"L" pattern maker

Hi, It seemed every time I googled something I'd always end up here at the woodworkforums so i thought it time to join.:U
I needed to make patterns for things to cast in polyurethane and metals, so
I was on the lookout for lathe for awhile when I struck it lucky and a pattern makers lathe came up locally. I'd never heard of such a thing but it looked liked what I needed so bought it. It's a Marvel and very old.
Attachment 149719
This is the first time I've had contact with any sort of lathe and this forum reinforces how little I know.
The wood on the mandrel is Jelutong. The bloke that sold me the lathe put me onto Jelutong.
The drill in the picture is held by a jig and is used as a fly cutter and the motor is a apart as I'm trying to figure out the wiring to a fit a reversing switch.
The thing I'm learning about pattern making is you spend a hundred times longer thinking about and making jigs 'n things then you do making the actual pattern!
I'm looking forward to being regular here and learning a lot.:U

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Originally Posted by GSRocket

Hi, It seemed every time I googled something I'd always end up here at the woodworkforums so i thought it time to join.:U
I needed to make patterns for things to cast in polyurethane and metals, so
I was on the lookout for lathe for awhile when I struck it lucky and a pattern makers lathe came up locally. I'd never heard of such a thing but it looked liked what I needed so bought it. It's a Marvel and very old.
Attachment 149719
This is the first time I've had contact with any sort of lathe and this forum reinforces how little I know.
The wood on the mandrel is Jelutong. The bloke that sold me the lathe put me onto Jelutong.
The drill in the picture is held by a jig and is used as a fly cutter and the motor is a apart as I'm trying to figure out the wiring to a fit a reversing switch.
The thing I'm learning about pattern making is you spend a hundred times longer thinking about and making jigs 'n things then you do making the actual pattern!
I'm looking forward to being regular here and learning a lot.:U

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Cute little toy, I was raised in a second generation pattern shop and worked there until I went to university and on to better things. People that have never used or even seen a real Pattermakers lathe have never really experienced wood turning. When my father passed away I shut down the pattern shop and put the equipment in storage, there are truly some monsters in that building. For instance an Oliver No. 66 Gap bed and a Oliver No. 22 that will swing a 96" disk, google them, you might be impressed. These tools are available to Very serious collectors and Pattermakers only, sadly this is a profession that has all but fallen by the wayside due to outsourcing and CNC tech.

And your right about the time involved in making patterns insofar as the actual making of the pattern is really the least of it.

Nice catch on the toy esp. if it's in good shape and even if it's not it would be well worth your effort to make it so.

Welcome to the forum.

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Originally Posted by swallow

Cute little toy, I was raised in a second generation pattern shop and worked there until I went to university and on to better things. People that have never used or even seen a real Pattermakers lathe have never really experienced wood turning. When my father passed away I shut down the pattern shop and put the equipment in storage, there are truly some monsters in that building. For instance an Oliver No. 66 Gap bed and a Oliver No. 22 that will swing a 96" disk, google them, you might be impressed. These tools are available to Very serious collectors and Pattermakers only, sadly this is a profession that has all but fallen by the wayside due to outsourcing and CNC tech.

And your right about the time involved in making patterns insofar as the actual making of the pattern is really the least of it.

Nice catch on the toy esp. if it's in good shape and even if it's not it would be well worth your effort to make it so.

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When I laid eyes on this lathe I thought it was big, but when I researched it on the net it's as you say, "a cute little toy". The Oliver name came up as the patternmakers lathe to own. I found nothing on Marvel.
Stories like yours are are always a little sad...all that knowledge is gone so quickly. Progress the say...progress....:C

G'day GSR and welcome to the cubby!!:2tsup::2tsup::2tsup:

That's a decent looking mini beast! I think many here would love to play with it.

And Mr. Swallow I just HAVE to get to se your true beasts.:U:U

Nice looking lathe. welcome aboard.

