File Handle Experiment

From the video description:

Paul Sellers did a video about making a chisel handle here: https://youtu.be/xocuzBlViEo 

The way he drills the hole in the handle after he turns seems sort of wishy-washy. He is also relying on the shape of a cordless drill for the axial alignment of a hole. It's definitely accurate enough, but the method has no elegance! 

I bodged together a lathe with a schroeder breast drill, an awl, and some clamps to try a different method. I first drilled a hole in an octagonal chunk of wood, then pressed a slightly larger drill bit into the hole to act as a mandrel. I held onto the bit with the drill chuck (could just as well use any drill), and spun it to visually find the center of the non-supported end. I stuck the awl in the end to act as a center, and turned it using a chisel. 

The handle is made of recycled wood and the ferrule is made of a scrap of bicycle steerer tube. I cut the ferrule with a hacksaw blade while mounted on the lathe, to show you do not need a 800kg lathe to turn (tough) steel. A hacksaw blade can also be used for turning like this: https://youtu.be/17D_Jglr4Q0?t=2m1s 

I think a faceted wooden handle is nicer to hold and easier to make by hand, but this works for parts which need to be more accurate.

Speaking of faceted handles:

This is a rod I hang my clothes on to dry. The original rod was hickory, which started growing mold(?), so I began searching for a replacement. I found this stick of plastic decking in a pile of construction waste and it followed me home. I felt like a knight with a lance, carrying the 6' stick on my bike. The original was clamped to the closet doors, which was ugly and kept two clamps occupied. I whittled these pins out of hickory to keep the rod in place.