The crossed knurl uses two wheels, one with a left hand angle and one with a right hand angle. Barber pole or angled knurling just uses two right or two left handed wheels. The rest of the process is the same, but I imagine it's more temperamental as the cross pattern tends to cover small issues a little better. Perhaps I will get a set of wheels for it and see what I can do.
I’m finding this very fascinating, Evan. So much more technical than woodturning, with very precise tolerances.
I wouldn't need to be so precise if I wasn't knurling, but if the circumference isn't right the teeth don't land in the same groove on each pass and you end up with a mess. It is facilitating to compare the tools and techniques. I have no feel for cutting anything by hand. The feedback I get is tool noise and resistance and vibration in the dials. I'll have a much harder time when it comes to turning curves. My options are either, make a fixture for guiding the lathebit around a curved cut, making custom shaped bits, or turning on my CNC mill. We'll see. Interesting! I guess it makes sense because the wood itself will burn. No way I should see smoke while drilling aluminum. That bit is dull.
Interest in these seems pretty high. Multiple requests from people at work and on TSD. I may have offered one to a few people too. Knurling produces a gray paste that flings everywhere, but I kinda like the look of a dirty lathe.
If you could duplicate the handle to a Ronson razor or a Wilkinson 7 day razor for a DE that would be cool!
I like the barber pole knurl that has deeper groves for the barber pole twist but still has cross hatching for grip. To me the best looking knurl I've seen is on the Gillette Bulldog. This is a pic from Google images. Unfortunately I do not own a Bulldog.
Hmmm... I have some ideas. I bet a course wheel paired with a fine wheel would work. Pre-sizing the piece would be more difficult as you'd have two pitches to line up. I suppose it could be done in 2 steps as well which still wouldn't be easy. Let me see what I can figure out.
The Rockwell knurling is easy... well that finish quality on stainless steel is never easy, but the knurling pattern is not complicated. The multiple thread pitch knurling has me intrigued. I'm embarrassed how long it took me to figure out the math... duh... 35 threads per inch is SMALLER than 25 threads per inch. You guys are making this both hard and fun at the same time. I predict epic failure many times before making anything that looks good.
Made 2 all-resin handles. First time completely away from my beloved wood turnings... Bit of a back story here. A good friend asked me to make a replica of an Omega 10098 handle in green, with an Omega 10098 knot and hopefully keeping the metal band. I made a blank and poured the green resin. Had some extra, added some coral coloured powder and poured enough for a ‘chubby’ handle. Well, apparently there was an air bubble in the green resin blank: Was there enough resin above it to turn a 10098 dupe? Of course not, by 1/8”. Time to make chicken salad from chicken you-know-what. Got a decent sized handle from it still. You can see the remnants of the air pocket in the pic below: Sanding and 10 coats of CA later, and I’m happy enough with the results. The finish on the green one isn’t perfect, but it is basically perfect on the ‘chubby’. Adding the coral to the green resulted in a nice bronze metallic colour. It is a different style for me, but I did see a Milk Churn handle from Joseph that inspired me a bit. The coin on the bottom is a Rotary coin. My own touch on it, I suppose. There is a Zenith boar in the Green handle, and I am awaiting a Omega Pro 48 monster for the Chubby: Not sure whether I’m keeping either or not, starting to accumulate quite a few boars. That was the last of my resin. I have to buy more to make that 10098 dupe still...I think I’ll make a spare to avoid another issue.
Those are really awesome! Is the resin difficult to turn? I ordered a few items needed for anadizing. Basically just titanium wire and some screws. My plating tools will do double duty. I'll have to drill and tap inside the bore. Still need to find some good anadizing dyes as well.
I don’t know if I’d say more difficult, Evan. More finicky to get good blanks without issues. I have had a few not turn out. All resins are not the same. First brand I used was very easy to turn, but didn’t always harden perfectly. This last brand is a little more brittle, but always hardens. They do polish so nicely. I’m not expert with resins, that’s for sure.
Looked back and read up on the discussion on chucks. Are all 4 jaw wood chucks self centering? Wondering because metal 4 jaw chucks often aren't so you can secure odd shaped pieces. I thought that would be handy for wood too.
Mine is self centring, but it just isn’t that big of a deal with wood as you can secure odd shapes easily enough anyway.
I did spend some time looking at wood chucks and didn't find any that weren't self centering. Obviously, it wasn't an exhaustive search. You asked earler, how people finish the end after parting. I'll post pictures of how I am doing it. Since I'm working with aluminum right now, I'm looking at anodizing. I'll share my results, but since most the people here won't really find it useful, I'll avoid posting too much detail. If there is interest, I'll start a thread for metal finishing... even if I'm there all by myself.
As far as I know all standard 4 jaw wood chucks are self centering. However there are speciality chucks for eccentric turning. I've seen a few pictures of those that where 4 jaw. And if you start another thread on the metal turning please try to remember to tag me so I see it.
Made brush #5 today. Experimenting with anodizing. Had a red dye but the test piece came out very pink so I aborted on the dye. Here you can see it with my first for comparison. The anodizing has a mat white quality. It won't tarnish like the polished aluminum, but it won't shine like it either. Going to play with some color and some new shapes...