I've already gotten some GREAT help from people on the board about lathes, chucks, etc. Most notably Mark Blabaum, regarding construction of checkered wood pieces, and Mike Barkley with regard to a lot of other stuff :-)
Thanks a ton guys.

I have a new Nova Midi chuck sitting here (gosh it's purty), my Jet Mini is on order from Amazon for $199 w/free shipping (new model, indexing head and spindle locks), won't have it until mid/late February. That's ok, I'm too busy ice-fishing right now... I also joined my local chapter of the American Association of Woodturners (yes, I will be turning pens, peppermills, bowls, in the near future :-)

The questions I have now seem very basic, but I'm trying hard to lessen my learning curve - I have not worked with any wood yet. I'm wondering what's the best way to mount a wood grip (or grips, I'll build mainly split grips). I love the idea of drilling out the wood to fit a flex-coat arbor - but what is the best way to do this - specifically so you don't end up with the arbor showing say at the top of the foregrip or at the butt? Also, what is the best way to mount and turn the wood?(barring buying Andy's wood mandrels, which I intend to do when my pocketbook recovers from the lathe/accessories purchasing spree) I like the idea of pre-boring the wood blank to keep everything centered, but then do you have to bore the blank to the largest diameter of the rod blank and use tape arbors to make it fit? Ok, if I do this - is there a good way to put the pre-bored grip on a standard mandrel without it spinning around? Same for mating wood and cork together - I would assume you turn the wood to very close to the finished diameter, glue it up to the cork, then turn the cork down to the wood? I would appreciate any and all help, little tips, things NOT to do, etc. Also, are there any Rodmaker back issues that address any of this stuff? I see one (forget the issue#) that mentions building multi species wood grips.

Sorry for the ton of questions, my brain is spinning with ideas and I can't wait to try them out, but I want to do it the right way.

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide!

Yup, you got the wood/cork fit-up idea right. We use wood trim rings as spacers between sections of our cork grips and sometimes on our foregrips and we found that after we size the stack of grip rings (or the premade one-piece grip) to the rod, and we size the individual wood rings to fit the rod where they're gonna be, the best way to get the whole thing to go together is first to glue the wood ring to the proper end of the cork section. We use one of those smaller Quick Grip units to hold it. Then we put it on the rod. We do it this way with each cork-stack and wood-ring combination.

We use mandrels to shape and semi-finish the grips (regardless of the combinations of wood and cork). The mandrels are spare pieces of old rods, or wood dowels. After shaping and smoothing you ream the grip, or the sections of it, to fit the rod. The mandrel is used just to assemble the grip pieces.

As for an arbor, I'm not sure about your reference to it showing on the grip. Generally, our grips butt up against the reel seat on one end, and are capped on the other, so an arbor wouldn't be visible on either end. If you want an all-wood butt end to a wood grip, use the small wooden plugs available for the purpose. There are also some nice metal disc-caps used mostly for fly-rods.

The only thing to be careful of is that any holes you drill are centered going in and coming out the other end. A drill press helps ut it just takes practice.

Uncle Russ
Calico Creek Rods

Rich,

The only way that I have found to get it straight is to bore the wood BEFORE I turn it, I do this on the lathe and usually bore the stock to 3/8" as that is good for most of the rods that I build (smaller rods I just drill smaller) I then put them on the mandrel and turn/shape them (this way they are sure to be concentric to the hole) and ream them to fit the rod just like I would with a cork grip. When combining materials, wood/acrylic/cork, etc. I glue up and mount on mandrel and turn. You have to be aware of the different hardnesses (I keep the chisel turning on the acrylic, for instance, until it's close to size, then do the wood part, etc).. Not as hard as it sounds. For split grips, Iyou can bore out the hole close to the size that you need for the end that will be showing and when it's completely done (sanded, finished etc. wrap tape around it to protect it and chuck it up and re-bore to the size of a flex coat arbor but only drill to about a half inch or so from the end. That way you can just slide the arbor in and it won't show.

Andy's new mandrels have a sliding collet and threaded portion on one end that enables you to securely lock the stock in place The best thing since sliced bread!!!! [www.rodbuilding.org]

I'm not that good at explaining so feel free to e-mail me

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/25/2007 10:54AM by Mike Barkley.

Andy Dear's mandrels are a must. That is the only way I've found how to keep the ID centered perfectly. Bite the bullet and get one or two sizes.

I used the flexcoat arbor on one grip, it's a lot of work and I'm not sure just how much weight you really save by doing it that way. It was a while ago and I'll see if I can remember just how I did it. I think it went something like this. First I started with a size 20 arbor and sanded it down on my pen mandrel (1/4" shaft) to fit the ID I was about to make. Next, I chucked up a 1 1/2" blank in my Nova chuck then used a brad point bit to bore out the blank equal to the length of the arbor and epoxied the pre-sanded arbor in while it was still in the chuck. Leaving it in the chuck to dry, I then drilled the arbor and blank all the way through with a 3/8" bit to get everything centerbored together. The blank I was using had a butt just a hair bigger than 3/8" is why I said that you should get a couple different sized mandrels, or turn your own bushings with a 3/8" ID to fit the size you need. I then mounted the blank on my 3/8" mandrel from Andy Dear and used a fender washer on the arbor end to keep the spacer from eating into the arbor while I turned the blank. The arbor end is obviously the reel seat end and I used an inletted type fly seat and the OD of the ring covered the arbor and only the wood showed. I can't remember exactly what size brad point bit I used, but it had to be smaller than the OD of the inletted reel seat hardware. I think it was 3/4" or maybe 5/8", it's too cold to go outside and get my micrometer to check what size I used. Since the butt of the blank is almost always going to be a different size than your mandrel, I just use a tape arbor to fit the grip to the blank. I tried to make the ID of the grip smaller than the blank and step drill/ream out the grip to fit the blank, but I invariably ended up with one end or the other (usually the fore end) being off center enough for me to be extremely upset with the finished product. The winding check can sometimes cover that issue up, but I have found that oversizing the grip by just a hair is a much cleaner and easier way to go. CLear as mud?

