Sphere Turner

For the Wood Lathe.

I have the one thats in your first link sold by boffin guy on eBay

its great works well and I wouldn’t think making one any better is going to make it better to use…it does the job out of the box. And at the price he sells them for I wouldn’t go to the trouble of starting to make a copy.

if you want a ball turning jig rather than making a ball turning jig that is

Hi Vic,

It;s normally called a ball turner and there are lots of articles and designs on metal work forums, youtube, etc.

(and the previous post to this one)

You may get some inspiration from this alternative design, Vic : **LINK**

https://youtu.be/fmzD8wI8RIA

MichaelG.

Thanks folks. I’ve actually got two ball turners already, one for the metal lathe and one similar to the one Michael linked for my wood lathe.
The reason I’m interested in the type in my original post is that they look to be much easier to set up and can be fitted to a standard wood lathe Banjo.

Having used a ball turner there are however a couple of small things I don’t like which I think I can easily improve upon.

Vic,

FWIW - I have a faint idea that this one was described in Model Engineer many years ago, perhaps in the 60's. A round cutter (e.g. a piece of broken drill bit) is inserted into the left hand end and pokes out as per the illustrations in the links above.

Other than making a couple of stainless steel handles (for a six-way turret and a rear tool post, oh and an aluminium ball on the end of the handle which I carelessly cropped off in the photograph), I hardly ever used it.

Capacity? About 50 mm max.

One extravagance was the bronze body, a left-over from another job.

The bronze body was made to be clamped in the normal (ML7) tool post.

I seem to recall making the lead screw with a 40 tpi thread. It allowed very fine adjustment.

Cheers,

Sam

Edited By Sam Stones on 12/10/2021 20:01:28

Thanks. I did see that one during a search. I’ll be using a round carbide insert for the cutter as it works so well on my other jig. I’m looking to turn wooden spheres up to about 250mm diameter.

Sam,

It looks like an earlier version of the ball turners that use a boring head. (Possibly where the designer got the idea)

Yes Paul, very similar.

As my memory mist clears slightly, I feel sure it was described with drawings in ME. That would have to be pre '72.

When I made it I'm not sure. Late 60's or early 70's. It went out with my ML7 and most other stuff in '07.

Cheers,

Sam

From a still chilly Melbourne.