Just to clarify: there are some really great treadle lathes in the world. The basic idea is sound. But they're much harder to build than a spring pole lathe and some of the shop-made examples I've seen haven't worked well. If you're building your first lathe, the spring pole design is more likely to work on the first try.
I totally agree on the assessment with some of the later model flywheel lathes. I operate a few different flywheel treadle lathes (cast iron) and some perform much better than others. But i have also found that it really depends on what i plan to do on the lathe. This helps me choose the particular lathe for the work i want to accomplish. As always, great video Rex!
on the subject of spring lathes, after the innitial design is doned, would it be possible to go fancy and find a way to atach a spring to body? like thin bamboo which holds its spring well after it dries or mabe laminated pole?
@@jebowlin3879 if you search for "roy underhill pole lathe" in google images, you can see a tested design for a spring lathe that comes with integrated "spring" (only mentioning Roy because it's easy to find pictures by googling with his name)
Any particular reasons a tredle lathe didn't work as well? I've always had the idea of using the base off an old treadle sewing machine to make a lathe (not because I'm overly interested in turning, I'm more interested in building the thing itself
A tip for using a pole lathe is try to work with green wood as much as you can, just get 90% of the way done and then finish the piece once it has dried and warped. It's a significantly quicker and much more enjoyable tool to use that way
I'm from a long line of woodworkers, on both sides of my family. I am a woodworker as well, and I make it a point to do high quality work. My father was a woodworker, his father was a woodworker, and about two or three more generations back were also. My grandfather on Dad's side made his own wood lathe, and he had repurposed an old foot powered Singer sewing machine for the turning action. When he passed away the tools in his shop were meant to be passed down to me, through my Dad. That old foot powered wood lathe was one I was especially hoping to get my hands on. I wanted to try doing the turning the old fashioned way that my grandfather used. His wood lathe was definitely more refined than the one you made in this video, and the belt drive worked off of the foot pedal of the old singer kept the material turning in the same direction. Unfortunately, a cousin took all the tools from Grandfathers old shop and sold them. He did not ask to do so, he just did it. I've not associated with him since that time, because he knew that was supposed to be my inheritance, and did not care. He just wanted the money he was able to get out of it. Not being in the family business of woodworking may have played a part in his choices. Grandfather's furniture was some of the best made furniture in the whole area of northwestern South Carolina, The adjacent parts of North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama. On my mother's side of my family was a buggy building company partnered ownership. The one that was my ancestor designed and built the carriage of Catherine the Great of Russia. If you've ever seen photos of that carriage, you know how ornate it was. That is what my family is about, high quality in everything we make. I still live by that tradition to this day.
I build a spring pole lathe just like this 20years ago. I used it alot and its fun. I never missed a moving headstock . I used it alltime outside and fixed it to the ground so i can do heavy cuts . sometimes its usefull to ad some wight to the legs when you can´t fix it to the ground
A good example to study is Roy Underhill’s design. I think he solved some of the problems you encountered while trying to provide a similar, inexpensive path to a human powered machine that can produce high quality results. I applaud your ingenuity and tenacity and I’m impressed with your creativity. I would encourage you to study others designs who have expressed a similar motive for bypassing the modern electrical contraptions and opting for a closer relationship to the material we love to transform into beautiful, functional objects.
YES!!!!! Love this video! I built a pole lathe a few years back and it is one of my most favorite tools to use and I’ve built a lot of really gorgeous stuff with it. Turned table legs, in particular, put your furniture in a different category. I built mine crazy cheap and fast - 100% SPF (except the tool rest) and didn’t even plane the parts or even wait for the wood to dry. It twisted some, but still worked great. No real joinery (except the wedges); I just screwed it all together. It's very "bodger" style - down and dirty. But it works amazing. So great I never bothered to build a “nice” one. I have low ceilings in my basement so I use a bungee instead of a pole. I also eventually rigged up a couple pulleys to get a 2:1 mechanical advantage so now with each stroke I get twice as many turns and twice the turning speed. And with pole lathe turning the number of rotations and rotational speed is KING. Just promise to keep make pole lathe videos. Too many popular woodworking youtubers make one video on making the pole lathe, try a video using it, and then you never see the lathe again. So please keep using it and making videos with it. I will also say that a pole lathe is the absolute cheapest and easiest way to MASSIVELY expand one’s woodworking capabilities. Everyone should make one. Once you can turn something it opens up a TON of new options.
I've been searching for a good hand built lathe video as I work totally unplugged. Loved this, I really enjoy when you show the honesty of how your build processes go!
In regards to learning the first time you make something, regardless of how experienced we are, Jimmy Diresta has a great saying: "You go to school on the first one."
Flywheel definitely is a bit more complicated to build. And to balance. But still I'm right in process to building one right now. I tried out one such flywheel lathe some 40 years sgo. With a belt, and the two parallel beams made of 2" by 4" pine planks. I love how it worked. Mine will be with bearings, one of them conical. I'm not a very physically strong man, ya know...
Can’t wait for your follow up! I wonder if using an actual spring would give you a better easier result? Maybe extend the two legs up, add a second ‘bed’, and hang the spring from that. Might prevent the “jumpiness” you mentioned, which I’m guessing is the pole trying to pull the whole lathe up to the ceiling. Would also make it even more portable!
Very cool idea, looks kinda portable. You could move it outdoors and not have to cut a limb😅. Hey Rex, I have been following your videos for a couple of years and really like the information you share with the community. I live in Hartville, so if you ever come to the flea market let me know. I have a lot of antique stores you may want to check out and some you have mentioned in the past. I have been out of work for 2 years and cannot afford to subscribe to your patrion or I definitely would. I hope one day to shake your hand and thank you personally for the encouragement you have given me to get back in the shop.
