3 Attachment(s)
If I can do it anyone can
Dunno what I was so nervous about. :rolleyes:
For a first try, I used a piece of very dry, splintery Tassie Oak. (I already had a piece of 1/4" sitting here and was too impatient to cut up the White Beech yet.)
My mini lathe was jumping out the door initially, so I had to drill a couple of extra 8mm 'push-out' holes under the blank for balance. OK now as long as I spin the lathe at 1500 or faster. The faster the better anyway.
I ran out of time and only got the first of 4 sets of cuts done, but so far so good.
Attachment 334077 Attachment 334076
For a depth guide, I inset the blank exactly half it's thickness into the faceplate, then cut until I just brushed the faceplate surface.
To make things easier and more accurate, after mounting the blank I used a compass to draw 3 lines per slot onto both the faceplate and the blank, one accurate line at each side of where the slot would be, then a rough line in the centre. When the rough line just started to disappear I knew I was in half-way. (To do this, though, you have to be careful to avoid a parallax error by looking on from directly in front of the cut. If your eyes are to the side, the cut will be too.)
To clamp the blank, I have thin DS tape underneath then the visible 1.5mm strip of Blackbutt screwed across the top as an extra safety measure.
The original reason I didn't use the dowel method of registering the blank was that it limited the amount of offset too much. The depth thing was a bonus that I thought of later. :wink:
This is fun. :D
This is what I'm aiming for:
Attachment 334078