Chop Sticks - I just had to have them...

One night I was sitting up in bed, rebuilding my bicycle bearings (never got the hang of gnitting) and I went Y-reka, I want a new set of chop sticks... In fact I just have to have them.. So I cut up some 10mm dowel into 2 bits at about 300mm long and then had a crack at tapering them with a tiny plane and kind of gave that up... The next day I made up a TAPERED wooden clamp / lathe chuck to center and grip the chop sticks and I also made the concave tapered dead center for the tail stock, I waxed the dead center and kind of tapped the stick home in the taper chuck and away we went with the sanding blocks and I made a lovely super fine radius and taper on them... They got a sanding of a flat on the "big ends" and an inscription on them, and then a few decent coats of shellac. Bingo My own EVER so sexy chop sticks. A bare wood would give a better grip on slippery food, but shellac keeps them as a wipe clean utensil - that and the lovely shellac finish, means they are just superb eating sticks.

H

I have to make some hair sticks (Thanks Eliza) for SWMBO so get ready for some pics of those. ( Now I know where to post them)

HazzaB

I don't have such a fancy set up!!! I just use the pin jaws on my chuck.

Mind you, my sticks also don't turn out that straight.

I put up a WIP http://www.elvenhair.com/turning.html

Some really helpful ideas on chucking small bits on wood on your web page Eliza :2tsup:

OK Hammahed....have had the pleasure (wife's dis-pleasure) of rebuilding a Chevy 327 engine in the dining room, but have never dreamed of re-building bike bearings in bed...there are much better things to do in bed :q:U:D:cool:

....anyway, glad to hear that you have the chopsticks you so desperately needed:2tsup:

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Originally Posted by HammaHed

and I went Y-reka, I want a new set of chop sticks... In fact I just have to have them..

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I want some splades. How do you think I'd go about making splades?

:)

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Originally Posted by Ed Reiss

...there are much better things to do in bed :q:U:D:cool:
...

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Anyone want to tell my wife that?:rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by ElizaLeahy

I don't have such a fancy set up!!! I just use the pin jaws on my chuck.

Mind you, my sticks also don't turn out that straight.

I put up a WIP http://www.elvenhair.com/turning.html

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Yeah.... that's just a "short run" set of tooling. made for sanding / or fine machining of already round stock.

The principle of tapers is that at an particular point say a 90* included angle (45* centerline, 45*) it is a neutral center. It's ability to grip is equal to it's ability to slide against another surface.

The narrower the included angle becomes the more it grips on the surface it is running against, and the wider the included angle becomes, the less it grips against the surface it is running against.

That "wooden chuck" is just a wooden core from a hole saw / drill, with a $10 tapered reamer run into it (sheet metal hole enlarger) - which gives a very narrow taper or narrow internal included angle, much like a morse taper, which grips on the wood by friction, and it centers the wood as a default setting.

The steel dead center, is simply a bit of scrap machined up with a not terribly brilliant taper seat - to locate it in the tail stock.

The centering in the dead center, is a drilled hole about 4 mm deep, with it's very wide or open included angle - being far wider than 90*, provides no real grip on the wood, but it's taper, centers the wood in it's included angle - and some wax provides some nice lube when it spins.

If I was to make a heap of these chop sticks, I'd be possibly removing the chuck and poking some morse taper sleeves in there, OR drilling and taper reaming some plain aluminum bar stock and poking that in the jaws, and for the dead center I'd cut the seat far more accurately and I'd be using a counter sink to make an approximately 90* included angle....

That dead center as is - centers well enough, and it's OK for a once off, but the angle is too shallow to keep the end of the chop stick properly centered when the taper is being sanded into the sticks.

Assuming that the misalignment in your sticks is due to turning the pins in 2 operations, I'd hazard at a guess that they would be turning out dead straight IF you were to machine them in ONE operation.

How I do almost all of my single operation turning is to do all the coarse turning to remove all the excess material and "sort of" take the end mounting points, down to to fairly fine amounts of timber, then I do all my fine detailing and finishing etc., and then I use a sharp knife (parting tool), I slightly "open" the lathe around the job, or wind back the tail stock a wee bit, and then alternately slice the mounting points, until they give away at about the same point in time and thickness, leaving nice dressed ends - with no dags on them.

With those pins, I'd be keeping the heavy end of the timber at the chuck...

I turn them because I want to finish both ends. One end has to come to a point, the other has to (usually) be smoothly finished to sell. The exception is when I'm going to be decorating the tops with beads, in which case the finish isn't as important as getting the size correct.

For what I do a slight eccentric turn at the top before the beads doesn't matter, indeed, it ads to the design.

You should try knitting needles, they need to be totally straight along the length.