Wood Lathe Tool Holder Repair

I was foolishly trying to round a large piece of tree stump which was out of round and the roughing gouge caught on the wood and broke my cast iron tool holder. The tool holder (as I discovered) was probably not flat and not very heavy so it was really only designed for lightish work.

When I looked up replacements they were of the order of $160. After some research I decided to fabricate one from bits of steel I had lying about the place.

Parts list

• Length of 15mm square steel
• 75mm x 5mm flat steel
• 3/4" water pipe
• 10mm nut
• Eccentric bar and circlips (recovered from  the old tool rest)
• Bed securing assembly (recovered from  the old tool rest)

I started by cutting the 15mm steel square into two lengths  the length of the old holder less 10mm for the two end plates. I put a small 45 deg chamferon the corners of the bars to take the weld. From the flat steel I then cut two pieces one for each end, the one at the tool rest end being higher to cater for the tool rest. I then cut a short piece of the 3/4 water pipe for the tool rest.

I drilled two 20mm holes in the end places centered across and 5mm up from the bottom. I then welded these plates onto the 15mm bars I cut previously. This left a gap of about 50mm in the center for the eccentric bar. I then welded the piece of 3/4" pipe to the inside of the longer end plate to take the tool rest. After drilling a 10mm hole in the side of the pipe, using a short piece of threaded rod as a gauge, I welded a 10mm nut to the pipe to take the tool rest securing screw. I used a 10mm tap to clean up any splatter that obstructed the thread and to cater for any misalignment with the 10mm hole in the pipe.

The assembly was now complete. I then reassembled it and tested it on the lathe bed.

My thanks to Kryn over at the Woodworking Forums for the idea.

Restoring an old paring chisel

 I inherited an old paring chisel from my dad who was a carpenter by profession. The family has some very nice old furniture that he made, possibly using this very chisel.

 The blade is 220mm from the tang which provides very good control over the chisel and it has a primary bevel of about 18 deg and a secondary bevel of 20 deg. This makes it very hard to sharpen. The handle was made by me a long time ago on an old bargain basement  mini lathe (which has since gone to join the choir invisible). the tang ferrule is a piece of copper tubing and the end ferrule is some chrome tubing from a bed that I used to sleep in as a child. Why I thought a paring chisel needed an end ferrule is beyond me.

I think it may be time to make a much nicer handle for it but after I clean it up some more.

In any case I set to yesterday to try to give the edge some much needed TLC and I managed to get a very nice edge to it as can be seen form the photograph below.  I have  not yet had a chance to use it in anger but i tested it by taking a sliver of of a piece of scrap and it came away very nicely indeed.

After many years of being used as a paint tin opener I think that this nice paring chisel is very pleased to be used for what it was designed for. In truth it has probably never been sharper.

Table Saw

I have used it quite a bit over the last few years since I bought it and when I finally decided to hone my woodworking skills I decided that it was time to give it the once over.

One of my neighbours was selling off his woodworking equipment and this Jet 10" table saw was amongst the items he was selling. I paid $200 for this saw and another $100 for a 1 HP twin bag dust extractor.


I started by cleaning the top. It was caked with many years of resin from the various woods that had been cut on it. It made a very nice hard protective coating but did nothing for its smoothness and accuracy. I tried various solvents but nothing seemed to shift it. I suspect that if I soaked it in Turps for several weeks it would have softened over time but being an impatient lad I decided to take a more aggressive approach.

I tried various methods but I finally settled on a 4" angle grinder with a stiff wire brush. I tried it first on a small corner of the table. It did a great job of removing the gunk without any damage to the surface. It took me about two hours of hard graft to clean it up and it came up like new. A final coat of wax and it is like a bought one.

I have adjusted the carriage to straighten the blade but there is one bolt on the front right that is extremely difficult to get to. It still requires a tune up consisting of shimming the side tables (which angle up by one or two mm) cleaning the rust from the rear fence slide, re-adjusting the carriage, and cleaning an lubricating the gears.

All in all it is a great workhorse and cuts very nicely despite its limitations.