Thread: 1964 VW Beetle - WIP

Another great jig for wheels so many lately must make myself one. Looking good on the wheel Steve

I still would have really preferred to be making the wheels on the lathe, was looking forward to it, but that will have to wait until I'm better organised for turning.

Meantime, I sat down last night and re-designed the wheels. Slightly narrower to fit under the guards better and a smaller diameter rim to allow for a higher profile tyre. I'll do a test run when I get a moment, but might also switch to a single timber for the rims, closer matching the body colour. Still 2-piece rims, though. It's easier to get a good shape that way.

I'll make the wheels slightly narrower because the guards are 1/2" and the tyres were to be 1/2", so the tyres would have been flush with the outside of the guards. Now they'll be just inside the guards, but only by 1mm. Will look better though. The skinnier wheels are more suited to a '64, too. The ones in the plans were equivalent to 6" at 1:12, for a 70's Beetle, whereas a '64 Beetle had 5" tyres, from memory. Mine will be 5 1/2".

Hello Steve,

What you have come up with to make the wheels is great. I can't imagine what they will look like when you make them on the lathe. I can understand your frustration with not having all the proper tools. I didn't have any hand tools for mine for the first 2 months or a chuck. I ran into the same problem you did with the wheels being off center from the center pilot hole. I think the case is the bolt you mounted it to in the chuck has some slop in it. Not much but enough to make a difference. Plus when you clamp the wheel in this way you can only work on the outside and can't do any face work due to the washer and nut in the way.

I tried making several things for the train using this method and they never came out quite right. All the stuff I make now starts out as a square piece of stock with enough material sticking out of the chuck to be able to shape and part off the the piece I am making. If you start with a square piece and drill your center hole while its in the lather using a chuck in the tailstock. Then you can turn the piece and everything will line up properly. Just my .02 cents.



You found out the hard way that cheap lathe tools are garbage. Especially if they aren't HSS. I was going to tell you might look at the carbide tipped hand tools. They are gaining popularity and don't require all the sharpening techinques just a quick rub on a diamond hone. The only downside is they are very expensive. But the replacement carbides aren't too bad.
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?p...9&site=ROCKLER


I didn't get a grinder till recently to properly sharpen my tools. Which is a whole other skill to gain knowledge of.(More jigs to make here). I made all the parts for the train using the cross slide and 2 different toolings used. Since I have started to learn the hand tools I have found it much easier to make wheels and anything round for that matter versus the cross slide. It is still my go to for something that needs to be exact though such as an axle or a dowel. But my favorite hand tool for making wheel is my mini skew chisel.


The design of your wheel looks spot on to me and I am amazed what you were able to make with the router.

Bret

Originally Posted by bj383ss

I ran into the same problem you did with the wheels being off center from the center pilot hole. I think the case is the bolt you mounted it to in the chuck has some slop in it. Not much but enough to make a difference.

Yep, that's what I figured. When a 6mm bolt is slipped into a 6mm hole drilled in a piece of wood, there is a bit of play.

I tried making several things for the train using this method and they never came out quite right. All the stuff I make now starts out as a square piece of stock with enough material sticking out of the chuck to be able to shape and part off the the piece I am making. If you start with a square piece and drill your center hole while its in the lather using a chuck in the tailstock. Then you can turn the piece and everything will line up properly. Just my .02 cents.

That's what I figured. Even if I had lathe tools, I'm better sticking to my current method this time - the timber that I'm using isn't thick enough to allow extra for chucking, not even the screw chuck.

You found out the hard way that cheap lathe tools are garbage. Especially if they aren't HSS. I was going to tell you might look at the carbide tipped hand tools. They are gaining popularity and don't require all the sharpening techinques just a quick rub on a diamond hone. The only downside is they are very expensive. But the replacement carbides aren't too bad.
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?p...9&site=ROCKLER

Great minds .....
I've been seriously considering buying carbide-tipped tools. They look pretty good to me. I've looked at the Robert Sorby Turnmaster set ( Robert Sorby Turnmaster Set Handled : CARBA-TEC ) @ $139 for scraping and shear scraping, and/or the 'Easy' range of tools, the 'Mini Easy Rougher', 'Mini Easy Detailer' and 'Mini Easy Finisher', ( Carbide Tipped Tools - Woodturning Tools and Timber, Woodturner Accessories, Woodcarver Supplies, Woodturning Equipment ), $135 each, but they look very good. Didn't check out Rockler until now, though. Thanks for pointing them out. They're less expensive at $190 for a set of 3.

I didn't get a grinder till recently to properly sharpen my tools. Which is a whole other skill to gain knowledge of.(More jigs to make here). I made all the parts for the train using the cross slide and 2 different toolings used. Since I have started to learn the hand tools I have found it much easier to make wheels and anything round for that matter versus the cross slide. It is still my go to for something that needs to be exact though such as an axle or a dowel. But my favorite hand tool for making wheel is my mini skew chisel.

Derek offered to help with a pdf of sharpening jigs.
I've been needing a grinder for ages, so I've decided to buy a std high-speed 8" grinder w/ 40mm wheel(s) and an 8" wet-stone grinder, probably the Scheppach Tiger 2000S, ( https://www.machineryhouse.com.au/W859 ). Cheaper than a Tormek, but the Tormek jigs apparently fit. I've been doing all of my sharpening on wet 'n dry paper so far, with the Dremel for shaping.
I can't get both grinders immediately, but will work towards them.

