When you have a wood lathe, it can feel like the world is your oyster, and there is nothing that you won’t be able to do. However, as you start learning more about the trade and get new ideas, you may want to start turning other materials on the wood lathe, with brass usually being the first.
To cut brass on your wood lathe, you need to slow down the lathe’s speed to the slowest that it can go. You will need to use the right chuck and have a center ready to hold the tool perfectly, while you have a different tool holder to ensure that the cutting tip can cut into the brass.
Many people have made the easy mistake of assuming that when you are cutting softer metals like brass or aluminum, you can simply use the wood lathe. However, metals are a lot more dangerous to start cutting. They can easily cause you to hurt yourself as the material will act differently.
Can You Turn Brass On A Wood Lathe?
Yes, you can turn brass on a wood lathe as it is considered one of the softer metals on the market and can be cut using only high-speed steel instead of tungsten carbide. It is important to remember that you should only cut smaller brass pieces to make minimal changes to the lathe.
Experienced craftsmen can use the same tools they would use on wood to cut into brass; however, the positioning of the materials and tool sled will be different. You will need to ensure a little space between the tool and the material.
In the metal cutting world, brass is considered a sticky material; this means that it is likely to catch your tool and either rip it out of the holder or out of your hand. This is why you will need to be careful when cutting brass on your wood lathe, as the tool can be pulled out of your hand and flung across the room.
What Tools Will You Need To Use When Turning Brass?
Before you start cutting brass on your wood lathe, we would recommend getting several tools and sleds for your lathe to ensure that you can cut with ease. Many people who have bad stories about cutting brass on a wood lathe have made minimal changes to their lathe before cutting.
It is never easy to cut material on a lathe that it was not necessarily made to cut, with many wood lathes not having a chuck capable of holding onto such small pieces. You need to have the right tools and set up to ensure that the material is being cut in the best way possible.
Center
The first thing you need to get is a center that will work with your brass pieces, depending on the size of your piece. If you are working on small pieces, you may not need to use a center; however, anything longer than one to one and a half inches will need a center hole drilled.
The center ensures that the piece you are working with will stay perfectly centered and prevent the piece from bending as you cut it. This means that when applying the cutting tool, you will be able to make something perfectly round instead of oval-shaped.
Chuck
A metal chuck and a woodchuck have different teeth and closing mechanisms, which means that you may want to get another chuck. However, most often, all you will need to do is get a different set of teeth for your chuck, which will ensure that it can hold onto the brass with ease.
However, if the only type of chuck you have is a spike chuck, you must get an entire new chuck; unlike wood, brass does not do well when trying to spike it onto the chuck. We recommend getting a different chuck to ensure that the cutting materials are not mixing, making a cleaning nightmare.
Tool Holder
While many people can use their chisels and tool sled to cut into brass, we do not recommend this. Not only will the tools be pulled out of your hand, but the tool sled also won’t be able to give you the control that you need to accurately cut into brass, which is not as forgiving as wood.
A proper tool holder for cutting brass will hold the tool you are using to cut or shape the brass between a set of screws. This will allow you to adjust the cutting depth within millimeters, making precise and accurate cuts in the brass without having to guess or try to apply the right amount of pressure.
Coolant
This won’t always be needed, but you should have a bottle on hand to help you cool down the material and the cutting tip. Overheating tools while cutting brass or any metal are usually the ones that will snap, break, or chip, which can be dangerous, especially when cutting on a wood lathe.
However, you need to be careful because brass and coolant usually react with each other, causing a layer of oil to be over the machine. When cutting brass and using coolant, we recommend cleaning the entire machine before and after cutting brass to ensure that you do not get an oily mix.
Air
Air is the machinist’s best friend and will ensure that the brass shavings aren’t flying into your eyes while you are cutting. Brass is extremely hot when you are cutting it, unlike wood, and can burn you and cause scarring while you are cutting it if you are not protected.
You will have to get the air to push away any brass shavings that may be flying through the air, ensuring that nothing is flying into your face or causing trouble. We recommend that you have the air on the cutting to ensure that the shavings get stuck between the tool and the material.
High-Speed Metal
Wood chisels are usually pretty strong; however, they are rarely made out of tungsten or high-speed steels, often just hardened steel. High-speed steel is what cutters are made from, meant to be used on metals of all kinds, with ceramic and tungsten tips meant for the hardest tips.
When cutting brass on your wood lathe, we recommend getting high-speed steels to ensure that you can easily cut into the material. High-speed steel won’t easily chip when cutting brass and will not get dulled within the first few seconds of cutting into the material.
What Types Of Brass Can You Turn On A Wood Lathe?
