turning vessels

[Thad Nickoley]

Hello, I have been lurking for years but still have a lot to learn. I have been turning pens and stoppers and would like to try boxes, bowls and urns. i have the jet mini lathe. i assume this is pretty small for what I would like to try. So I have two questions....

What would i need to turn these items on my Jet?

If i were to move up to a larger machine, what would be an affordable option and what accessories would i need?

Thank you for any input!

[Dennis Ford]

Welcome Thad!
You can turn all of those items on your Jet mini. Of course you have to keep the size small. If you want to upgrade to a larger lathe, you have to make some choices on size and budget. My favorites (in order of increasing cost) would be:
Jet 1642
Powematic 3520
Stubby
There are lots of other choices, most of them are good machines.
Tooling is a little about what you need, mostly about what you want.

[Roger Chandler]

Hello, I have been lurking for years but still have a lot to learn. I have been turning pens and stoppers and would like to try boxes, bowls and urns. i have the jet mini lathe. i assume this is pretty small for what I would like to try. So I have two questions....

What would i need to turn these items on my Jet?

If i were to move up to a larger machine, what would be an affordable option and what accessories would i need?

Thank you for any input!

Thad,

It seems to me that at a minimum, for an urn, and the larger of the items you wish to turn, that you will need a midi lathe. The Delta 46-460 VS can be had in the $500.00 range, and of course you will need a scroll chuck [think SuperNova2, or something similar] and at least a hand held hollowing tool.

The Delta midi does have the power you need to succeed, and it does not take up a lot of space. This would be a good starting point, and would do if you want to keep a minimalist approach. It will turn a 12" diameter piece.

Should you decide you want to go bigger, the Jet 16/42 or the Grizzly G0698 would be good options, but if you want to play with the big boys, then a PM3520b, or Oneway, or Robust is the ticket, but not inexpensive either.

[Mark Hubl]

Thad you can turn all on your lathe, albeight your size will be limited. You may need to start with some more balanced wood, but most of the stuff I am doing could be done on a Jet mini. The little Delta is a great machine and many here are cranking out terrific work on it.

Here is a link to a tutorial in my gallery of a piece turned on my mini.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/album.php?albumid=280

I started doing hollow forms with a super economical set of tools from Grizzly. Knowing what I know now I would have more quickly moved to something a little larger. I mostly use my Don Pencil Stinger tools and the Grizzlies. I just made some handles for the Pencil stuff so I don't have keep changing them out of the pistol grip handle. I don't use any captured system. Just hand held, but I will say that on pieces over 6 or 7 inches some sort of steady is recommended. (I recently got a Oneway and have used it on a couple of pieces, really helps). All kinds of tools out there, especially on the entry to mid level. For your research start at Craft Supply or Packard they have good varieties. I will let others chime in on their favorites and captured systems.

Many also start hollowing and boxes with a Sorby multi tip tool. I have one and like it, especially for shear scraping.

I have not done many small boxes, but much of the work can be down with gouges and scrapers. I still get little nervous around the bottoms of these little buggers.

Could go on and on, as far as lathe, buy the Powermatic. No just kidding, as I said the Delta gets high marks and is highly recommended. I moved to a Nova. Was economical for me and has a lot of options. Others will chime in, really depends on your budget and direction.

If I get a chance I will shoot a pic of the tools I use.

I am sure this thread will have some traction for you.

[Prashun Patel]

As a new bowl turner, here's my 1cent:

Start with bowls. They're an easier entry point to enclosed vessels and hollow forms.

I would get a scroll chuck. With a screw and the jaws that most come with, you shld be able to turn both sides pretty easily.

I would also get a 1/2" bowl gouge to start.

My lathe is a midi with a 12" swing, and while I would like a 16" or 20" swing, but you can make a lot of great stuff under 10" too.

IMHO, that's the 'need to have'. The 'would like to have' list reveals itself with time, and requires very deep pockets.

[Mark Hubl]

Prashun makes a great point. The bowl gouge will be the go to tool for much of this type of turning. I have a couple, but my Crown Ellsworth is my go to tool. Learning this tool and grind took my turning up a notch.

[Thad Nickoley]

Thank you for the replies that I have received so far. I guess that I am on my way. Since I have only turned pens and such so far I still dont know anything about chucks and how they work. I looked up the jet 1642 but I only have 110. Is the Jet 1442 a good alternative?

[Prashun Patel]

Thad-
(Humbly) I think you should try turning bowls on yr existing lathe first to see how you like it and whether you need to upgrade right now.

If you are serious about upgrading eventually, then you might consider purchasing a chuck that natively fits the larger spindle. For a small price you can then purchase an adapter that'll allow the chuck to work on yr smaller lathe temporarily.

[Wally Dickerman]

Thank you for the replies that I have received so far. I guess that I am on my way. Since I have only turned pens and such so far I still dont know anything about chucks and how they work. I looked up the jet 1642 but I only have 110. Is the Jet 1442 a good alternative?