The design of your wheel looks spot on to me and I am amazed what you were able to make with the router.
Bret

The little Dremel and router accessories are great for this type of stuff. Much less scary than the full-sized router table for these tiny parts, too.

My house inspection was done this morning, so I can get stuck back into filling the place with dust again.

After all of the lathe talk, I thought I'd better include a pic of the new toy. It has to live with the mower and pushbike. No room anywhere else.
The stand is just an old clamp-table - I pulled off the top and winders etc and bolted on the piece of timber. A nice size, but still about 2" too tall. I'll hacksaw the legs off to length.

Lathe.jpg

That is a good Lathe Steve. It is the same as my small one just with a different badge I have made many a pen on it along with quite a few other things. Having variable speed is great.

Originally Posted by Dalboy

That is a good Lathe Steve. It is the same as my small one just with a different badge I have made many a pen on it along with quite a few other things. Having variable speed is great.

_fly_ has the same lathe too, and recommended it to me. (Thanks Pete.)
The 50mm scroll-chuck set was a bonus, a package deal. Came with 4 sets of jaws.

I might have a go at pens at some stage, to make use of some of my smaller scraps. The pen-turning chisels look pretty handy for making wheels etc, too.

Donut anyone?

ck. Wheel rim & tyre blanks.jpg

I made a start on the wheels today - cut out the blanks for the tyres and the rim inner and outer pieces. All the same timber, Blackbutt, but the tyres will be black, (ebonised), and the hub caps will be white, (Silver Ash). Should be plenty of contrast, so I've done away with the two-tone rims.

I'll cut out the hub caps in the morning, then get stuck into fine-trimming them all to final dimensions.

Your Busy Busy Busy,
All looks good.

Originally Posted by _fly_

Your Busy Busy Busy,
All looks good.

Yeah, it took longer than I expected. All small scraps of Blackbutt, so I had to do all of the thicknessing with the Dremel router/planer sled. Effective, but very slow.
Still, I thought I'd better make 6, so I can weed out any mistakes along the way and hopefully still end up with 4 acceptable wheels. So far so good.

I finished shaping and gluing up the rims today.

Rims finished.JPG


Also cut out the hub cap blanks. Still need 7mm trimmed from the diameter. They'll have 6mm dowel glued in the centre to serve as axles, then I'll shape them to the classic VW wok shape.

Hub cap blanks.JPG


Tomorrow I'll trim and shape the tyres to fit the rims.

Slow going today, but I made some progress.

I got the outside of the tyres trimmed to 51mm. Also realised that I'd thicknessed them at 12mm instead of 11.5mm as planned, so I wasted a while shaving them down with the Dremel router/planer sled, then W&D on perspex to finish.

I got the inside of the first two tyres fine-trimmed to fit their respective rims, too. At this point, all parts are numbered and registration marks added to ensure the same fit at glue-up. Don't want any nasty surprises.
I got a pretty good fit, but it's a bloody slow process - shave a bit, test fit, shave a bit, test fit, ad infinitum.

cl. First rim&tyre test fit.JPG


A shot of the headlights, too. Not glued on yet - I drilled shallow 2.5mm holes in the guards and matching ones in the back, centre of the lights. A few mm of bamboo skewer is glued into the holes in the guards as locators for glue-up. Even I can't get them in the wrong place that way.
(Don't forget, I cheated, too. They're just T&J headlights, sawn off at the rim.)
The front guards are partly-shaped, but not glued on yet either. The Silver Ash 'pole' will be the VW emblem. Incidentally, that's why I drilled right through the hub caps for the dowel axles, rather than 'blind' holes. I figure the end of the dowel will look a little like the VW emblem.:

cm. Headlights.JPG


Tomorrow I'll finish fitting the rest of the tyres to their rims, then get into the side-wall shaping and tread, to make them look like tyres. When that's all out of the way, it's into the ebonising solution (tyres only) for the final touch before glue-up. The hub caps can come last. They're not nearly as scary as the other wheel bits.

Edit: The tyres won't be flush with the rims like that when fitted. The tyres are actually 1mm wider than the rims, allowing for 0.5mm either side, at the middle of the sidewall, to stand out from the rim. The tyres are pressed on slightly further than they need to be in the pic. I wanted to make sure they weren't too tight a fit, to allow glue space. Don't want any jam-ups while sliding the tyre on during glue-up.

Steve,

Looking great.....

You freehand scale modelers just amaze me.....

I'm happy if I can adequately complete a kit.......

Jim

Originally Posted by Script

Steve,

Looking great.....

You freehand scale modelers just amaze me.....

I'm happy if I can adequately complete a kit.......

Jim

Thanks Jim. Don't forget that this build is mostly based on the Gatto plans, though, so not really 'freehand'.

I've spent the last day busily knocking the tyres into shape. To keep them all consistent, I used the Dremel w/ router bit to put a 45 degree bevel on the inside edge of the tyre wall, then an Ezy-Lok disc in the Dremel to put a shallow taper on the outer edge leading to the tread area.:

Tyre wall outside tapering.jpg


Then, onto the lathe to blend them to final shape with sandpaper. It was much easier to chuck them up so they ran true than I expected. Just needed a little patience.
I figure flat-out is probably best for sanding, so it's doing 4100rpm in the pic.:

Final tyre shaping.jpg


They didn't turn out too bad. (That's not really big gaps - just shadows from the rim lips. I left them sharp.:

Tyres shaped.JPG


I'm just pondering the best way to add tread at the moment. Probably the Dremel again, with a jig and a thin cutting disc. I'm a bit concerned about burning, though, so I'll see if I can come up with something else.