Cutting shopmade metal beads

I collect interesting pieces of hardware for jewelry purposes, and many of the best would make great beads if only they were shorter. Objects longer than about 1/2 inch get in the way of a bracelet or necklace developing a nice curve and can be uncomfortable to wear.

So I gathered a bunch of those pieces and made them shorter with an abrasive cut-off wheel mounted in the compound mitre saw.

The face shield and gloves are not optional -- some of the chunks I’m cutting are brass or aluminum, but some are steel, which throws very hot particles of red-hot metal. I had tiny red burns all over my left hand the first time I tried this. And possible disasters include red-hot and freshly sharpened workpieces fired as projectiles or the cut-off wheel exploding. It’s all very exciting, and I risked Eve’s camera to bring you the action shot at the top.

The 1/4 inch baltic birch plywood is a sacrificial fence to support the workpieces and prevent them getting lodged or lost inside the saw’s table. It would have been better to afix the fences to the table and score them with a wood blade, but I was too lazy to change blades twice, and I like the smell of burning wood.

Now there's a pile of interesting objects. I ripped off the biggest burrs with pliers, and then dumped the whole pile in a rock tumbler along with some water, abrasive grit and all of the grinding filings, aniline dye powder, kosher salt, and some rectangular wooden beads that I'll describe in a later post. I like the antiqued finish that results, and the hardware helps with beating up the wooden beads.

Stripping down an abandoned bike

(Originally posted on October 30, 2009)


When I left the post office after shipping a pair of bicycle derailleur gear earrings last week, I walked into an abandoned bike containing the parts to replace them. I spent the evening in the shop taking a first pass at the parts that interest me most. (I’ll try to find ways to use as much of the bike as possible later.)

The bike was a pretty pink Sport Racer with a floral saddle. I treated her gently, like a lady.

I was after the navy blue plastic gears from the rear derailleur, the caged ball bearings in the head tube, and the chain. Except for a little trouble loosening the handlebar gooseneck, the bike gave them up readily.

After a soak and a thorough scrubbing in artists’ odorless mineral spirits (much nicer than hardware store solvent), the bearings and gears are ready to wear. The chain still has a light layer of rust that I’ll need to brush off.

Earrings-in-waiting!

Chunky cherry hexagon bangle

(Originally posted on October 29, 2009)

This bangle started as an offcut from a cherry bowl that I turned years ago. The bowl was successful, and the offcut had such interesting figure that it survived all of the culls.

I picked it up a while ago and saw that there was enough wood left in the corner to get a bangle, but I wasn’t sure how to approach it. There weren’t any interesting wane edges to include, and a square wouldn’t fit, and I wasn’t in a circular mood. So I tried a few polygons and found that anything higher than a pentagon was fine. I grabbed a hex nut from a parts drawer, laid it on the work, and eyeballed out a scaled-up shape.

I had recently tried turning a bangle and hadn’t been happy with having to finish the hollowing by hand, so I drilled out a centre guide hole and bored out the bangle with a hole saw. Then I cut outside my hexagon lines on the bandsaw, and contemplated the work. It was horrible. The wobbly cutlines and bandsaw tracks were not charming, but ugly.

It was then that I began to wish I had flattened and parallel-planed the faces, because there was a quarter-inch difference in thickness from one side of the bangle to the other. I turned to the tablesaw, cranked up the sawblade for the thick workpiece, and crept up on straight sides that were roughly perpendicular to an imaginary average of the faces. Very carefully.

With the shape looking more hexagonal, I flattened the faces on a sander and re-examined the workpiece. The attractive knot and internal split had opened right up to one face, and I could pull the two sides of the split apart like a mouth. Not good now that I was so invested.

I wish I could remember which woodturner to credit for the technique, but I’ve read that cyanoacrylate glues will stabilize and fill through cracks in turnings. I decided to try it, and after packing the cracks with fine red sanding dust, I flooded them with thin adhesive.

After the glue cured, I scraped it off, then sanded to 220 grit and finished with a few rubbed coats of walnut oil. Not the shortest route to the finished piece, but then I didn’t know that’s where I was going.

Set of five small rings

(Originally posted on October 28, 2009)


These were also inspired by discarded designer samples -- in this case, of Abet Laminati Tefor recycled thermoplastic, which looks something like this: http://bit.ly/3mCul2.

...except that these samples had 1/4 inch holes punched in each corner so that they could be strung on a chain. I measured 7/8 inch in from each face and marked out four square blanks with one rounded corner. I stacked the samples and duct-taped around their edges, then gang-cut them on the bandsaw. (Duct tape was my choice here for the fabric backing, which stretched to apply light pressure to hold the stack aligned. But I also like the cred.)

I then marked centre and drilled a 1/4 inch hole in each blank, stacked them all up on a 1/4 x 20 bolt, and added a pair of counter-tightened nuts. This provided a shaft that I could mount in a Jacobs chuck on the lathe. Turning the rings round was more fun than you’d think -- long, thin spirals of coloured plastic off a shallow-fluted detail gouge. I lightly sanded the rings on the lathe, and then removed them from the bolt.I shattered a couple of workpieces trying to find a way to open up the central holes. I expected to be able to enlarge them using a succession of twist drills, but no matter the speed or feed rate, I couldn’t make it work. And with only about 1/8 inch thickness outside the intended 5/8 inch bore, I couldn’t see how to clamp the rings to attempt a hole saw.When all else fails, try abrasives, and a conical grinding point in the drill press worked, if not well, then eventually. I was able to hold the rings by hand while reaming them out. By inspecting the progress frequently and selectively applying light pressure, I kept the bore roughly centered.

I then mounted a 1/2 inch sanding drum with a medium-fine grit (probably about 220), cleaned up the bores, and cut a slight bevel at the inside edges for comfort. The outside edges were no longer quite concentric in some cases, so those were reshaped very gingerly on a benchtop belt sander. I then hand-sanded the rings with 220 grit, and finished by burnishing the plastic with my fingernail.

The finish I ended up with feels good, but looks rough. I’ve been experimenting with the offcuts from this project, and the solution seems to be to finish with scraping and burnishing after the final abrasive shaping.

But Eve wants them for herself, so I must have done something right.

Scalloped bamboo ring

(Originally posted on October 27, 2009)


My wife is an interior design consultant, and she routinely updates her library of material samples. That gives me access to a stream of small chunks of interesting stuff.

In this case, I was given a box of bamboo plywood samples. Some are cross-laminated, and others have plies aligned for appearance. The piece I picked up first was of the latter sort.

Without the cross-laminations, the gluelines would probably be too weak for a bangle, and the sample was too small for that anyway. So a ring or earrings it was, and I’m on a roll with rings.

I started by marking out a 5/8 inch diameter hole in the sample and drilling it with a hole saw. I then cut the workpiece out square and contemplated it. Too chunky -- wearing it would spread your fingers and be uncomfortable.

I mounted a 1.5 inch sanding drum to the drill press and hand-shaped the scallops and rounded over the outside corners. The shape looked better with curves and more interest, and my wife pronounced it wearable. Some tearout and face damage remained from the machining, so I sanded the faces flat and the finger hole round and smooth, rubbed in a couple of coats of walnut oil, and called it done.

The exciting tiger figure on the face was a result of the scalloping process revealing portions of different layers of plant cells. I didn’t plan it, but I sure am pleased with it.