GSRocket
I to have only been looking at this site for a short time, I had worked at Walkers in Maryborough as a carpenter and Cabinetmaker for 12 years.
Spent a lot of time with Patten markers and they are different Tradesman I can tell you.
There were 4 blokes working there and they were all the same very deep thinkers and after seeing the pattens that they made, no wonder.
I have 32 years & 2 trades under my belt and after looking at what people talk about, what they dicuss, if I look at a mitre long tape and knowledge is rated in millermitres then I only know about a mills worth.
I love old tools and have many, many of them, that is my wife tells me so all the time.
You have been kissed on the butt my an angle with that lathe, I do not think that you would be able to buy one like that any more.
Thank you for sharring it with us.:2tsup:

All sounds really interesting! One of my good friends years ago was a pattern maker. He mostly did hand calving of all things. Must look him up again! Haven'; seen him for years.

Welcome to the forum GSRocket.:2tsup:

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Originally Posted by tea lady

All sounds really interesting! One of my good friends years ago was a pattern maker. He mostly did hand calving of all things. Must look him up again! Haven'; seen him for years.

Welcome to the forum GSRocket.:2tsup:

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Where I grew up, hand calving as the province of the AI (artificial insemination) man, or the vet. But anyone could try hand carving.

Just stirring

Thanks for the welcome everybody:)
I understand now why the owner refused to negotiate and I nearly walked away from it but now I feel I got a bargain.
Down the road from where I live is a lovely old retired gent whose speciality
was setting up big metal working lathes. He's doing a couple of modifications
and a bit of fine tuning to the slides. He's been very good in helping me understand how it all works.
Birdie, that would have been a treasured opportunity to work with those guys....
now a passing era and knowledge lost to time.
I'm making this pattern to be cast in polyurethane, one part of it is about the size of a coffee mug, little naive me thought I'd do in one go but now I'm about to attempt my 6th effort....this time it'll be perfect :laughing1:...hang on.... I said that five times before.
You spend a lot time thinking, thinking and more thinking and that's just to make the jigs 'n things to make the pattern. But I do believe it will be only a couple of hours to make the final pattern this time round.
Even in the old days I'd say it would have been a very difficult business to
make money in because of the time factor.
I've barely got my "L" plates in patternmaking. I'm really enjoying it..... once I took the time presure off myself.

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Originally Posted by GSRocket

Even in the old days I'd say it would have been a very difficult business to
make money in because of the time factor.
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Even with the time factor involved there was VERY good money to be made in the Pattern Making field. Most people have simply no idea of the costs involved in pattern tooling.

In the shop we used to own all of the pattern makers in our employ made a very good living and our shop rates reflected that. Even twenty five and thirty years ago pattern shop rates where in the $200.00 an hour range and that started as soon as the pattern maker picked up a pencil to the time the tooling left the shop.

Of course it wasn't all gravy as the only lumber that we used was Honduran Mahogany No. one pattern makers select, now for those of you not familiar with wood grades, No. one pattern makers select had to be a plank full ten quarter, twenty two feet long ,minimum ten inches wide with NO checks splits or knots. No. two pattern makers select is 22 feet long, minor checks allowed, no knots, No. three, some checks, tight knots no larger than .5 inch spaced at no less than three feet apart. After that the grades went down to fine furniture grade wood.

Needless to say this type of lumber was expensive, I say WAS simply because even if one was willing to pay the price it's simply no longer available ANYWHERE. I remember this kind of lumber being delivered to our shop by the flat deck load fifteen to twenty thousand board foot at a wack. Those where the days, sadly all but gone, but for me at least not forgotten.

I started my Patternmaking apprenticeship 57 years ago in a jobbing shop with five tradesmen and two apprentices and two bosses who were non working Pattermakers.

We didn't have a Patternmakers lathe as such but we had basically three lathes. One was actually a double lathe that is two head stocks and two tail stocks on the one bed. The bed would have been about 20 feet long and consisted of three cast iron stands and the actual bed was two lengths of Oregon beams 20' x 10" x 3" with a 3" gap between them and the head stocks, tail stocks and tool rests were mounted on the beams.

The lathes operated with an overhead pulley system that operated both lathes as well as the band saw and you turned the individual lathes on by pushing a rod sideways that moved a flat belt from an idler pulley wheel to a fixed pulley wheel that turned the shaft that ran the lathes.

