David,

I metal spin ends for fuel tanks from emersion tank copper, I made my former from a piece 1/2 " mild steel by machining a half ball on the end and polishing the end to near mirror finish, If you dont get a good finish it will show on your work as marks,

I use the tool clamp bolts on my tool post to guide the former, I use tallow as my lubricant and can I ask what your lathe is as you need to have a strong tailstock to stop the work from leaving the machine. When I make my parts I have to heat treat the copper as it hardens very quickly, you may find brass will do the same.

There is a good booklet on the subject produced by the publishers of the Exhibition hall at Fosse Way, currently I cant remember it but will hunt it out if you need it.

Martin P

Edited By martin perman on 22/02/2019 18:10:23

Do you mean something like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HQuCx9RyC4

The book I was thinking of can be bought from here https://www.teepublishing.co.uk/

Martin P

Hi David,

You may have a problem trying to spin a bell. Whenever I've tried spinning brass I've found I need to keep annealing it to get it to flow evenly. I suspect annealed brass will be fairly dead as far as ringing goes so you are more likely to get something to ring by turning it from either a hard brass or bronze. Phosphor bronze may be a good candidate as it is hard and readily available in short lengths for bushings.

I actually have some brass which rings really well. It is 1" dia. and came from an old set of door chimes. Two different lengths were suspended from wooden plugs driven into the ends of them and a solenoid mounted between them hit first one then the other with a wooden striker giving a ding – dong noise. You might find some of this material in a junk shop.

Regards,

Alan