Before you can turn out a really good job on a lathe you must practice awhile. A good thing to try your hand on is to make some tool handles. The size of these will, of course, depend on what you intend to use them for.

Take a stick of wood, round or square, it doesn't in the least matter, a couple of inches longer and a trifle larger than the largest diameter that the handle is to be and drive one end against the spurs of the face plate as shown in Fig. 19.

This done screw up the feed of the tailstock until the back-center is forced into the end of the wood about 1/8 of an inch; clamp the rest so that it comes to within 1/4 an inch of the wood you are going to turn and you are ready for work.

Now put your foot on the treadle and work it up and down; very soon the speed of the drive wheel will carry it round smoothly and it will deliver considerable power to the pulley of the headstock. If the drive wheel is 5 times as large as the pulley and you treadle the drive wheel 100 times every minute, the stick of wood which you want to turn will revolve 500 times a minute.

Fig. 19. Putting The Rough Wood In The Lathe

Fig. 20. The Right Way To Hold A Wood Working Tool

When you have the wood rotating at about this speed grip the handle of it firmly with your right hand, lay the back of the chisel on the rest and press down on the blade with your left hand as shown in Fig. 20. Of course the top edge of the wood is turning toward you.

Whatever you do when you are roughing down a stick of wood don't try to take off too large a cut. Go at it very gently with the point of your chisel and as it begins to cut you can swing the tool around so that the whole width of the blade is cutting.

Gouges are used in the same way as chisels and with them you can turn out hollow parts. A parting tool is used for cutting off the ends of the wood after you have finished turning it.

Sizing With A Pair Of Calipers

A Regular Sizing Tool

Fig 21. sizing the turned work

When you want to turn a piece of wood down to a given size you can do so by testing it with a pair of calipers, as shown in Fig. 21, or you can size it with a regular sizing tool. To size the work measure off the distance between the points of the calipers with a rule for whatever thickness you want the turned part; then as you turn the wood you can try it from time to time until the wood will just slip through between the points.