First of all, just wanted to say, great design! very simple, cheap, and affective. One minor nitpick @ 6:27 you can see the end of the steel start to run through colors, and you can see the point of the tailstock is purple and gold. Not too sure about the steel alloy, but generally speaking, you shouldn't heat hardened steel up to that temperature unless you're going to re-heat treat it. I bet it still works great, but refraining from heating it up like that in the future would improve the longevity of the part!
At the moment I have two projects going, restoring a 1940’s wood lathe is one of them, however the second project hasn’t gotten off the ground yet, and that is a flywheel/ treadle lathe, for this build, I want to have an adjustable bead height, or a detachable section of bed, for turning larger bowls. With my knowledge of mechanical things and wood turning I also know that the weight of the lathe is just as important as the inertia of the flywheel, and that the drive pulley vs the head stock pulley will help maintain speed! So engineering and imagination both will come into play!
I made a spring pole lathe from Roy underhill's plans as my first lathe a few years ago. Loved it! I turned parts for a rocking chair, and some coffee table legs, a blank for a wooden screw, tons of stuff. It was fun! I did convert it to a bungee cord instead of the wooden poles, much more convenient, and you can adjust the tension by adding more bungees or changing the way you hook them up.
Hey Rex!! TYSM for the inspiration and motivation to make mine. To know that a pole lathe is better than continuous motion was the last thing I needed to hear to give me the push. I’ve started it! I’ll be using the style of legs you shared, the takedown style so it doesn’t occupy as much space, and the same screws you showed here. I’m making it more traditional style because I have access to plenty of wood, and I’ll make it closer to Townsend’s version, mostly from a single tree, milled by myself. I’ll also be making it to work standing up, I’ll get more power on the leg’s downstroke. I’m using parts of old tires instead of a pole though - learned I could do this from Advoko Makes. He has tons of brilliant content. He cuts the sidewall of a tire into a continuous rubber strip/strap. Good use for what would otherwise be trash in a landfill. Ps: check out his clamper. I fixed all the old chisels around the garage that my dad had split open because he didn’t know they had to be used with a wooden mallet instead of a steel hammer. Easier than remaking handles and have withstood a lot of work, and will stay in place till I remake them on my new lathe haha
Great idea for a project. Seems a bit complicated to me but no idea how you can simplify this. Like you mentionned trials and errors would help. Nice reminder about the fact that we should build in bulk before refining the piece of work. Gratz! 👏
The video is great, but the discussion around and during the making of this project is well worth the price and time. I truly can't recommend that highly enough.
I built mine in a similar fashion, but into my workbench. Both heads were removable. Two 8" 2x4 stand outs and a full length 2x4. It had one of 2 string overhead pivot arm styles with the spring pole under my bench between the legs.
If your already laminating the end stock, just clamp the pieces together (and maybe screw too) before gluing, drill the through hole, then inset a nut that fits the threaded rod. Though, that many wood threads are probably fine.
I’ll be looking for the plans eagerly. I’ve been wanting to build one for years-since seeing the design in FoxFire #2. I’ve started other projects that were beyond my abilities, however, and was waiting for a good plan.
the manx leg is just genius design. looks super strong, simple, and efficient . i did not know about this. thanks Rex. it would also make very good, light sawhorses, i bet.
I saw a treadle-lathe for sale on FaceBay the other day and I was mildly tempted by it - having heard they're not as good makes me glad I didn't bother investigating it further. This one looks like a beast and I'm looking forward to seeing it more
Just a thought, why not use the internal thread on the clamp as a nut in the poppet and just drill a tight clearance hole for the bolt? To reduce the jumpiness you could add some kind of platform for the user to sit/stand on that transfer their weight to the lathe. Finally, have you tried to drive the workpiece using some kind of pulley on the drillpress instead of the pedal?
When you're taking your lathe apart get a pair of coupling nuts to put over the ends of the points. Keeps you from poking holes in yourself. Voice Of Experience here... And yeah, pole lathes are fast. I was at the Bodgers Ball last May and competed in the Log 2 Leg race. My time was just shy of 19 minutes to make two chair legs from a log. And I was dead last. The winning time was less than 9 minutes. Yikes.
I made one years ago and opted to use a bungee cord tied to the rafter over a spring pole. Not as “authentic”, but it was much easier to get the springy-ness.
I really like the idea of this. I might have a couple ideas of my own to try if I ever get experienced enough to do this. Instead of a tree branch, I could possibly swap it for an actual spring bolted to the rafters. I could also make or buy a pulley to put the rope on, so I can work on the whole piece without having to reconfigure it. That would also let me bolt the lathe to the floor so it doesnt jitter around like this one. Heck, with a pulley, I could add a bit of gearing, so I can get more speed and more turns with less foot power.
Quick tip if it helps: put a metal pipe on the handle of the clamp screw when you want to thread it into the poppet. The longer the pipe, the more leverage you can put on it. Also works great for lug nuts!
Such a great video! Lots of solid tips, ideas and concepts. Even though you're not satisfied with the result, you were never going to be fully satisfied on your first attempt.
You could also cut off the threaded part of the c clamp and counter sink it on the work side of the poppet. Epoxy it in place and then you have metal threads. You can also cut the threaded part in half to create nuts so that the thread doesnt move.
I’ve been in the process of building a lathe based on Roy Underhill’s double spring pole design for a while now. I ton a break to figure out making bowl hooks, but with the weather finally starting to cool a bit, I’m going to get that finished soon. I hope by end of October.
"i let my 2x4s dry in the shop for a few weeks" you are so freeking smart, i just learned the hard way on something similar, i had bought 2 treated posts and used a post hole digger to sink them in the ground, bought the straightest ones home depot had, used my level and made them perfectly vertical and cemented them in, in just like a weeks time they warped so bad and look horrible now. interesting how that works, clearly you know from experience on this as well for you to leave them sit for a few weeks.