Thad, do yourself a big favor and take a lesson in bowl turning from a good teacher. You'll be very glad that you did. You get started by doing things right. If you have a Woodcraft store in your area, check out their bowl turning classes.

A good teacher will help you in selecting the tools you need. If your budget is small, forget the scroll chuck for awhile. You can turn bowls very well by using a glue block and faceplate. The scroll chuck that is so popular today didn't exist before about 1990. We turned a lot of bowls before that.

Wally

[Thad Nickoley]

Thank you Wally and Prashun... The problem is that I live about 4 hours from civilization so the teacher thing is hard to do. Maybe the thought of teaching myself, starting small is my best bet. Where do I start as far as chucks etc for starting small on the Jet mini lathe? I usually order from Craft Supplies but they have so many chucks. Is there a suggestion as to where to start.

[Bob Haverstock]

Thad,

I started with a JWL 1220. I like doing bowls and urns, it didn't take me too long to realize that I needed a steady rest. (Jeff makes nice ones) Then, I found out that trying to go deep with a short tool is grueling. So I made some long handled hook tools.

I like my WoodRiver chucks, they work well and if you move up to a larger lathe all you need purchase is a new $6 adapter. And BTW. a smaller steady rest can use a riser to fit a larger lathe.

Last year I bought a larger lathe, a Nova 1624. You can catch deals on them. It is a good lathe for the price. ( I didn't spend $3500 and my $900 lathe won't stand toe to toe with a MustardMachine. Not a problem for me.)

Thad, have bunches of fun. That is what it is all about.

Bob Haverstock

[Wally Dickerman]

Thank you Wally and Prashun... The problem is that I live about 4 hours from civilization so the teacher thing is hard to do. Maybe the thought of teaching myself, starting small is my best bet. Where do I start as far as chucks etc for starting small on the Jet mini lathe? I usually order from Craft Supplies but they have so many chucks. Is there a suggestion as to where to start.

Thad, you can turn bowls on your Jet mini. I taught classes at a local Woodcraft for several years. We had 5 Jet mini's. We turned a lot of 6 or 7 inch bowls, using a glue block and the faceplate that comes with the lathe.

Tools used in beginning bowl classes are a 1/2 inch bowl gouge, a diamond point parting tool, and a 1-inch round nosed scraper. Those are the minumum. There ere other tools that you'll decide that you need later.

If you decide that you want a chuck, get a small one, such as the Oneway Talon. I have several and like them.

If you are going to be self taught, Books and DVDs from Richard Raffan would be a big help for learning tool technique and a lot more.

Good luck,

Wally

[Thad Nickoley]

Well Thank you all for your advise. I took the plunge and ordered a SN2 and some hollowing tools. I would like to make some small urns. Is there any place that sells larger blanks for this?

[Mike Willeson]

Well Thank you all for your advise. I took the plunge and ordered a SN2 and some hollowing tools. I would like to make some small urns. Is there any place that sells larger blanks for this?

Good choice Thad. I have the Jet mini 1014 and you can do a lot with it.

Buy your tools and accessories carefully and you will be able to use them on your upgrade lathe as well.

The next task to learn about is harvesting your own wood and preparing your own blanks.

Have fun!

[Marc Himes]

Thad, I would suggest starting with any wood you can get free before buying it. Making a few or many for practice will be fun and instructive before you have to really care about the wood. I live in northern Michigan and there is wood all over the place, so free wood is easily obtained. If you want to buy wood, Bell Forest Products In Ishpeming, Michigan has a good selection of maple and exotics. For boxes, Richard Raffan has an excellent CD. There are also several wood turning websites that have instructional videos

Good luck.

Marc Himes

[Rich Aldrich]

Thank you for the replies that I have received so far. I guess that I am on my way. Since I have only turned pens and such so far I still dont know anything about chucks and how they work. I looked up the jet 1642 but I only have 110. Is the Jet 1442 a good alternative?

Thad, I have the 1642 in the 1 1/2 HP model that is 110V. The 2 HP requires 220V. I very few time has the lathe slowed down, but I haven't stall it. I have only been doing bowls since June and plan to get into hollow forms. I would suspect less hp required for a hollow form because of small cuts, but others on this forum can answer that better than me.

I belong to the same club as Steve Schlumpf and Marc Himes. We had a Gary Weiermiller in for a demonstration in Sept that showed us how to make our own hollowing tools. His had big handles - 24" long, 2"dia that were branches from a tree. The tools were unrefined, but he could sure make a nice hollow form with these tools. If I remember correctly, he made these tools when he went to a one on one week with Daivid Ellsworth. They just went out on Ellsworths property and cut some branches or small trees and made handles out of them. The boring bars were hardened tool steel stock ordered from some place like MCS and the cutters were made from key stock or something similar (maybe a little harder).