The first thing to consider when turning floats is that you won’t save money. Well, you can save money if you already have the tools needed and you require a hundred or so floats for your personal use, otherwise, I hope your doing this for fun. If that didn’t deter you, than by all means keep reading. I would like to add that I’m not an authority on turning techniques so please be forgiving if you are an advanced turner.
There are some tools and supplies that you will need to make hand turned floats. The following paragraphs should help you get started. In addition I've provided some low cost alternatives to expensive tools.
Use eye protection. You will be playing with a fast spinning pieces of wood, chips and stuff fly around. I like the yellow color lens like in shooting glasses, it just seems to brighten things up. A face shield offers the most protection and it can incorporate dust protection.
Use a filter mask. You will be creating a ton of dust. Why complain about second hand smoke, then fill your lungs with balsa dust. A cartridge type designed for dust is great but at least use a dust mask before you go without.
A box fan with one of the .5 micron furnace filters taped to the back will help keep your shop air cleaner and make cleanup easier. It's no substitute for proper dust control but it's better than no dust control at all.
Use some kind of ear protection. With a Jet or other real lathe noise won’t be an issue but if you are using any drill powered version, that high pitched whine will get to you in no time. I use to think it was cool to have my ears ringing after a concert when I was younger, now I don’t feel so invincible. Every tool outlet sells ear protection from simple ear muff style to electronic noise cancellation. The local CVS has several different densities of cheap foam earplugs.
Remember what your shop teacher said about loose fitting cloths. Tuck your shirt in, no hanging sleeves or loose fitting cloths. Even a mini lathe can wrap you up.
Please work safe.
A lathe is the most obvious tool and can be the most costly tool. There are any number of wood or metal lathes that will fit the bill. I have a Jet Mini and it’s a great lathe. With the bed extension it handles everything I need to turn except larger bowls. If all you are only interested in turning floats then you can make an adequate lathe with a power drill and a sealed ball bearing (roller blade bearings will work well). You will need to make a base for clamping a drill in the horizontal position. You will also need to make a base to hold the ball bearing. Below is a drill lathe that I built years ago. It was all I had to turn grips, floats other soft woods for quite some time. Everything doesn’t have to top of the line. Grizzly sells a hobby lathe that works with a drill for $40 or less. I’ve never tried the Grizzly Hobby lathe but have heard many good reviews.
You will need a saw to cut balsa blocks into appropriate sized turning stock. You just can’t beat a bandsaw for making blanks fast. A sharp blade and a piece of scrap to save your fingers and you can reduce a large block of balsa to small blocks for turning quickly.
For just a few any gentleman’s saw will do a fine job but I really like the Japanese style pull saws. Balsa is a "stringy" wood in addition to being soft. It can clog up your say so be patient and remember that you started this project to have fun. Below are some blanks ready to turn.
For turning floats I use my mini tools since standard size tool get in the way. Since balsa is soft you can get away with just a gouge but I prefer to use a skew from roughing out the block to finished shape. A gouge works fine but it must be very sharp and riding close to the bevel is important. It’s easy to get a lot of fibers folding over the cutting surface with a gouge even with a very sharp edge. A sharp skew will make quick work of balsa and fold over can be eliminated by the skew angle. Anything more precise than a rough shape with a gouge or skew can be done faster with sandpaper and with less chance of cutting too deep. Balsa is not only soft but fibrous or stringy. To keep from tearing while turning be sure to keep you turning tools sharp. I’ll add a sharpening section to this in the future.
You will need a mandrel to mount your turning stock to turn floats. Balsa is too soft to use a drive spur and live center. I use 1/8” drill rod for my mandrels. You can get drill rod from any construction equipment store or your local metal wholesaler. I cut my mandrels to 6’ and 9” lengths. I have a couple dozen mandrels that have a 60deg rounded nose to fit the recess in a dead center I turned for making floats. The dead center is turned from oak with a #2 Morse taper on one end and recess on the other end to accept the rounded nose of the mandrel. The recess end is 2 1/2” long to allow it to be trimmed if it wears but a touch of packing grease in the recess and some turning shavings occasionally provide plenty of lubrication.
