Thread: Most satisfying piece of equipment to use

Probably the Blanchard type spoke lathe for shaping wooden spokes for old car wheels. It's a noisy, messy beast, but, like a shaper or a planer, everything happens very slowly and deliberately, and is mesmerising to watch. The two headstock spindles turn at 17 RPM, and the follower wheel for the template moves the cutter head in and out at a leisurely 34 cycles per minute to form the oval section of the spoke shank while crawling along the spoke blank at 40 mm/min as the spoke profile slowly appears on the workpiece.

I'd love to find a small shaper to enjoy the same experience cutting metal, but, alas, they are rarer than hens' teeth around here, and I don't want to buy one sight unseen - hopefully one day something might turn up locally.

Frank.

Originally Posted by franco

Probably the Blanchard type spoke lathe for shaping wooden spokes for old car wheels. It's a noisy, messy beast, but, like a shaper or a planer, everything happens very slowly and deliberately, and is mesmerising to watch. The two headstock spindles turn at 17 RPM, and the follower wheel for the template moves the cutter head in and out at a leisurely 34 cycles per minute to form the oval section of the spoke shank while crawling along the spoke blank at 40 mm/min as the spoke profile slowly appears on the workpiece.

I'd love to find a small shaper to enjoy the same experience cutting metal, but, alas, they are rarer than hens' teeth around here, and I don't want to buy one sight unseen - hopefully one day something might turn up locally.

Frank.

I would love dearly to see that machine working Do you have any footage of it in operation? Hickory these days be a rare commodity.Cheers John.

Originally Posted by j.ashburn

I would love dearly to see that machine working Do you have any footage of it in operation? Hickory these days be a rare commodity.Cheers John.

John,

Sorry, no action shots, but there are a few static photos in posts 29 and 33 of this thread:

https://www.woodworkforums.com/f65/wh...vented-133650/

At the moment I have (temporarily?) given up using it after getting a reaction to the very fine dust produced, even though I always used a pressurised, filtered helmet air supply, and small dust extractor unit while machining spokes. The last big batch batch of about seventy spokes produced a lot of very fine dust, which accumulated in the C purlins in the roof and blew down for weeks in every gust of wind after the batch was finished - it also liberally coated all uncovered exposed horizontal surfaces in the shed.

I use mainly Tallow Wood and Queensland Hickory for spokes, since these are readily available locally. Both these, and several other native timbers, e.g. spotted gum, are quite suitable, and the traditional American hickory and English Oak are scarce and expensive. I suspect the Tallow Wood dust caused the cough I had for several weeks after finishing the last batch. It also bleached my blue work shirts around the shoulders where it landed - powerful stuff!

Regards,

Frank.