Since you will be turning pens, pepper mills etc, you will become familiar with pen bushings. If you have a rod that is smaller than your mandrel, just turn yourself a bushing to fill in the void between the mandrel and grip and turn away.

Ive never turned any handles but the custom duck call guys have all kinds of tricks for turning game calls. Some mandrels are hardwoods turned to their own specs with rubber o-rings to hold the wood in place. also a PLS system that grips only when spinning at webfootcustomcalls.com.

Find the book Turning Custom Game Calls and youll have another great use for that lathe. These guys know turning.

Rich,

I'm surprised nobody mentioned this!! Invest in Andy's DVD, Wood Turning For Rodbuilders, or something to that effect. I don't have it in front of me, and I can't remember the exact title. Anywho, it will be an invaluable learning tool for turning wood grips.

Good luck, and Happy Turning,

Bill in WV

Thanks guys - that's alot of help!

I do intend to pick up Andy's wood mandrels and DVD too - I know they will make life alot easier.

Mike - what do you use to ream the wood??? I have been kicking around trying your idea of re-chucking the bored/turned grip to re-bore for a flexcoat arbor - I will be trying that.

Jay - thanks for those tips too - I know what the pen mandrels look like, I will be picking one of those up soon too, I can see them having a LOT of uses in rodbuilding and of course pens, duck calls, etc.

Robert - custom duck calls is another one I want to try, pretty neat and functional stuff there - thanks for the site!

I can't wait to get my lathe!!!

Several thoughts:

1. If you're low on cash right now, buy these two sizes of mandrels from Andy Dear--5/16" and 7/16". Almost everything you turn for freshwater rodbuilding will be close to that. You can then ream just a little with a rattail file and be exact. Or, if you have a really small fly rod, you can shim the blank with thread. If you know a welder or machine shop guy, you might luck out and get some scrap. The hardest part is getting the counterbore for your tailstock, though.

2. The "arbor inside the wood" idea is really neat, but it's a ton of work, and doesn't save enough weight to justify all the work, IMO. Besides, it gets really tricky on fly grips with the contours. The couple of times that I did it, I used low grade cork as the arbor. That way, even if it shows, it doesn't look bad. Actually, it kinda' looked neat.

3. Drill your wood, slide it on the arbor, then slap some 5 minute epoxy on either end of the wood/mandrel. Let dry, then turn. The trick is to get the epoxy on the wood and down the mandrel about 1" on both sides. If the bond breaks and the wood spins, put some more epoxy on it, let it dry, etc. Andy's new mandrels would be the best option to this issue, but I'm accustomed to doing it the other way, and I already have the original mandrels.

Andrew - I have 'conventional" mandrels in 1/4, 5/16, and 3/8 sizes - I bought drill rod from MSC and found a local machinist to make them for me, so I've been turning cork on hand drill lathe setup for quite some time - your idea of the 5 minute epoxy on each end is interesting - do you ever have any trouble with not being able to break the bond after you are done turning the handle?

If you have those mandrel sizes, then you're set. You have exactly what you need for the wood. Rarely will you need anything larger.

I have never had any problem with the bond not breaking. If it's just on the ends, there's no problem. In fact, I generally try to get a little just inside the edge of the wood too. The bigger problem you'll have is keeping the wood from breaking loose and spinning. You can keep this from happening (sometimes) by sanding the edges of the wood off on a belt sander before you put the mandrel/wood on the lathe. It's usually the turning from square to round that breaks the epoxy bond.

If your epoxy bond lasts till you get the handle or insert turned, then just use your chisel to cut it off the mandrel.

Andrew, as mentioned above, you can make your own mandrels from smooth rod. I prefer drill rod, but smooth rod from the local hard ware is ok. I use end drills to install the end holes to match with the tail stock of the lathe. As far as using foam arbors, why? If you are going to ream the arbor to fit, just ream the wood handle itself. I have a bunch of broken rods that I have turned into reamers, using sanding belt spiraled and glued to the rod blank. Using this method you will ensure a much better fit, the taper will be correct, and the sensitivity of the wood mounted directly to the blank is the reason that custom rods are better than factory. Measure the place the end of the handle will end up on the rod, top end of the handle, then just pick the drill bit that is the closest to the size without being larger. In the reaming process the fit will be taken care of because of the taper of the reamer. I can't remember the last winding check I used to cover the end of the handle. The handle is custom fit to the blank and no gaps or rough ends to show through. Longer drill bits will be necessary to drill the center holes, but as mentioned before, once the hole is drilled, and the mandrel is installed, if you have a band saw or hand grinder, the corners can be cut or ground off and it will make the turning much easier. Remember if you drill a hole using a 3/8ths drill bit it will not be a 3/8 hole, the 3/8ths rod will not fit. So you may have to upsize 1/64 size bit to get the mandrel to fit. If the hole is loose, then take masking tape, spiral it on the mandrel, one end is all you need, and hand turn the wood the same direction the tape is wrapped, you can take up the gap and the wood will stay put on the mandrel. One tip is , when turning the wood, put the taped bushing end towards the chuck, and that way normally I work from right to left and the wood will keep working towards the tape and not come loose. Just my take on the subject. Galen Briese