Dowel making jig

[rich pierce]

I’m looking to buy a dowel making jig. When building a gun to sell it takes me too long to taper a 1/2” dowel to a little under 3/8” uniformly by planing and scraping and sanding. Mike Lea doesn’t have his model available as far as I know. Anyone have experience with something like this?

I really don’t want to make one. I tried that.

[WKevinD]

Rich, I bought one of those...they are OK.
The one I use is By Veritas
I use the 3/8" cutter with a 1/2" or 9/16" hickory blank to leave a "bulb" end and finish taper with sand paper in one hand and drill mounted rod in the other. I make a 5/16"x3" 10-32 tip that I taper to.

Kevin

https://www.leevalley.com/en-us/shop/tools/hand-tools/dowel-and-tenon-cutters/52401-veritas-dowel-and-tenon-cutters

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

I haven't used the one pictured, Rich, but I bought dowelllingcutters from Lee Valley Tools in sizes, 1/4", 5/16", 3/8" and 7/16" and they work really well.  And they are adjustable so you can get exactly the size rod you want.

[Dave Marsh]

I use the same one Kevin uses.  Works great for a guy with 10 thumbs.   

[rich pierce]

Thanks guys!

[Bill Raby]

I tried one of those. It did not work out so good. Problem is that it only cuts using the corner of the blade. I think one like what WKevinD mentioned would be a lot better. It looks like it uses the whole blade and not just the corner. But it probably costs more.

[Kevin Houlihan]

I use the same one that WKevinD uses.  It's easy to make a 3/8" RR with a tapered tip.  I usually start w/ a 7/16" RR and turn it down.  You can use it like a hand held pencil sharpener or put it in a vise and turn the RR w/ a drill.  Turn the RR slow or it whips around.
 Kevin

[alacran]

I was given a 3/8th Veritas doweling cutter like the on Kevin uses. The guy that gave it to me said he couldn't get it to work.
All I had to do was adjust the blade depth and angle and it works great. If you make a square and straight batten it will not whip around as it is coming out
of the tool. I turn them fairly fast.

[P.Bigham]

This is easy to make and cuts ok

[bluenoser]

That looks like a good idea. I'll bet it would work even better if one were to cut some teeth into the circumference.

[Hatchet-Jack]

I recently got one from TS Steelworks. I did one 1/2” tapered down to 3/8". It works well and is easy to sharpen. It took me about an hour to do it. To remove material more quickly I'm thinking of trying a technique I read somewhere. You sand it down by running the dowel across a belt sander, dragging it along the bottom of the sander plate against the belt, turn and repeat. Then I would use the TS steel scraper to round and smooth it out.

https://tssteelworks.com/products/ramrod-scraper-v1

[longcruise]

I use the Veritas pictured above to make ram rods and arrow shafts.  The instructions would have you think that you need only clamp it in a vice and go but it really needs a jig that controls feed and output whip.  Not complicated but IMO necessary.