Rockler Mandrel for Cheese Knives/ bottle openers, etc

[Michael Schaefer]

Hi Guys, I recently bought the cheese knife set from Rockler and I'm having trouble with the mandrel.  http://www.rockler.com/mandrel-3-4-in-shoulder-1-4-in-20-threads  

I have had no issue attaching the mandrel to the blank, my problem lies in connecting the mandrel to my headstock.  The photos seem to show a drill chuck, but my drill chuck (and I think most) is just a friction fit between the drill chuck and the morris taper shaft.  If I mount the drill chuck in my headstock, then put the mandrel and work piece on, without having the tailstock putting pressure on the workpiece (and effectively the drill chuck) then the drill chuck separates from the morris taper shaft and the workpiece falls.  

I was at the Rockler store on Sunday and they were dumbfounded by this....they actually put the parts together and then went "yeah that isn't going to work."  They didn't have a solution.

Do I need to get a different drill chuck?  I'm not having the best luck finding one that will screw onto my headstock.  I'm a pretty novice turner and this has me completely flummoxed.  

 

[RichardA]

I'm not a turner, so take this with a grain of salt!  Do you have a drill press? I rough turned a couple of small things on my drill press!  It's not fun, but it can be done, at least till you find the proper solution!

[Gixxerjoe04]

You need a collet chuck

http://www.amazon.com/PSI-Woodworking-Products-LCDOWEL-Collet/dp/B004CVJBZS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456883712&sr=8-1&keywords=collet+chuck

[TomP]

Doesn't your mandrel have a taper. If so, the mandrel goes on your head stock, then slide your blank on with the bushings and thumb screw. put your live center in your tailstock and bring it up to the mandrel. I will look at the kit to see what's up. I just did a coffee scoop, ice cream scoop, and a seam ripper. Then again I may be way off course.

ok Mike. Got it. The piece that goes into your drill chuck is like the one I use to turn a bowl. Mount that in your chuck with threads out. Drill your hole at whatever depth they want and thread the blank unto the mandrel. Install a live center in the tail stock and bring up to support the blank. Start turning. The 3/4 mandrel is sized to match the diameter of the cheese knife. Hope that helps.

[williaty]

If you wanted to attach your Morse Taper drill chuck to the headstock securely, you'd need to use a Morse Taper to Jacobs Taper arbor (the bit that sticks out the back of your drill chuck isn't actually a solid piece of metal with the body of the chuck) with a female thread in the Morse side of it so that you could use a drawbar to set it firmly into your headstock.

 

As mentioned above, it would be a much better idea to buy a Morse Taper collet sized correctly to your mandrel. You'll still have to use a drawbar to firmly seat the collet into the headstock, but it will be MUCH more secure, less likely to have vibration problems, and hold the work closer to the headstock than using the drill chuck. Be aware that a collet is made to hold one and only one diameter of object. Their range of accommodation is only a few thousandths of an inch on either side of their nominal female diameter. That's why drill chucks became popular: they allow you to hold a huge range of diameters of things in comparison to a collet. Even a small drill chuck can handle a diameter range that would take a set of 10-15 collets to cover. On the other hand, the collet is a rock-solid mount and has impeccable centering and lack of runout while the drill chuck is loosey-goosey and vague.