (I will need to make several of these) has come along ok.

Pict 1 - Put the rod in the lathe with the glued on square pieces of wood still in their ruff state.

Pict 2 - Turned them down round. (The piece of maple on the end is only to protect the other pieces of wood, it is not part of the design.) Time to bore out the centre.

Pict 3 - Centre has been bored....................cont