Longworth Chuck Build

Kenneth Hakansson
Sweden

WR Discussion Link

I found some pictures from a build on the net somewhere a while back, and I
got my basic design from it. But made my own interpretation out of it if that was
a good thing or not is for the future to show .. hehehe

But my basic idea was building it with a hardwood base, designed to fit perfectly in
my 4 chuck with as much as possibly stock for the jaws to grip onto, because I've never
been fond of the idea of having to unscrew my chuck just to attach the plate with the longworth
chuck, it just seems to be an unnecessary step when I could just mount the whole thing on the
chuck. I do not know if that is a stupid thing to do, but thats what I decided to try.

I had a piece of beech and another piece of oak in my scrap bin that fitted my plan
so I shaped them and glued them together and made sure the whole thing fitted the
jaws the way I planned it. I marked the piece with the numbers of each jaw to be able
to mount it the same way or at least nearly the same way everytime.
This is what I came up with.


As you can see on this image I shaped it so the chuck has alot to grip on to, but not
to reach all the way to the back of the chuck to avoid alignment problems.


Made a very simple but workable circle jig for my router.






I drew 8 slots in my design, with the option to have all 8 bolts on when working with
mid to larger size bowls, and using just 4 bolts for the smallest ones.
My lathe can handle about 12" bowl without swinging the spindle around so I went
for about 11.5" discs. The Disc are made out of 1/2" birch plywood (what I had laying around)






I didn't find a suitable rubber "grips" so I used vinyl instead, which I get from
destroying a kitchen cutting board (I've made wheels and bearings and such out it before)
I drilled out 24 small wheels with a "solid board cutter" (that's what I believe the english name is for it)


I glued two rods together with them using 8 wheels in each to be able to mount them on
my lathe so I could shape them into cones.




I used 8 carriage bolts

16 washers of suitable size
and the last 8 wheels where shaped like a dome and then I pressed
a nut into each by first drilling a hole that was a bit smaller than the nut itself,
to use as fasteners, and "knuckle savers" in case I somehow get to close to the screws
when using it.





Mounted the back disc to my hardwood jaw grip using both screws and glue.



Did a little touch up sanding and got rid of the pencil lines and then
I waxed all sides using rennaisance wax thinking it would slide smoother.


So far so good .. I've not really tested it yet but it seems to be working 



Like I mentioned before it's about 11.5" or so


mounted on the lathe