Turning Metal

[Burt Alcantara]

What tools would I need to turn down a 1/2" square of tool steel to fit into a tool handle? I'd like to do the same to a HHS cutter in order to make an Oland tool.

Thanks,
Burt

[David Christopher]

I used a file

[Joe Pfeifer]

I made an Oland tool with instructions I found online (don't remember where). Drill a 3/8" hole and a 1/4" HSS tool bit will fit, held in place with a set screw. This allows you to adjust the length of the bit extended past the shaft. Otherwise, a grinder will take those corners off.

[Tim Cleveland]

It depends on the type of steel. Brass, aluminum, and other metals of similar hardness can be turned with standard M2 HSS cutters, but if it's square it will be a pain to turn round (prsonally I think I would just take it to a machine shop), that's about the extent of my knowledge regarding this subject. I don't want to hijack this thread, but this brings up something that I have been wondering about for a while and might be relevent to this question - can you get cross-slides (like what's used on metal lathes) that fit on wood lathes?

Tim

[Burt Alcantara]

can you get cross-slides (like what's used on metal lathes) that fit on wood lathes?Do you mean something like a Baltimore Vise?

[Tim Cleveland]

Do you mean something like a Baltimore Vise?
Not quite sure what a baltimore vise is. What I'm talking about is the attachment (it rests on the bed of the lathe) that holds the cutter and you have one small wheel that you turn to move the cutter back and forth parallel to the lathe beds, and another wheel to move the cutter in and out of the work. Sorry for not being clear the first time.

Tim

[Bob Haverstock]

Burt,

There are two very basic types of tool steel annealed and hardened.

Annealed you can turn on a small lathe with sharp high speed steel tools. Hardened steel for the small backyard shop is better ground to round.

The better idea is drill a hole in the shank that is equal to the diagonal of the tool bit and hold it with a set screw.

I'm curious why you would choose such a large bit. The bigger the bits are the harder they are to grind.

Bob Haverstock

[John Fricke]

Grizzly has 2-way slide vises for around 50 bucks. I'm not sure what you would have to do to fasten to your lathe.

this one is 45.95 they have other ones also< I found them in their on-line catalog.

http://www.grizzly.com/images/pics/jpeg288/g/g1064.jpg (http://www.grizzly.com/products/G1064/images/)

[Richard Madison]

Just grind the corners off until it fits? Have done exactly that to fit a 1/2" square bar stock into pipe handle. Crude but effective.

[Chris Rae]

I ground the corners off using my old high speed grinder with the coarse gray wheels.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

You can't turn HSS in your wood lathe, even on a metal lathe you'd have a hard time doing that, but there is no need for it
It would be easier to make a square hole in the mild steel to fit the tool-bid in, but again there's no need for it.
Just drill a hole the size of the tool-bid, measured diagonally over the corners, and then use one or two set-screws to hold the bid.
Here's a link to Darrell Feltmates site with some more toolmaking help HTH.
http://aroundthewoods.com/oland.shtml