The other lathe was a stand alone lathe head stock without any bed which had a 3 feet diameter steel face plate which we mounted various size cross arms too up to 6 feet diameter to turn up patterns of Socket and Spigot ends for precast concrete pipes.

That was pretty scary stuff having a cross arm swing around at 300 to 400 revs with no guards. Today Workcover would shut you down.

As to wages in 1959-60 the average Patternmaker was only on $40 a week which was what the average tradesman was on anyway. Time may have changed since then.

Hi GSRocket,

Good score alright. Plenty of life left it that little beast.

I thought that Marvel was a engineering equipment brand made in Japan, am sure I have seen it before. Somebody else might be able to confirm.

Welcome to the library.

Cheers
Pops

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Originally Posted by swallow

Of course it wasn't all gravy as the only lumber that we used was Honduran Mahogany No. one pattern makers select, now for those of you not familiar with wood grades, No. one pattern makers select had to be a plank full ten quarter, twenty two feet long ,minimum ten inches wide with NO checks splits or knots. No. two pattern makers select is 22 feet long, minor checks allowed, no knots, No. three, some checks, tight knots no larger than .5 inch spaced at no less than three feet apart. After that the grades went down to fine furniture grade wood.

Those where the days, sadly all but gone, but for me at least not forgotten.

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Hi Swallow

Here in Australia things were probably a bit different. The timbers we mostly used were Sugar Pine, Yellow Pine, Jelutong and Beech. Sugar Pine was a beautiful timber to work, hardly ever a knot. Yellow Pine quite often had gum veins in it and the Jelutong was a very dusty timber to work.

Mate those lathes are rare as hens teeth, I know I tried to find one! ended up modifying an old woodfast. But I still keep a lookout.

Check out this wadkin for a dream lathe
Used WADKIN RU 15 Patternmakers Lathe, Very Rare for sale: $9,500 AUD - A Class Woodworking Machinery -Wood Lathes

Swallow, Sounds like your dad had a great business, did he specialise for any particular manufacturer or industry?
Barry_White, Things have changed with the invention of WorkCover.. eh?
Somethings had to change....but there is something exciting working around a little bit of danger. I always felt a bit more excited when I was a roof tiler, working on a two or three story building. The WorkCover thing has gone a bit over board these days.
Where I could I get some Sugar Pine to try? My first efforts were done with MDF. The guy that sold me the lathe put me onto Jelutong.
Although I still like MDF. After getting the final shape and then soaking it in thinned out epoxy resin, sanding it and coating it again, you get a very hard durable finish. But I find I can get a more precise shape with Jelutong.
When Col, the retired lathe man finishes getting the slides right, I'll post some more pictures. This lathe has been modified in it's past with metal lathe parts. It has a top slide fitted with a post and tool holder. Col is making a threaded post so the tool holder can quickly be wound up and down.:cool:

Interesting that Bazza mentions patterns for precast concrete pipes. I have a reprint of A. A. Houghton's "Concrete from Sand Molds," originally published in 1910. For ramming sand molds for concrete or metals, wood is the material of choice for patterns.

In one of my previous lives, I was employed in architectural precast concrete manufacture. The company had got started making concrete practice bombs for WW2. They had an old patternmaker's lathe, which had been idle many years by the time I started there. They might have used sand molds at the time. One of the partners had experience in ornamental plaster, and they eventually used plaster of Paris, straight-run or rotary, for pattern construction. They still do, BTW. Instead of sand molds, they use concrete with suitable bond-breaker, to produce a production negative, and intermediate positives as needed for multiple negative molds. (The original positive is destroyed in the process of de-molding).

The proprietor of our woodturning club has a fine old Oliver. The tailstock is about the size of a lawn mower engine. I may have to use it when/if I get around to turning a large root ball.

Excellent find, GSRocket, and welcome aboard.

Cheers,
Joe

Hey Rocket, Our shop catered to all foundry customers large or small, whilst most of our customers were the large oil rig companies with all of their massive castings, ie:crank arms, gear boxes and counter weights weighing up to five tons we also did a lot of work for farm implement manufacturers like John Dear, International, McCormick Dearing , Alis Chalmers and Ford also we did a lot of work valve companies like Singer Valve with their massive Bell valves up to four ton casting weight for .
city water works applications.