Thank you so much for making this. I'm not convinced on the reciprocating concept vs a flywheel because I feel like the speed is just not going to be there, but I can see how much you learned from this project and I am grateful that you've shared it.
The power output of your leg is relatively constant. Extra speed comes at the cost of less torque. Furthermore, varying the speed/torque on a pole lathe is trivial, just move the anchoring point of the thread to the treadle closer or further to the pivot point.
@hugbearsx4 No doubt one could build some mechanism to convert torque to speed, but I was speaking specifically to the reciprocating nature of it. If the rope was wrapped around a ratcheting point the wood would keep turning in one direction and you wouldn't be fighting the momentum of the piece.
If you can't find a good branch to setup one of these or if you're worried about the branch taking out your lights when it falls you can use an extension spring to achieve the exact same effect. It ends up costing only a few dollars more from harbor freight and you'll need a bit of wood to hang it above the work piece but otherwise the concept is the same. Spring pulls rope, rope unwinds and spins piece. Super simple and very effective. Also saves you having to replace your lights cause a branch broke in your garage. That's a real pain, ask me how I know...
so... I want to do something like this, but I need the pedals to operate in only one direction like a modern lathe [generally] does. I was thinking about using bike sprockets, pedals, and chains to operate this, but it feels complicated. It's one of those things where I'd like to get a design that more or less works first, and you've given me something close. Thank you for this.
could you have cut up the frame of the g-clamp to utilise the threaded hole in it - after all it is a perfect match to the thread of your shaft. Maybe angle grind it out in a slight wedge shape, chisel our wedge-shaped hole in your lathe's frame & hammer it in.
I defer to your expertise on spring pole vs treadle but I will stick to my trusty Powermatic 3520. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.🙂🙂
Why not cut off end of C-clamp, drilling holes for cross pins. Mark, chop out relief in wood, no need for exactness. Drill pour hole and relief holes. Clamp halves together, fill with thin, long set epoxy, while tapping to remove bubbles and voids. Result: long lasting metal threads. Longer time to rebuilding. Thanks for getting my thoughts sal flowing. God bless
Instead of a sping pole you can use a bungee cord for the return. Tension it horizontally a little and attach the cord in the middle or the bungee then down to your pedal
Hey Rex! You did amazing! I don't if you're doing a follow up, but... how about salvaging a motor and doing a powered add on? It would be cool for the final tool if it could do both. Of course it's using the spring pole, so that means a different end piece I guess? That would be kind of a pain. I wonder if a motor could turn the string instead of the pole.
Built one a few months ago myself. I used dual uprights instead of the sapling spring pole. Bungee cord is strung between the uprights and paracord connects to the workpiece and the treadle. I dont have a dedicated spot for the lathe and too many spiders up in the rafters.
Well, I am surprised about the comments that some don't like the treadle lathe with the fly wheel. I have heard a number of solutions for the fly wheel, most common was the brake drum from a truck, which had mass and was balanced. For your tool rest, most when turning spindles prefer the tool rest to be slightly above center height. A lower rest means having to drop your tool handle lower to get the proper cutting angle. For the tool rest itself, I would use the hardest wood you can find. Also, a piece of A@ drill rod, better if it is hardened, can be epoxied into a shallow groove on top of the tool rest. Far better than cast iron. Proper/most efficient cutting angle for spindles is more of on a tangent rather than square to the center like. It cuts better/easier that way. And eventually, you need to skew it... I am also wondering when the line shaft lathes and power machines came in to use. I know water wheel powered shops have been around a long time.
0:26 i think water-driven lathes were around back then, they seem to go back to around the early 1700s. not a gripe with your video, just think it’s cool to know that!
Please do a short video on how the string works. I've seen these lathes before, but never really understood what happens between the time you step on the pedal and the work piece spins. 💖🌞🌵😷
I might have to check out those books about the #manx legs. If I'm not mistaken, "Manx" is term that implies perhaps this particular technique initiated in the *Isle of Mann*
Hey, that's a super cool project. A few years ago, I wanted to build one, but didn't have much space in my apartment workshop. I was thinking of building one that I could somehow clamp directly to my workbench, so that I wouldn't have to build legs for it, and to use strong rubber bands tied to the (very solid) shelf above my bench. In the end I didn't have time to get into it, but it would be so much fun!
I've been tinkering around with reciprocating lathes for a bit. One conclusion I've come to is that it's probably better to have a tool rest that is on a separate banjo, rather than mounted on the poppets. Sure, poppet mounted is more traditional, and there's logicistical complications with having a movable tool rest, but the ability to get the tool rest set to the right position, without having to worry about complications with the poppets seems worth it to me. Although it's in bits now, the last tool post I built used a stack of 3 3mm plywood shims, so I could move one from either above the ways (to raise the tool post height) to below the ways (lowering the tool post, but keeping a surface for the wedge to press against). With an angled top surface (as you noted), that seemed to be precise enough, whilst not having anything that could slip in use. I think the poppet mounted rest works well for one of the most common historical use cases - where one is making many items of about the same diameter (e.g. the bodger turning out parts for Windsor chair). However, I was wanting to make less individual items, but of much greater variability; hence designing the right poppet mounted tool rest just never fit in. I suspect that most use cases today will be less of the production situation. As a separate point, I also found that the skew chisel was by far the best tool to use, after a gouge to get the stock 'roughly round'. The gouge copes with an interrupted/uneven cut, but the tool pressure is so much lower with the skew that it went much faster. Although the skew is a bit more challenging to use, I think that pays back. Also: With the lower surface speed of a manually powered reciprocating lathe, ordinary tool steel is perfectly sufficient for a cutting tool. Indeed, the typical tool steel (e.g. O1) will usually be able to be honed to a finer edge than the typical high speed steel - which is a difference that I could feel. It also means that one can purchase an ordinary bench chisel of, say, 25mm width, and use that (or grind it to a double bevel), rather than needing specific tools for the lathe. I can see others feeling that the usual HSS lathe tools are a better tradeoff point, but I do think it's worth recognising that non-HSS tools are an option on a pole lathe. Particularly if one wants a specialised tool for limited use (e.g. a form tool for a specific shape; or a captive ring release tool), being able to knock one up quickly can be well worth it.
