Rouging Gouge

[Bigbud78]

Whats everyone's preferred size ? Ive been looking for a used 1" but not found anything yet so im going to buy new, should I get a 1" or would a 3/4 be better ? I've got a 12mm spindle gouge already. Was thinking of Axminsters premium range, any other suggestions ?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Depends whether you're roughing cartwheel hubs or lace bobbins.

 

[CHJ]

It's basically down to what you intend to use it for, if it's for just rounding the odd 50mm square spindle you might just as well use your bowl gouge.
If you are intending to clean up large bark on logs then the bigger and heavier the better, although I must confess to more often than not picking up my 15mm square carbide tool to rip things into shape.

 

[Dalboy]

I use two one 1 1/4" and the other 3/4". Like what has been mentioned depend on use my larger one I use for larger pieces and the 3/4" for things like 2" spindle work

 

[nicguthrie]

If you're looking to buy as few tools as possible, you might be better having a carbide tool, or just using a bowl gouge as previously mentioned, as long as they are sensible sizes for the project you are planning. All my stuff is normally pretty small, so the tools are quite interchangeable.

Not having a roughing gouge also limits the chance as a beginner of making the - usually pretty dire mistake - of trying to use it to rough down a bowl blank instead of a spindle... Look it up on YouTube, the results can be very dangerous. At least using a bowl gouge where it's "not intended" to be used - on spindles, doesn't carry the same risk of injury. In fact, one of the major authors (I think it's Keith Rowley) suggests they really should be called deep fluted and shallow fluted gouges, as they're useful for many things, whereas the roughing gouge should really be called the spindle roughing gouge, for safety's sake!

Nic.