We also did a fair amount of work for the shipyards down east building wildcats, props and anchors. The largest pattern that we made was for a bronze prop that was sixteen feet from hub to pitch which would cast a propeller thirty two foot across, I believe that it was for a tanker of some sort. It was a big job, the jigging and glue up took six weeks and then the real work started. A lot of mahogany went into that beast.

The pics that I have uploaded are from the last job that I did before going to University to become a Biologist. It was for a restoration project of a John Able steam powered tractor of which only one existed from twenty seven thousand made, they were all melted down for the war effort. The only things that I had to work from were the original castings sent from the steam museum in Ottawa Ontario. No plans and no drawings just old castings and some really grainy black and white photos. It was a bear, but it had a lot of gears in it and that had always been my job. If the job had gears it was sent to my bench. Damn I have cut a lot of teeth in my time. All manner of gears from cone gears to flat gears to screws, you name it and I made it. It's not as hard as people make it out to be but it's piddly work and one Really has to know how to make jigs.

I probably have more job pics laying around some where but it was along time ago and these were kept in an album as it was my LAST job as a Pattern Maker, now I just putter in my little shop in the basement Ya know just to keep the saw dust flowing in my veins.

Now the biggest problem I have is what to do with the several thousand board feet of Mahogany that was left in the shop when I shut it down, that and a massive storage shed full of pattern making equipment, tools that no normal wood worker could possibly have any use for due to their size and the fact that it's all three phase.

Of one thing I am sure and that is that these tools will not end up in the scrap yard, it's ALL Oliver and it's all in good shape and it won't be sold cheap.

Whoops they didn't all post.

Enjoyed your story Swallow. A massive change from patternmaker to biologist! But I went from train driver to photogragher then to roof tiling. Now I'm trying my hand at patternmaking, I'll see what I can make and then start casting it.
So what kind of work do you do in your work shop these days?
Thanks for posting the photos. I notice some of them are silver...Is this the resulting casting or a finish you use? And if you have the inclination I would like to see more photos. :U

Rocket: G'day, the silver paint on some patterns is part of a foundry code denoting what kind of metal is to be poured, in the case of silver it would mean that the castings were to be poured from Malleable iron which was a precuser to todays ductile iron which is of course much stronger than gray iron. I always did hate painting mahogany with colored paint, seemed such a waste.

As for what I do these days, well it's not much besides making the occasional tournament archery bow for a select few that are willing to wait till I gitaroundtoit . To me retirement means doing what I want when I want to do it so certain concessions have to be made.

I do still however make the occasional pattern for farmers in the area when they break a part on some implement and can't get a replacement part off of the shelf. I won't do any big stuff like front end transfer casings on four wheeled drive tractors, but small hubs, pulleys and gears is ok as it keeps the fingers nimble. As long as they can get the machining done. Once it was a job, now it's sorta fun.

If you run into any snags whilst making your patterns feel free to drop me a line and we'll see if we can't lend a hand.

Here we painted all of our patterns with shellac. We used three colours black was used for "off the mold" surfaces, Red used for all surfaces that were to be machined and yellow was used for where there was a core print.

We also used to make patterns for very large transfer gear boxes for Borg Warner. We also made patterns for the very first Ford Falcon gear boxes and diff housings. These were first cast in aluminium and then cleaned up and mounted onto aluminium plates. This was done to reduce the wear on the patterns from constant use.

I then later worked at the foundry that actually made the gearbox and diff housing castings in Malleable Iron called Malco Industries in Marrickville NSW.

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Originally Posted by Barry_White

Here we painted all of our patterns with shellac. We used three colours black was used for "off the mold" surfaces, Red used for all surfaces that were to be machined and yellow was used for where there was a core print.

We also used to make patterns for very large transfer gear boxes for Borg Warner. We also made patterns for the very first Ford Falcon gear boxes and diff housings. These were first cast in aluminium and then cleaned up and mounted onto aluminium plates. This was done to reduce the wear on the patterns from constant use.

I then later worked at the foundry that actually made the gearbox and diff housing castings in Malleable Iron called Malco Industries in Marrickville NSW.