I have a suspicion you might be happy at how cleanly, quickly, and accurately a brace and bit might handle the holes you need in your poppet, and the driver can be recharged with an unsweetened ice tea or cold beer. I can barely drill a straight hole using an electric drill, and as often as not the point where the drill pops through is ragged.
Thanks Rex this was really great, Mike Abbot is an amazing craftsman, it would be great if you did a video building his "Lumber Horse" which is a really enabling tool for the green woodworker !
Welcome to the ranks of the pole lathers Rex! I'm self taught from Mike Abbott's book too, although my lathe uses a rubber bungee cord instead of a springy pole. It's nice to be able to saw bits off and add bits to a lathe that you have made yourself. When you get the rhythm right, and a stream of buttery smooth shavings is flying off the back of your gouge it is a supremely satisfying feeling. It's very addictive too. Looking forward to seeing your progress on this one.
Looks like it would work well, but could the lathe work if you replaced the spring pole within springs? That modification (if it works) might make a “knock down lathe more “portable.”
Beautiful work, Rex! It turned out great! 😃 Now I'm wondering if I could make a smaller one that could fit my workspace... 🤔 Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
Instead of that huge sapling you might try mounting a bow to the tool. Tie your drive string to the middle of the bow string and use that for the spring action.
I love this lathe design, being portable and all. an upgrade idea would be to have the spring pole attached to the lathe. that way it would be truly portable.
I can't help but think up a design using a spring, or perhaps bungee cord under the workpiece instead of the spring pole above. Having the lathe depend on an overhead spring pole makes it a lot less portable than I'd like. Now using modern springs or bungee cord is kind of a cheat, but I think it's forgivable if the result is a more compact design and makes it easy to set up and move around. I'm just not certain if the design change would make it harder to use. This really bears thinking about. I started writing this thinking about using a steel spring in tension, but I now think using bungee cord would make it cheaper and easier to make. It would need replacing every few years, but I think it's a worth while trade off.
What issues usability issues did you have with the Treadle lathes? My my lathe experience of any kind was building roy underhill's treadle lathe. It worked, but it's also been a bit of a wack-a-mole fixing problems with it. The plus side is it's easy to turn a treadle into a spring pole with some tall 2x4 uprights and a bungee.....
Looks really interesting. I am curious, is it possible with this design to use it for a grinding wheel as well as a lathe? Or would there be too many problems with that?
I think you get more torque from string pull lathe than treadle lathe. One aspect, when you sit down, you can't use your body weight to drive the lathe any more.
I have a spare Singer treadle sewing machine base and am considering using it as the basis for a treadle lathe, or even some other treadle powered workshop tool. I am open to suggestions. Thanks.
I outfitted my shop with electric tools about 2 years before we had this internetz thingie, but never had room to buy that Delta lathe (still don't). THIS solution I could set up in my back porch (or under a living tree like someone below mentioned), and I could finally be turning at age 63. Hmm. Hmmmm.
I just thought... Would it be just as easy to make a drill, with a 'base press' instead of a drill press? (raising the base toward the drill instead of lowering the drill as is the norm).
Just to clarify: there are some really great treadle lathes in the world. The basic idea is sound. But they're much harder to build than a spring pole lathe and some of the shop-made examples I've seen haven't worked well. If you're building your first lathe, the spring pole design is more likely to work on the first try.
I totally agree on the assessment with some of the later model flywheel lathes. I operate a few different flywheel treadle lathes (cast iron) and some perform much better than others. But i have also found that it really depends on what i plan to do on the lathe. This helps me choose the particular lathe for the work i want to accomplish. As always, great video Rex!
on the subject of spring lathes, after the innitial design is doned, would it be possible to go fancy and find a way to atach a spring to body? like thin bamboo which holds its spring well after it dries or mabe laminated pole?
@@jebowlin3879 if you search for "roy underhill pole lathe" in google images, you can see a tested design for a spring lathe that comes with integrated "spring" (only mentioning Roy because it's easy to find pictures by googling with his name)
Any particular reasons a tredle lathe didn't work as well? I've always had the idea of using the base off an old treadle sewing machine to make a lathe (not because I'm overly interested in turning, I'm more interested in building the thing itself
A video on how to power this with a rotary tool would be cool.
A tip for using a pole lathe is try to work with green wood as much as you can, just get 90% of the way done and then finish the piece once it has dried and warped. It's a significantly quicker and much more enjoyable tool to use that way
I'm from a long line of woodworkers, on both sides of my family. I am a woodworker as well, and I make it a point to do high quality work. My father was a woodworker, his father was a woodworker, and about two or three more generations back were also. My grandfather on Dad's side made his own wood lathe, and he had repurposed an old foot powered Singer sewing machine for the turning action. When he passed away the tools in his shop were meant to be passed down to me, through my Dad. That old foot powered wood lathe was one I was especially hoping to get my hands on. I wanted to try doing the turning the old fashioned way that my grandfather used. His wood lathe was definitely more refined than the one you made in this video, and the belt drive worked off of the foot pedal of the old singer kept the material turning in the same direction. Unfortunately, a cousin took all the tools from Grandfathers old shop and sold them. He did not ask to do so, he just did it. I've not associated with him since that time, because he knew that was supposed to be my inheritance, and did not care. He just wanted the money he was able to get out of it. Not being in the family business of woodworking may have played a part in his choices. Grandfather's furniture was some of the best made furniture in the whole area of northwestern South Carolina, The adjacent parts of North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama.
