Tools and materials I propose:
I made this mallet out of a 40mm spruce dowel and a small log I had in the shop. Due to it's size it was pretty challenging to make it! So I used a few interesting techniques to make it.
I begun by cutting my log, roughly to size with my electric chainsaw.
Using a chisel and a drawknife I cleaned the bark off the log. It had started to rot and I didn’t want to inhale all that stuff while woodturning.
I then used my centre finder to locate the centres on each side of the log.
I set the lathe at a low speed and used my roughing gouge to turn the piece true. Once it was pretty round I increased the speed of the lathe.
I squared the ends with a parting tool.
I filled any cracks with super glue and wood chips.
With my bowl gouge I rounded over the edges of my cylinder. With a flat chisel I turned the cylinder straight. I roughly sanded with 100grit.
I cut off the excess wood on the sides with a handsaw. Next I sanded everything flush with my random orbit sander.
Using a forester bit on my electric drill, I drilled the hole for the handle.
The handle is a 40mm spruce dowel. I used the same forstner bit to mark how much material I had to remove from the dowel. The I used a simple set up on my table saw to resize my dowel in order to fit snuggly in the hole I had created earlier.
The handle was longer than my lathe could handle. But using a steady rest and a chuck, I managed to mount it on the lathe and do all the necessary work.
Basically I created a slight taper. I used my skew chisel to create grip grooves and a wire burner to add decorative burn marks. I then cut the handle off the lathe and sanded it’s bottom on the belt sander.
Finally I glued the handle in place and finished it with mineral oil!
It came out nice and I think it will be pretty useful to have in my shop. Because the mallet is pretty heavy, you let it’s weight do the job for you.
But that was it, see you soon with a new project video!
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