Oldie but Newie
 

Hello everyone,

I'm a retired software developer. I've had a life-long interest in manufacturing processes, especially metal-forming methods. I have
several hobbies, all of them scale models; sailing ships, horse-drawn
vehicles, antique trucks and cars. All scratch-built.

I have a Jet 10" woodworking lathe and recently bought from Penn State
Industries which converts the lathe to a metal-spinning machine. I hope
this was a good investment. I know very little about the metal spinning process but I'm sure any questions about it can be answered here.

Looking forward to joining the forum.

Arlen, welcome and thanks for the introduction. Hope you find the site helpful and enjoyable. Thanks for joining us.

HI Arlen welcome to the forum
Peter

Hi and welcome Arien!:)
We have a few spinners here that might be able to help.

Please post pictures of your successes and failures of the metal spinning . This is a interest that has tickled to long and is turning to the itch stage . I now have a lathe big enough for starters but finding big enough pcs of metal for cheap enough to make a lot of scrap just to learn with no particular actual need . has bin the stumbling block. I have watch utube videos and want to try it.

metal spinning - very difficult!
 

I have just recently become interested in metal spinning and have found the process very frustrating. I purchased the conversion kit to convert a small (Jet 10") woodworking lathe to a metal spinning one. I also ordered the Terry Tynan DVD for small lathes. Of course he makes it look so easy. As you can see from the photo my attempts are laughable. The disc on the left was not annealed, but the other was, with somewhat better results. In the process of spinning I also re-annealed with no improvement. The mandrel is shaped to resemble an old truck headlight. The brass used is about 22g and comes from K&S. The edges of the blanks always waffle (is there a correct term for this condition?). I understand one reason for this is applying too much pressure at the edge. I can't seem to get the edges to bend toward the mandrel. The discs would turn out great if I were trying to spin a sombrero! Questions are: is lathe speed important, is the metal too thin,etc.. Any advice would be extremely gratefully received.

Arlen