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    Video

    Turning For Furniture Makers: Sharpening

    If you want to turn spindles successfully, you need to start with sharp tools

    By David Douyard Apr 02, 2019

    The first step to mastering any woodworking skill is to start with the right tools, and as usual, the best tool to start with is a sharp one. Professional furniture maker and instructor David Douyard starts his sharpening process at the slow-speed grinder, equipped with a Wolverine jig. While not absolutely necessary, the Wolverine jig makes grinding primary bevels quick and easy—and more importantly, repeatable. From there, David uses diamond paddles or his sharpening stones to create a micro-bevel on the very edge of the chisel or gouge.

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    Videos in the Series

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: Sharpening

      April 2, 2019

      If you want to turn spindles successfully, you need to start with sharp tools

    • Turning for Furniture Makers: The Roughing Gouge

      April 9, 2019

      David Douyard shows Anissa and Ben how to use the workhorse of lathe work, the roughing gouge

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: Roughing from a riven blank

      April 16, 2019

      David demonstrates how to find centers on a riven blank and start the process of safely shaping a rough piece of wood

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: The Skew Chisel

      April 23, 2019

      The skew chisel is another woodturning multi-tool in the hands of an experienced turner. But what about in the hands of Ben and Anissa?

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: V-Grooves and Beads

      April 30, 2019

      Things start to get real as David Douyard teaches Anissa and Ben how to use the skew chisel to start adding decorative v-grooves and beads

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: Accurately Sizing Parts and Tenons

      May 7, 2019

      Now that Anissa and Ben know how to shape parts, they need to be able to size them correctly and create accurate joinery

    • Turning For Furniture Makers: Turn a carving mallet – Conslusion

      May 14, 2019

      David Douyard ditches the amateurs, and demonstrates one of his favorite practice projects, a carving mallet.

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    About This Video Workshop

    Turning is a skill that many woodworkers avoid learning. For some, it's a rabbit hole they'd rather not go down. One day you're turning a Shaker pull for a cabinet, the next day your tablesaw is buried under a pile of bowl blanks, and soon you find you haven't cut a flat piece of wood in years. If this sounds familiar because you've been avoiding turned furniture parts, this video series is for you. The… More about this Video Workshop

    Comments

    1. splinterjim | Apr 04, 2019 08:35am | #1

      Great video. David is a terrific teacher, very clear, concise and calm. Looking forward to more of these videos with him.

    2. graymo | Apr 08, 2019 10:02am | #2

      I was waiting for how to sharpen a spindle gouge but it didn't happen. Coming later?

    3. User avater
      hunkeydorey | Apr 08, 2019 10:55am | #3

      Super video. Having both a Wolverine grinder setup and Tormek it convinces me that the Wolverine grinder setup is perfect tool to use with my Jet 14 inch lathe. No need to take the sharpening to a razor edge for each turning event. Small comments within the video are priceless.

    4. turner1029 | Jun 12, 2019 01:32pm | #4

      A thought that occurred to me as I watched this. People often ask why turners sharpen so often; while bowl turning is a slightly different beast, the math works the same. When turning a 10” bowl at 1000 rpm the tool is taking a shaving that’s nearly six miles long every minute its in contact with the wood.
      Sharp tools don’t stay sharp long. Learn to sharpen first, sharpen often.
      Good video, good information.

    5. user-6001446 | Jul 27, 2019 12:06pm | #5

      Turner1029, you make a really good point and this is a fantastic illustration regarding sharpening of lathe tools. However, are you sure it’s not 0.496 miles per minute vs nearly 6 miles? I could be wrong here, really trying to understand if I am off. 10 inch diameter is 31.4 inch circumference x 1,000 rpm = 31,400 inches per minute. 63,360 inches in a mile if internet-site conversion calculators can be trusted. Even if this is right vs the 6 miles, half a mile is big for an edge tool.

    6. Suburbanguy | Aug 07, 2019 10:40am | #6

      user-6001446
      You're absolutely right. 10/12 of a foot diameter. Mult by pi. 2.617 feet per rev. Mult by 1000 is 2617 feet per minute. 5280 feet in a statute mile when I went to school. So... 0.496 miles per minute. Nuttin' wrong with the imperial system. The metric system is for the "mathematically challenged".

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