Now that we know what you need to get before you start cutting brass on your wood lathe, we must ensure that you are not getting the wrong type of brass. As brass is an alloy material, it can be harder or softer, depending on the mixture of the metals inside it.
If you get something too soft, it will be more likely to grab the tool you are cutting with, while getting something hard means that the wood lathe cannot turn slow enough. There are two types of pieces that we recommend working on with your wood lathe; otherwise, you should invest in a small metal lathe.
Soft Brass
Most brass is considered soft and can easily be turned on your wood lathe; these are brass pieces that you would consider easy to dent. If the brass is too soft, it can cause a problem; however, even the softest brass can be turned with absolute ease with the right tool holder.
When deciding what pieces you are making, consider what your wood lathe is capable of doing as well. You won’t be able to cut the material if the machine is turning too fast. Instead, you will often have to adjust the wood lathe to turn on its slowest when cutting your brass.
Small Pieces
If you have a small piece of brass that you need to slightly shape or just put a groove in your wood lathe will be able to cut it. You need to ensure that as little as possible material is sticking out of the chuck and that your machine is not turning at full speed.
Even hardened brass can be cut in this manner to add a few details or just to polish the material into a nearly perfect mirror finish. We recommend that you have a tool sled; if something goes wrong while doing even these small cuts, the piece can become a dangerous projectile.
How Do You Turn Brass On Your Wood Lathe?
We now know what tools you need and which types of brass you can turn on your wood lathe; it is time to get everything on the machine ready for turning the material. We recommend that you go through these steps before you start following them.
Every wood lathe is different and may already have a few of the tools required as standard, with many of the larger machines specifically having the right centers already installed. Knowing what to do before doing anything will mean that you can easily have the best possible cutting experience.
1. Remove The Wood Chuck
This is the most essential part to do first as it will become difficult to do once everything else has been installed. If your wood lathe does not have a chuck with teeth, you need to remove the entire head of the chuck, replacing it with a more traditional one that can clamp onto the piece you are working with.
You need to ensure that the chuck you are placing on the lathe has the right teeth as well. Brass is more likely to slip when being cut and held in the wrong type of chuck, which means that you need to ensure that it can hold onto the piece while you work on it.
2. Put In The New Center and Tool Sled
Two of the most important things you will have to do, especially when working with longer pieces of brass, are to replace the center and install the right tool sled. A typical wood lathe tool sled lets you rest a chuck on it while the center clamps onto the end of the piece you are cutting.
When working with brass, you need a tool center that can hold onto a drill to cut a center hole and then have the tailstock pushed into the center hole. Once that is done, you need to have a tool sled that holds onto the tool using the right screws and bolts, with you only having to move the tool into the cutting position.
3. Adjust The Speed Of The Lathe
Before starting to cut anything, we need to adjust the speed of your lathe, preferably as slow as possible, as woodchucks turn faster than is necessary when cutting brass. You will have to test which speed works the best, but it is essential to remember that slower is usually better.
When cutting into metals, speed usually means that you will make the wrong cut or cause damage to the material you are cutting. Instead, moving slowly but not stopping no matter how deep a cut is the best way to get the perfect cuts and shapes.
4. Put The Material In
Now that the chuck, tool sled, and center have been replaced with the right tools, you will have to put in the material and cut the center hole. With the brass only sticking out a few millimeters push the center with the center drill into the material, cutting a hole perfectly in the middle when measured to the chuck.
Once the center hole has been cut, you need to stop the machine and pull the material into the full length that you want to cut. Using the center to support the material from the center hole, cutting slowly, remember that cutting brass speed will mean it is much easier to make mistakes.
5. Start Cutting The Brass
When cutting, we recommend first cutting the entire length of the material exposed outside of the chuck. This makes everything perfectly center with your center hole; we recommend cutting everything to the shape you need and the lengths you want, including any radiuses.
Once the piece is done, you have to cut it off from the part that is still being held in the chuck. This is because the piece in the chuck will not be centered with the rest of the piece that has been cut. Cutting it off, turning the part around, and sanding everything smooth will give you the best possible piece.
Conclusion
Cutting and turning brass on your wood lathe is entirely possible and is often done by craftsmen when they need to add embellishments to their work. However, we recommend that you have a good metal lathe if you are going to be working on metals quite often.
Whatever you do, please ensure that you have the perfect setup before just cutting brass; people can lose eyes to a flying brass piece!
References
Can You Turn Soft Metals on a Wood Lathe – What metals can be turned? (modernwoodturning.com)
Using chisels for turning brass – Modeling tools and Workshop Equipment – Model Ship World™
Turning Brass on a wood lathe? (sawmillcreek.org)
Can you turn brass? – Canadian Woodworking and Home Improvement Forum