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G'day Barry: Here the various colors would have been somewhat pointless as the moulder was not the coresetter, After the molds where made they were sent to the core room for core setts and then to pouring.

The only reason for various colors in these applications was to denote which type of metal was to be poured ie: gray 20,G30,G40,G80, Ductile,65,D80,D100, Malleable, White Iron or Black. The numbers above denote the strength of the metal in thousands of pounds per square inch.

Pardon my asking but what would have been the point of painting machined surfaces red as the Machinist probably never got to see the tooling and wouldn't have cared if he did as he is working from a blue print?

Also we never made any large patterns out of Aluminum, what we did for high run tooling was to make the master out of wood then send it to the foundry for sample casting. After it was ok-ed for production we then made a master mold using either Hydro Cal cement or plaster after which a permanent pattern would be cast using either Glass filled Urethane or glass filled epoxy. Either one would outlast aluminum ten to one and weigh one quarter as much as we used Balsa for the filler.

Oh and Rocket, do yourself a favor and don't use that crap called MDF or as it's known here "Termite Barf" With the Formaldehyde and various and sundry adhesives mixed in to keep this crap held together sooner or later it's gonna make ya sick. Oh sure you can wear a mask but sooner or later ya have to take it off and that crap dust don't just go away. Just because it's CHEAP don't make it good and when one considers the wear of the tools it ain't all that cheap either.

I am in awe of this body of knowledge, always heard stories of patternmakers shops who could create a timber master for mass production , thanks for sharing "the knowledge" Ross

Since it hasn't been expounded yet, a reason for different colors of the overall pattern for different metals relates to cooling shrinkage of the cast metal from molten to room temperature. To accommodate shrinkage, patterns are usually made oversize in different ratios for different metals. Different melt temperatures, and different rates of shrinkage, especially for iron, aluminum, and bronze. To make things even more jolly, peculiar parts of some castings may shrink not quite the same as their neighbors, so the needed pattern distortion must be found by trial and error. Worse yet, variations may exist from one foundry to another. Sand molds are soft enough to allow shrinkage to occur without imposing residual stress.

Hydrocal and plaster of Paris, OTOH, generally expand upon setting, although low-expansion formulations are available.

More than you ever wanted to know.

Cheers,
Joe

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Originally Posted by joe greiner

Since it hasn't been expounded yet, a reason for different colors of the overall pattern for different metals relates to cooling shrinkage of the cast metal from molten to room temperature. To accommodate shrinkage, patterns are usually made oversize in different ratios for different metals. Different melt temperatures, and different rates of shrinkage, especially for iron, aluminum, and bronze. To make things even more jolly, peculiar parts of some castings may shrink not quite the same as their neighbors, so the needed pattern distortion must be found by trial and error.

Hydrocal and plaster of Paris, OTOH, generally expand upon setting, although low-expansion formulations are available.


Joe

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And just what exactly would the color of the tooling have to do with the shrinkage of the metal Joe? I could paint any pattern designed for casting gray iron (paisley or Argyle ) and it would still shrink 1/8" per foot. Steel depending on the type would still shrink 1/4" per foot as would brass and bronze and Aluminum 3/16" per foot. Thats why pattern makers use a different shrink rule for each different type of metal to be poured (I still have 9) as it takes out all guesswork as shrinkage allowances are automatically factored in. Pattern makers DON"T as a rule use common rule ie: a tape measure except perhaps to rough measure out a piece before lopping it off a plank.

As to the isolated heavy sections there is very little trial and error as formula for this has existed for a very long time and this is in the realm of the engineer and the metallurgist not the pattern maker, besides shrinks or voids and distortions in isolated heavy sections are dealt with by the use of bosses, risers , pouring temperatures or chills not with paint. Sometimes distortions are built into patterns as in stove tops and panels but thats a completely different ball game, much too involved to get into here.

And BTW if memory serves, industrial molding plaster expands at 0.0018 inches/inch and Hydro-cal at 0.0005 inches/inch and this is on large molds and so is of virtually no concern to the pattern maker.