On my mother's side of my family was a buggy building company partnered ownership. The one that was my ancestor designed and built the carriage of Catherine the Great of Russia. If you've ever seen photos of that carriage, you know how ornate it was. That is what my family is about, high quality in everything we make. I still live by that tradition to this day.
Good timing! I'm just building a foot operated lathe from an old bicycle wheel, parts of a fitness rowing machine, and some wood I had lying around.
Using that screw from the c-clamp was a stroke of genius.
Man, that Manx design leg is AMAZING. Solves a lot of problems
But ... I just bought a 12-18 1HP DC Rikon Lathe with the optional bed extension. Don't do this to me Rex, not now. 😆
I'm waiting for the new Nova Neptune from their beta program. Hopefully it will be delivered in October.
I'll take it off your hands
You could use it to build a pole lathe with round legs.
@@ricos1497you used the lathe to build a large....
Yup seems to check out 😂
I build a spring pole lathe just like this 20years ago. I used it alot and its fun. I never missed a moving headstock .
I used it alltime outside and fixed it to the ground so i can do heavy cuts . sometimes its usefull to ad some wight to the legs when you can´t fix it to the ground
I really love these 'history of woodworking' projects.
A good example to study is Roy Underhill’s design. I think he solved some of the problems you encountered while trying to provide a similar, inexpensive path to a human powered machine that can produce high quality results. I applaud your ingenuity and tenacity and I’m impressed with your creativity. I would encourage you to study others designs who have expressed a similar motive for bypassing the modern electrical contraptions and opting for a closer relationship to the material we love to transform into beautiful, functional objects.
What a teaser! Can't wait for you to refine your design to the point that you publish plans...
YES!!!!! Love this video! I built a pole lathe a few years back and it is one of my most favorite tools to use and I’ve built a lot of really gorgeous stuff with it. Turned table legs, in particular, put your furniture in a different category. I built mine crazy cheap and fast - 100% SPF (except the tool rest) and didn’t even plane the parts or even wait for the wood to dry. It twisted some, but still worked great. No real joinery (except the wedges); I just screwed it all together. It's very "bodger" style - down and dirty. But it works amazing. So great I never bothered to build a “nice” one. I have low ceilings in my basement so I use a bungee instead of a pole. I also eventually rigged up a couple pulleys to get a 2:1 mechanical advantage so now with each stroke I get twice as many turns and twice the turning speed. And with pole lathe turning the number of rotations and rotational speed is KING.
Just promise to keep make pole lathe videos. Too many popular woodworking youtubers make one video on making the pole lathe, try a video using it, and then you never see the lathe again. So please keep using it and making videos with it.
I will also say that a pole lathe is the absolute cheapest and easiest way to MASSIVELY expand one’s woodworking capabilities. Everyone should make one. Once you can turn something it opens up a TON of new options.
Thanks for sharing your experience, it's super inspiring! The 2:1 pulley system is an amazing idea!
Could you explain that 2:1 puller system?
I've been searching for a good hand built lathe video as I work totally unplugged. Loved this, I really enjoy when you show the honesty of how your build processes go!
In regards to learning the first time you make something, regardless of how experienced we are, Jimmy Diresta has a great saying: "You go to school on the first one."
Words to live by. I love Jimmy.
Flywheel definitely is a bit more complicated to build. And to balance. But still I'm right in process to building one right now.
I tried out one such flywheel lathe some 40 years sgo. With a belt, and the two parallel beams made of 2" by 4" pine planks. I love how it worked.
Mine will be with bearings, one of them conical. I'm not a very physically strong man, ya know...
Can’t wait for your follow up! I wonder if using an actual spring would give you a better easier result? Maybe extend the two legs up, add a second ‘bed’, and hang the spring from that. Might prevent the “jumpiness” you mentioned, which I’m guessing is the pole trying to pull the whole lathe up to the ceiling. Would also make it even more portable!
Very cool idea, looks kinda portable. You could move it outdoors and not have to cut a limb😅.
Hey Rex, I have been following your videos for a couple of years and really like the information you share with the community. I live in Hartville, so if you ever come to the flea market let me know. I have a lot of antique stores you may want to check out and some you have mentioned in the past. I have been out of work for 2 years and cannot afford to subscribe to your patrion or I definitely would. I hope one day to shake your hand and thank you personally for the encouragement you have given me to get back in the shop.
First of all, just wanted to say, great design! very simple, cheap, and affective. One minor nitpick @ 6:27 you can see the end of the steel start to run through colors, and you can see the point of the tailstock is purple and gold. Not too sure about the steel alloy, but generally speaking, you shouldn't heat hardened steel up to that temperature unless you're going to re-heat treat it.
I bet it still works great, but refraining from heating it up like that in the future would improve the longevity of the part!
At the moment I have two projects going, restoring a 1940’s wood lathe is one of them, however the second project hasn’t gotten off the ground yet, and that is a flywheel/ treadle lathe, for this build, I want to have an adjustable bead height, or a detachable section of bed, for turning larger bowls. With my knowledge of mechanical things and wood turning I also know that the weight of the lathe is just as important as the inertia of the flywheel, and that the drive pulley vs the head stock pulley will help maintain speed!
So engineering and imagination both will come into play!
I made a spring pole lathe from Roy underhill's plans as my first lathe a few years ago. Loved it! I turned parts for a rocking chair, and some coffee table legs, a blank for a wooden screw, tons of stuff. It was fun! I did convert it to a bungee cord instead of the wooden poles, much more convenient, and you can adjust the tension by adding more bungees or changing the way you hook them up.
Hey Rex!! TYSM for the inspiration and motivation to make mine. To know that a pole lathe is better than continuous motion was the last thing I needed to hear to give me the push. I’ve started it! I’ll be using the style of legs you shared, the takedown style so it doesn’t occupy as much space, and the same screws you showed here. I’m making it more traditional style because I have access to plenty of wood, and I’ll make it closer to Townsend’s version, mostly from a single tree, milled by myself. I’ll also be making it to work standing up, I’ll get more power on the leg’s downstroke. I’m using parts of old tires instead of a pole though - learned I could do this from Advoko Makes. He has tons of brilliant content. He cuts the sidewall of a tire into a continuous rubber strip/strap. Good use for what would otherwise be trash in a landfill.
Ps: check out his clamper. I fixed all the old chisels around the garage that my dad had split open because he didn’t know they had to be used with a wooden mallet instead of a steel hammer. Easier than remaking handles and have withstood a lot of work, and will stay in place till I remake them on my new lathe haha
Great idea for a project.
Seems a bit complicated to me but no idea how you can simplify this.
Like you mentionned trials and errors would help. Nice reminder about the fact that we should build in bulk before refining the piece of work.
Gratz! 👏
The video is great, but the discussion around and during the making of this project is well worth the price and time. I truly can't recommend that highly enough.
I built mine in a similar fashion, but into my workbench. Both heads were removable. Two 8" 2x4 stand outs and a full length 2x4. It had one of 2 string overhead pivot arm styles with the spring pole under my bench between the legs.
If your already laminating the end stock, just clamp the pieces together (and maybe screw too) before gluing, drill the through hole, then inset a nut that fits the threaded rod. Though, that many wood threads are probably fine.
I’ll be looking for the plans eagerly. I’ve been wanting to build one for years-since seeing the design in FoxFire #2. I’ve started other projects that were beyond my abilities, however, and was waiting for a good plan.
Very interesting video - Thx Sir!
I learned a lot ❤
Cheers from Poland 🍻
This is amazing, can't wait for the plans!
You can down load the plañs from google just search pole lathe and mike Abbott's pattern comes up
the manx leg is just genius design. looks super strong, simple, and efficient . i did not know about this. thanks Rex. it would also make very good, light sawhorses, i bet.
I saw a treadle-lathe for sale on FaceBay the other day and I was mildly tempted by it - having heard they're not as good makes me glad I didn't bother investigating it further.
This one looks like a beast and I'm looking forward to seeing it more
Just a thought, why not use the internal thread on the clamp as a nut in the poppet and just drill a tight clearance hole for the bolt?
To reduce the jumpiness you could add some kind of platform for the user to sit/stand on that transfer their weight to the lathe.
Finally, have you tried to drive the workpiece using some kind of pulley on the drillpress instead of the pedal?
When you're taking your lathe apart get a pair of coupling nuts to put over the ends of the points. Keeps you from poking holes in yourself. Voice Of Experience here...
And yeah, pole lathes are fast. I was at the Bodgers Ball last May and competed in the Log 2 Leg race. My time was just shy of 19 minutes to make two chair legs from a log. And I was dead last. The winning time was less than 9 minutes. Yikes.
I made one years ago and opted to use a bungee cord tied to the rafter over a spring pole. Not as “authentic”, but it was much easier to get the springy-ness.
I really like the idea of this. I might have a couple ideas of my own to try if I ever get experienced enough to do this. Instead of a tree branch, I could possibly swap it for an actual spring bolted to the rafters. I could also make or buy a pulley to put the rope on, so I can work on the whole piece without having to reconfigure it. That would also let me bolt the lathe to the floor so it doesnt jitter around like this one. Heck, with a pulley, I could add a bit of gearing, so I can get more speed and more turns with less foot power.
Quick tip if it helps: put a metal pipe on the handle of the clamp screw when you want to thread it into the poppet. The longer the pipe, the more leverage you can put on it. Also works great for lug nuts!
Years ago I watched Roy Underhill build and use one of these. As I think about it I believe his was a treadle design.
Such a great video! Lots of solid tips, ideas and concepts.
Even though you're not satisfied with the result, you were never going to be fully satisfied on your first attempt.
You could also cut off the threaded part of the c clamp and counter sink it on the work side of the poppet. Epoxy it in place and then you have metal threads. You can also cut the threaded part in half to create nuts so that the thread doesnt move.
Great work Rex! Very nice first try! Also, your audio is MUCH better in this video than the previous ones i'd seen, so big props for sorting that!
I’ve been in the process of building a lathe based on Roy Underhill’s double spring pole design for a while now. I ton a break to figure out making bowl hooks, but with the weather finally starting to cool a bit, I’m going to get that finished soon. I hope by end of October.
"i let my 2x4s dry in the shop for a few weeks" you are so freeking smart, i just learned the hard way on something similar, i had bought 2 treated posts and used a post hole digger to sink them in the ground, bought the straightest ones home depot had, used my level and made them perfectly vertical and cemented them in, in just like a weeks time they warped so bad and look horrible now. interesting how that works, clearly you know from experience on this as well for you to leave them sit for a few weeks.
Thank you so much for making this. I'm not convinced on the reciprocating concept vs a flywheel because I feel like the speed is just not going to be there, but I can see how much you learned from this project and I am grateful that you've shared it.
The power output of your leg is relatively constant. Extra speed comes at the cost of less torque. Furthermore, varying the speed/torque on a pole lathe is trivial, just move the anchoring point of the thread to the treadle closer or further to the pivot point.
@hugbearsx4 No doubt one could build some mechanism to convert torque to speed, but I was speaking specifically to the reciprocating nature of it. If the rope was wrapped around a ratcheting point the wood would keep turning in one direction and you wouldn't be fighting the momentum of the piece.
@@AramisWyler Yup, the momentum will indeed result in loss of energy at the change in direction of rotation for larger diameter pieces.
If you can't find a good branch to setup one of these or if you're worried about the branch taking out your lights when it falls you can use an extension spring to achieve the exact same effect. It ends up costing only a few dollars more from harbor freight and you'll need a bit of wood to hang it above the work piece but otherwise the concept is the same. Spring pulls rope, rope unwinds and spins piece.
Super simple and very effective. Also saves you having to replace your lights cause a branch broke in your garage. That's a real pain, ask me how I know...
so... I want to do something like this, but I need the pedals to operate in only one direction like a modern lathe [generally] does. I was thinking about using bike sprockets, pedals, and chains to operate this, but it feels complicated. It's one of those things where I'd like to get a design that more or less works first, and you've given me something close.
Thank you for this.
could you have cut up the frame of the g-clamp to utilise the threaded hole in it - after all it is a perfect match to the thread of your shaft. Maybe angle grind it out in a slight wedge shape, chisel our wedge-shaped hole in your lathe's frame & hammer it in.
I defer to your expertise on spring pole vs treadle but I will stick to my trusty Powermatic 3520. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.🙂🙂
Why not cut off end of C-clamp, drilling holes for cross pins. Mark, chop out relief in wood, no need for exactness. Drill pour hole and relief holes. Clamp halves together, fill with thin, long set epoxy, while tapping to remove bubbles and voids. Result: long lasting metal threads. Longer time to rebuilding. Thanks for getting my thoughts sal flowing. God bless
Instead of a sping pole you can use a bungee cord for the return. Tension it horizontally a little and attach the cord in the middle or the bungee then down to your pedal
Love it. Been thinking about making one but been hesitant cause I figured I'd need to build a big heavy base. Love the solution you have.
I usually don’t comment before a video is up, but I am SO looking forward to this video!
Saint Roy has a super spring pole plans (as well as a treadle lathe).
Hey Rex! You did amazing! I don't if you're doing a follow up, but... how about salvaging a motor and doing a powered add on? It would be cool for the final tool if it could do both. Of course it's using the spring pole, so that means a different end piece I guess? That would be kind of a pain. I wonder if a motor could turn the string instead of the pole.
Built one a few months ago myself. I used dual uprights instead of the sapling spring pole. Bungee cord is strung between the uprights and paracord connects to the workpiece and the treadle. I dont have a dedicated spot for the lathe and too many spiders up in the rafters.
Well, I am surprised about the comments that some don't like the treadle lathe with the fly wheel. I have heard a number of solutions for the fly wheel, most common was the brake drum from a truck, which had mass and was balanced. For your tool rest, most when turning spindles prefer the tool rest to be slightly above center height. A lower rest means having to drop your tool handle lower to get the proper cutting angle. For the tool rest itself, I would use the hardest wood you can find. Also, a piece of A@ drill rod, better if it is hardened, can be epoxied into a shallow groove on top of the tool rest. Far better than cast iron. Proper/most efficient cutting angle for spindles is more of on a tangent rather than square to the center like. It cuts better/easier that way. And eventually, you need to skew it...
I am also wondering when the line shaft lathes and power machines came in to use. I know water wheel powered shops have been around a long time.
0:26 i think water-driven lathes were around back then, they seem to go back to around the early 1700s. not a gripe with your video, just think it’s cool to know that!
Please do a short video on how the string works. I've seen these lathes before, but never really understood what happens between the time you step on the pedal and the work piece spins. 💖🌞🌵😷
The treadle lathe is a much more difficult build. Makes me wish I build a spring pole lathe. Should be easy now! Great video!
That’s awesome! I can’t wait to see the next version (and plans)!
I have been thinking about trying to make one of these. Maybe instead of a springy pole, a couple of bungee cords affixed to the rafters might work?
Oh man definitely saving this video and gonna build it! Thanks Rex you the man!!!
I might have to check out those books about the #manx legs. If I'm not mistaken, "Manx" is term that implies perhaps this particular technique initiated in the *Isle of Mann*
See the ‘Three Legs of Man’ and the Manx flag.
Gura mie mooar ayd my charrey.
Hey, that's a super cool project. A few years ago, I wanted to build one, but didn't have much space in my apartment workshop. I was thinking of building one that I could somehow clamp directly to my workbench, so that I wouldn't have to build legs for it, and to use strong rubber bands tied to the (very solid) shelf above my bench. In the end I didn't have time to get into it, but it would be so much fun!
I've been tinkering around with reciprocating lathes for a bit. One conclusion I've come to is that it's probably better to have a tool rest that is on a separate banjo, rather than mounted on the poppets. Sure, poppet mounted is more traditional, and there's logicistical complications with having a movable tool rest, but the ability to get the tool rest set to the right position, without having to worry about complications with the poppets seems worth it to me. Although it's in bits now, the last tool post I built used a stack of 3 3mm plywood shims, so I could move one from either above the ways (to raise the tool post height) to below the ways (lowering the tool post, but keeping a surface for the wedge to press against). With an angled top surface (as you noted), that seemed to be precise enough, whilst not having anything that could slip in use.
I think the poppet mounted rest works well for one of the most common historical use cases - where one is making many items of about the same diameter (e.g. the bodger turning out parts for Windsor chair). However, I was wanting to make less individual items, but of much greater variability; hence designing the right poppet mounted tool rest just never fit in. I suspect that most use cases today will be less of the production situation.
As a separate point, I also found that the skew chisel was by far the best tool to use, after a gouge to get the stock 'roughly round'. The gouge copes with an interrupted/uneven cut, but the tool pressure is so much lower with the skew that it went much faster. Although the skew is a bit more challenging to use, I think that pays back.
Also: With the lower surface speed of a manually powered reciprocating lathe, ordinary tool steel is perfectly sufficient for a cutting tool. Indeed, the typical tool steel (e.g. O1) will usually be able to be honed to a finer edge than the typical high speed steel - which is a difference that I could feel. It also means that one can purchase an ordinary bench chisel of, say, 25mm width, and use that (or grind it to a double bevel), rather than needing specific tools for the lathe. I can see others feeling that the usual HSS lathe tools are a better tradeoff point, but I do think it's worth recognising that non-HSS tools are an option on a pole lathe. Particularly if one wants a specialised tool for limited use (e.g. a form tool for a specific shape; or a captive ring release tool), being able to knock one up quickly can be well worth it.
Wow, this thing is amazing Rex! looking forward to see it in use in one of your future projects!
I have a suspicion you might be happy at how cleanly, quickly, and accurately a brace and bit might handle the holes you need in your poppet, and the driver can be recharged with an unsweetened ice tea or cold beer. I can barely drill a straight hole using an electric drill, and as often as not the point where the drill pops through is ragged.
Great video, as always! I hope you use it to make some tool handles as well as furniture pieces. Thank you!
I'm excited to see your later build. This was a fun watch. Its now on my bucket list of fun projects to start building.
Looking forward to the finished plans.
Bravo bravo! Always clean. And simple.
Thank goodness simple will make one for me and then teach others from my church then open it to the community thanks again my friend
Love the build. I hope Mike Abbott does another print run of the books!
Thanks Rex this was really great, Mike Abbot is an amazing craftsman, it would be great if you did a video building his "Lumber Horse" which is a really enabling tool for the green woodworker !
The algorithm read my mind. I was just wondering if this kind of lathe was possible. Thanks.
That's so cool! I am looking forward to version 2 :-D.
This is exactly what I was thinking about. Thank you Rex
Great video - could you add some insights into why you believe treadle lathes don’t work that well? Thanks!
I look forward to your next iteration.
If anything will get me back into the woodwork shed. Itll be this project
Could you do this as an accessory to mount to your bench, possibly in the vice. I kind of remember the English woodworker doing something like that.
look forward to the redesign. I would buy the plans!
Awesome! I will never own a big, fancy lathe but I just might make one of these!
U think of just connecting string to like a big garage door spring from the ceiling?
Welcome to the ranks of the pole lathers Rex! I'm self taught from Mike Abbott's book too, although my lathe uses a rubber bungee cord instead of a springy pole. It's nice to be able to saw bits off and add bits to a lathe that you have made yourself. When you get the rhythm right, and a stream of buttery smooth shavings is flying off the back of your gouge it is a supremely satisfying feeling. It's very addictive too. Looking forward to seeing your progress on this one.
I've been waiting for this! Nice build Rex!
Looks like it would work well, but could the lathe work if you replaced the spring pole within springs? That modification (if it works) might make a “knock down lathe more “portable.”
Beautiful work, Rex! It turned out great! 😃
Now I'm wondering if I could make a smaller one that could fit my workspace... 🤔
Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
At this point, after the 2018 lathe, you'll be remembered as Rex the Lathe Teaser!
Instead of that huge sapling you might try mounting a bow to the tool. Tie your drive string to the middle of the bow string and use that for the spring action.
I love this lathe design, being portable and all. an upgrade idea would be to have the spring pole attached to the lathe. that way it would be truly portable.
Very cool cant wait to see what you make with it😊
I can't help but think up a design using a spring, or perhaps bungee cord under the workpiece instead of the spring pole above. Having the lathe depend on an overhead spring pole makes it a lot less portable than I'd like. Now using modern springs or bungee cord is kind of a cheat, but I think it's forgivable if the result is a more compact design and makes it easy to set up and move around. I'm just not certain if the design change would make it harder to use. This really bears thinking about.
I started writing this thinking about using a steel spring in tension, but I now think using bungee cord would make it cheaper and easier to make. It would need replacing every few years, but I think it's a worth while trade off.
What issues usability issues did you have with the Treadle lathes? My my lathe experience of any kind was building roy underhill's treadle lathe. It worked, but it's also been a bit of a wack-a-mole fixing problems with it. The plus side is it's easy to turn a treadle into a spring pole with some tall 2x4 uprights and a bungee.....
Looks really interesting. I am curious, is it possible with this design to use it for a grinding wheel as well as a lathe? Or would there be too many problems with that?
I think you get more torque from string pull lathe than treadle lathe. One aspect, when you sit down, you can't use your body weight to drive the lathe any more.
I have a spare Singer treadle sewing machine base and am considering using it as the basis for a treadle lathe, or even some other treadle powered workshop tool. I am open to suggestions. Thanks.
Interesting lathe build; these aren't common. We shared this video on our homemade tools forum this week 😎
I outfitted my shop with electric tools about 2 years before we had this internetz thingie, but never had room to buy that Delta lathe (still don't). THIS solution I could set up in my back porch (or under a living tree like someone below mentioned), and I could finally be turning at age 63. Hmm.
Hmmmm.
Great video!! Will wait for the plan!! Please!
I just thought...
Would it be just as easy to make a drill, with a 'base press' instead of a drill press?
(raising the base toward the drill instead of lowering the drill as is the norm).
Thank you Sir.🎉 14:57
Fantastic video with a lot of good advice that applies to many things....WAY beyond woodworking, Rex! KISS theory rules!