Don’t forget to wax the mandrel. This will provide enough friction between the blank and mandrel to prevent spinning. Below is a picture of some blanks mounted on mandrels and blanks chucked up in the lathe for turning.
I use 220 grit to get my shape finalized then 320 to finish sand the float. Choose an open-coat sandpaper for your turning. The open-coat will not clog with sanding dust. Choose aluminum oxide for your coarser grits, as it will last longer. Aluminum oxide fractures with heat and pressure creating new sharp edges. Choose garnet for your finer grades as it will kind of burnish the wood surface giving a smoother surface and will not cause as much of the grain to raise with any water base surface preparation.
I cut 1”x 4” sections of sandpaper to work with. It’s a good idea to mark the back of each piece with the grit number. You will be able to tell which piece of sandpaper is which but it will save time checking as you move through the grits. After playing with long enough you can tell the grit of the paper by the feel but it helps in the beginning.
I like solid stems for my floats but nothing beats a slip float, hollow stem, when fishing deep.
The solid stems I use are just the bamboo skewers from the grocery store. You get something like one hundred for a buck and change. At a penny a float I was done looking. Just be aware that there are several different O.D.’s available. Take a look at them while shopping with your wife and you will get a feel for the sizes. You can earn points with your wife by going shopping with her on occasion and get float-turning material at the same time. You’ll need the points once you spend three or four hours in the basement turning floats. If you are lucky you will come out even.
I’ve had the plastic tube I use for hollow stems for so long that I don’t even remember where I got it. I still have thirty or so feet of it around so I don’t think I’m in any trouble of running out soon. You can find plastic tube at the hobby store. It isn’t inexpensive but will do for a few floats.
I use surgical tube for my fixed stem floats. You can purchase surgical tube all many places today. I good source is your local medical supply store. A quick search on the internet will have you on your way in no time. It’s inexpensive and once you have some around the house you’ll find other uses for it.
I use an airbrush paint to paint the top of my floats. The airbrush paint isn’t the least expensive paint available but it is very bright and has great coverage. If you are using water bases paint, you will want to give your floats a dip or two in your finish first. Water based paints will raise the grain of the raw balsa, creating a bumpy or spiky surface. When finishing a table it’s desirable to raise the grain with water and re-sand to knock down the grain creating a smoother finish. Balsa is too soft to raise the grain and re-sand so a dip or two in finish before you dip the float in paint will keep the grain from raising. Below are floats that were dipped in finish to keep the grain from raising.
Removing the float from the paint slowly will allow surface tension to pull most of the excess paint from the surface. This makes for less paint wasted and less paint to accidentally step on and track around the shop.
There are paints that aren’t very expensive at your local construction store that are very bright. It seems that the guy that knows how to order amounts less than a gallon just went to get everyone lunch every time I’m there. If you try these paints out, let me know how they work for you.
The ideal finish for wood that will spend it’s working life in water would be one of the marine two part urethanes or a marine grade Spar Varnish but again for a few dollar float I just use regular old polyurethane. I generally use Minwax Gloss Polyurethane.
As with the paint remove float from the finish slowly to allow surface tension to pull most of the excess finish from the surface.
Since I dip finish my floats I need some way to hang the floats so that they can drip and then dry. I bought a bunch of alligator clips from Radio Shack, I mean a bunch maybe 100 or so. I attached the alligator clips to some of the same bamboo skewers that I use for the solid float stems. I use the green foam blocks that florists use to make flower arrangements for holding the floats to the ceiling. Buy the better quality blocks since the cheaper blocks shed foam dust that will contaminate your finish. I attached a row of blocks to the ceiling in my basement and just stick/skewer the float in the foam blocks. It kind of looks like an upside-down porcupine with floats hanging. I can hang about 60 floats at a time with the arrangement I have.
I block the ends of the a hollow stem while dipping slip floats and trim both ends to get a clean edge once the float is dry.
Don’t forget to dip the float from both ends to get finish coverage on the whole stem
That’s it. That’s all it takes to turn your own floats. Like I said, in small numbers you won’t save money but you can make any shape or size to fit you fishing needs.
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