For identification. A pattern made for steel will produce an inaccurate casting if used for casting iron, or any of your other 8. More people are illiterate than color-blind. And lest you think it's limited to ancient history, I learned at a recent funeral for a very skilled mate that he couldn't read and write, according to accepted practice. He was smart enough, though, to develop his own "secret code."

The paint has nothing to do with distortions; should have been in a separate paragraph. And of course there have been great advances in technology in the past 40 years.

We used the same color-code trick to match-mark multiple concrete form components (otherwise identical) for repetitive assembly, and for the same reason as above.

Cheers,
Joe

Barry-White
1959 well at the end of it I was just a ich in my dads crouch, 1960 just born.
You know I do not know if you lot will think that I am mad but to think of a load of timber on the back of a truck brings shivers down my spine, your right you will never see that again.
I keep on thinking that we have seen the best of this world, that is why I love talking the to the older generation because once they are gone so will all the stores, keep them coming.
Not that I know any thing about pattern making but the not only did they have to make the pattern they had to think of the shrinkages in the material, well so I was told.
I believe that Swallow would be able to tell us more about.
Well nice talking to you guys, I love every minute of it.:U

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Originally Posted by joe greiner

.......For identification.

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I knew that's what you meant :U
Swallow I've got a few more questions, but i've got go so I'll ask later.
Thanks for the great discussion people :U

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Originally Posted by Birdie

Barry-White
1959 well at the end of it I was just a ich in my dads crouch, 1960 just born.
You know I do not know if you lot will think that I am mad but to think of a load of timber on the back of a truck brings shivers down my spine, your right you will never see that again.
I keep on thinking that we have seen the best of this world, that is why I love talking the to the older generation because once they are gone so will all the stores, keep them coming.
Not that I know any thing about pattern making but the not only did they have to make the pattern they had to think of the shrinkages in the material, well so I was told.
I believe that Swallow would be able to tell us more about.
Well nice talking to you guys, I love every minute of it.:U

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Birdie: The Pattern Maker is a craftsman that wears many hats, firstly he is an expert wood worker working in all three dimensions plus upside down and inside out and backwards. He is also something of a metallurgist, a draftsman a machinist and an engineer plus an expert in plaster and plastics. It's not for nothing that the apprenticeship to become a ticketed pattern maker takes seven years.

It's somewhat laughable to think that there are those that google wikepidia or read some book and then think that they know whereof they speak.

When the second world war ended there was a large influx of European crafts men that immigrated to Canada. My father hired nine pattern makers who had come from Germany. These men had worked for the Krupp Steel Works during the war. Now you may not know what the Krupp steel works was but suffice it to say that Krupp produced the German War Machine and virtually all machines in it. I have been there and the shear size of the place is simply beyond description.

I started working in my fathers shop when I was about ten or so cleaning up and painting patterns after school and during summer holidays, when I got older with the tutelage of these men I soon graduated to doing real work.

You speak of the older generation, well let me tell you, I listened to these men when they would talk about the patterns that they had helped build, like the turrets for the Panzers and Kings Tigers, the great railroad guns and even one had worked on the patterns for the massive deck guns of the Bismark and the Tirpitz . Comparatively everything that we produced paled into
insignificance.

These were the true masters of this most exalted craft and I listened to every word and they taught me much.

The last of these men passed away five years ago at the age of 102 years, I miss them all and their knowledge.

You are right insofar as the best is all but gone and we have lived in the of all possible times. Sad that it has to end this way, with a whimper and not with a bang.

Swallow
Thank you very, very much for sharing that with us.
I have raed a book called "The forgotten arts"mostly it is about England but it does show in the book of what people could accomplish.
Black smiths, Wheel Wrights,Coopering which I love,and so on, if you can get hold of the books as there are two of them, they are very good to look at.
By the way got a mate to puschase some coppering tools from Scotland, did not get all of them but what I did get sits very well in my collection of old tools.
But I can tell you if I lived near you we would have some coffee together an lots of interesting conversations.
Even as a Carpenter when I did my trade I had only learnt a small amont of knowlage but to day they get tought nothing, most of them do not even know how to set out a house for the footings or for a slab.
Well very nice talking to you again take care.:2tsup: