Form Tools -- Turning the Ball End Features on my Cannon Barrel 

Great stuff! You have inspired me to purchase my own mini lathe to learn a new skill. Really appreciate the way you explain the right and wrong ways, rather than just saying, “do it this way”. I wonder how many people will watch till the end for the “after credits”?

Always nice to find Pie in my inbox. Thanks Joe.

You are a true Artisan sir, thank you so much for showing you’re years of hard work and trade secrets. Not many people are willing to do so in such an incredible in-depth manner. Thank you again!

Very nicely done Joe. I make mini cannons that are made to fire, so I don't really bother to pretty them up to any great extent. Your videos have made me re-think that attitude. Thanks for posting!

Joe you are a true blessing to the machining community, from rank hobbyist to seasoned veteran. I have enjoyed and learned from each and every one of your videos since Outside Screwball recommended you. Keep on keepin' on!

Look at those chips... How beautiful brass is!

Excellent as always. I can breath again now. Made me nervous just watching that ball being formed.

Good afternoon Joe. I noticed you stopped to blow off the chips quite often during the ball forming. A necessary evil I agree, but i wanted to share my method. I use a Kool Mist Tankless Mister unit. I run it without coolant when I want a constant air flow to keep chips cleared for milling & drilling operations. The magnetic base provides a means to easily mount it and the flexible nozzle allows precise positioning of the air blast. The knob on the valve body provides control of air volume. Benefits include keeping chips cleared from cutter so you're not re-cutting chips, removing chips while drilling so they don't fall back into the hole when you pull out to clear the chips, provide a marginal cooling affect on the tool, keep chips cleared off vise jaws & parallels when changing parts, etc. I know there are companies that specifically make air blow off devices, but name a machine shop that doesn't have old misters that don't "work" because they don't siphon fluid anymore. Keep posting the great videos. Since subscribing, I started watching all the videos from your library from the beginning....only 5 months behind now. :-)

I rarely comment, but I've watched all your stuff and it is all extremely well done. This particular video comes at a perfect time since I am arguing with some form tools for making some key chain fobs. Thanks for doing all the hard work that the rest of us can learn from! Also I love the little extra step on the second barrel, those are the little details that make the whole thing sing.

I´m revisiting the the series of the cannons.Breathtaking and a real true act of love.Thank you.

Don't think I've ever watched one of your videos and not learnt something new even on basic stuff I thought I already knew keep up the good work.

Hey im a subscriber and i paused to read that list lol. Funny list tho. I have to say tho, i really enjoy your content and you have a way of breaking down things in a way that's easy to understand and is always very useful. I've used many of your ideas in my everyday life. I have a son that's going to school for machining and I always tell him to watch your videos, just to help give him an edge on whats to come. Thanks for all your hard work.

FYI...Just thought you might like to know the rear portion of the cannon barrel you are working on is called the "Cascable". It is the section of the barrel from breech to knob (the ball is called the knob). As an artilleryman for Colonial Williamsburg I demo mortar and cannon, along with long arms so the nomenclature of 18th century weapons is very important because of the many questions asked by visitors. There are many commands given during the loading and firing of a cannon. When to command to "make ready" is called out the "linstock" holding the" slow match" is brought to the "Cascable" and held there till the command to "fire" is called out. At that moment the slow match held by the linstock is placed at the "vent" BOOM!

Some day I'm going to win a lottery and then I'm going to pay you handsomely to spend a few days with me in my shop teaching me stuff! (Maybe I'll have to upgrade from my Asian 10" lathe). But don't loose too much sleep over that statement cuz I don't buy lottery tickets very often. Thanks for sharing your knowledge with those of us that are less than rich or famous! God bless you.

I wish I had half of your Brain. Great and Informative Work.

It was so beautiful, you made it look as though the ball was always there just needing a bit of uncovering, but it was not so: There was extraordinary art and skill in the making of symmetric tools and in the cutting. Thank you for sharing and inspiring.

I think you made the 50k and tripled it ! Good for you. Watching again 4 years later. 🙂

Oh yes, and thank you very much for all this informative and useful videos, it improves and tackles a lot of milling and turning jobs.The first one for me was your threading video from head stock to tail stock! Since then I got great results, without any potential danger!! Please keep going!

Watched all 22 mins but took a break. Great video and can't to see the rest of the cannon assembled! Thanks Joe!

One way I have used to get a true circular quadrant is to install a piece of roundbar of the exact diameter in a drill press and use grinding paste on it to smooth off the high spots on the form tool. Run the drill press at high speed while plunging it up and down. If the roundbar is long enough, it can be advanced out of the chuck so that the finishing is done at the exact radius.

Once again Joe you have produced a quality piece of work, fantastic watch this take shape and being told how to do it the proper way, thanks mate 👍

A million dittos of all the nice great comments everyone has commented on your awesome work!!! Thanks, Joe!!!

honestly i liked the .075 step before the taper as seen @6:54. gives it some more character and is seen on many old cannons. that being said thanx for the lessons. i've learned a lot from watching

"Watch the Shine", WOW you're not kidding Joe, that really POPS! Yeah I already did my part pushing you over 50,000 SUBS, I subscribed about a year ago, LOL! As always thanks for the great show and info. Best Wishes n Blessings. Keith Noneya

I would subscribe again too if I could Joe. I am not a machinest in any form or fashion, but I love watching and if I was teaching this your channel would be mandatory watching.

That's a beautiful finished item and the chips were "right handsome."

Great as usual. Always learning new ways to think outside the box from you. Thanks Joe

That’s awesome work, Joe. Wished we lived closer. My shop is swamped with work. Everyone down here in Huntsville is suffering with “Trumponomics” and buried in defense contract work.

Nice demo of the form tools, beautiful finish job!

Thanks Joe always a pleasure to watch you.You make it look easy

It was mesmerizing watching your turn the ball f the cannon. Awesome work.

Turned out beautiful. Enjoyed it Joe, as always.

At one point (9:10 or so) you had a step on the straight taper and I thought that was a nice feature but your way looks good too. Thanks for not keeping us in suspense for too long! 😁

As always informative Joe. I learn something new every time I see your videos.

I have to say Joe that last operation gave me some major pucker factor , LOL . Beautiful job !

Love your work, your methods make sense. I learn from every video. Thank you.

Joe I had to add this I haven't watched the rest of the video I had to congratulate you on being my hero. I was never very smart in school never learn drafting or any of this stuff and I've started to learn it as the years of went on. I have had that tool that you used to do the second Mark it's the little square metal thing with the adjustable bar. I've had that for years and never knew what it was for how to use it. Thank you very much. I know I'm admitting my stupidity but it was definitely refreshing just to see I can't wait to watch the rest of the video.

sorry Joe I have to tell you that your video's are the most informative on youtube that I have seen in 3 years now I tried to break it to you softly .

One of my favorite RU-vidrs, always.

Nice approach using the form tool, I've always had trouble understanding how to cut using a form tool.

I always enjoy the attention to detail.

I am just blown away watching this video.

You make all of this look so easy, wish I had room for a decent shop.

Hi Joe, I have been a subscriber for some time now. Love your video's. It's good to see a proper tradesman at work. Grinding hi-speed steel isn't a lost art and nice to see the end results when it done corectly without the aid of computers. I have one critique, really Joe, filing on the lathe with your arm over the chuck was the first thing I was told not to do as an apprentice that and not to wear loose clothing. Other than that keep up the good work, I've picked up a few tips from your videos that were useful to me even after 48 years of being a journeyman. I guess your never to old to learn!

Joe Pieczynski AKA the metal wizard. as always, awesome vid joe!

gorgeous piece. can't thank you enough for your contributions. I've learned so much from you.

That was totally amazing how you massaged it into perfection.

I like the reveal you left on the second one better - cool project.

Incredible Joe...and well worth the wait. Just like Cruz, your a winner !!

Beautiful patient work. Thanks Joe.

Nice to see your fine work on a piece of jewellery !

who needs a Haas! Very nicely done.. Thanks for sharing

You are the master!!! Love the videos you put out . Thank you

Amazing finish on your cannon. Keep up your great work and your explanations :)

Many thanks for the great video. I would really have liked to watch how you free-hand such a precise radius on the tool. Maybe a short video on grinder tips and tricks? Part 1 was a great intro to dressing the wheel but sure there is a lot more to be learned,

Joe nice piece of professional work.

All I can say is wow! Thanks for sharing.

Unfortunately I can only subscribe once Joe, I enjoyed these two videos very much and as usual also learned a bit on the journey. Thanks for your efforts to upload, cheers from John, Australia.

Joe, thanks for sharing your craft! Your skill and especially your gift for sharing what you know begs the question...why the heck is college so expensive when we have teachers like you? I may need to enroll in a program to cure myself of my addiction to learning from your channel.

Joe, I was thinking a step on the 15 deg form would look nice and sure enough you made one on the other barrel. Nice job and thanks for the tips.

I never thought about using ScotchBrite. I will now. Thanks Joe!

Very nice. I look forward to seeing how you are going to fasten the trunnions.

Well done Joe! You should do this for a living.

A true Master and a Teacher.

OK so while you were turning the "cascabel" on your cannon I was looking it up to see what it was called and what it was for. Seems that you can get a bit of a varied description of the use but it was to hold ropes for pulling the cannon left or right for aiming in the azimuth and/or to restrain the recoil of the cannon when fired. Probably both. I never miss one of your videos. A fellow Texan here who would love to visit your shop.

Great work. Love the shine!

Really good work. I learned a few things as usual. Thank you Joe. Mal

Beautiful job Joe love the video

Very beautiful Canon Mr. Joe

Wow - first deep cut was smooth as smooth - great tool grind. My main comment, more a thought than criticism - is that I would have favored having the ball (pommel) somewhat larger diameter. Mainly thinking that because of how I have seen some cannons and also a matter of scale relative to the barrel dia and length etc. However, great to see how you applied the form tools - great result. Super demo Joe, thank you.

I used a similar method to turn 3/8" balls to form handrail supports, except they were drilled through for the 5/32" handrails to pass through, I drilled the cross holes through before forming the balls, then threaded the supports at the end (imagine the support post where the body of your cannon sits and just 5/32 dia. the inner form tool was shaped to produce flanges on the bottom end of the ball, so flanges, neck and bottom ball surface were consistent as all formed by one tool (all done on a unimat 3 lathe from 10mm brass stock)

Very surprised to see that outside diameter cut last... the "cascabel". beautiful work! I love the lathe

I enjoy your work. I am making the chains for my cannon now.

Another great video. Any chance on including some shots on you grinding the tool ends? I enjoy watching a master at work. Thank you for sharing all you knowledge.

That was nice, man I hope to get that good, but first I got to get the tools. Still learning.

For concave radii on the lathe I use a ball-endmill w/1 flute ground off. For convex radii I use a corner-rounding endmill.

Great work Joe, never fail to impress TFS G :)

When you mentioned about the thin section breaking because of cutting torque i was holding my breath while you were doing the back side of ball , Even though you had about an inch of cutter engaged doing the front side of ball there was almost no chatter ( you could hear some but I couldn't see it?) The finish came out great. Pretty sure that without a ball cutter would not have been possible on asmall hobby lathe? (at least not without a lot of filing and emery work to remove chatter marks) Small hobby lathes are just not rigid enough and probably wouldn't have enough power to make that depth/width of cut?

Thanks Joe, really informative, only one point - you did the grinding of the profile tool off-camera, it would have been useful to me to see how you used the wheel edge to get the radius you wanted. I spent ages making a ball turning attachment to do a similar job which works fine but it needs a long mandrel overhang to get the tool round to the chuck side and then a profile tool to tidy up, if I had made a tool like yours it would have been better.

When you were using the first tool and had to blend in the 15 degree angle and finish the ball simultaneously, would it have been easier to set the compound to 15 degrees and advance along the angled surface until the ball was finished? The angled surface would be turned continuously & not needed to be matched/blended.

Absolutely beautiful....period.

oh im so glad there was a part 2 :)

Great video Superb work Thanks Joe

Beautiful job! I wonder how many folks caught on to how you were managing the load on the form tool by only using part of it at a time until maybe the end of cutting the ball.

G’day Joe, very nice indeed. Cheers Peter

great video! would love to see footage of the actual grinding of the tool. cheers Teun

I have an axle just waiting to be made into a cannon, but where can blueprints be found to make it historically accurate? Either Spanish naval or Civil War Napolionic style would work for me. Awesome videos...

Noice! Nothing like shiny brass.

Looking good JP

That was simply amazing...

Joe ,Pie you are amazing!

awesome video, discussion, demonstration, build

That’s a cracking Cannon Joe. :-)

You almost got a perfect ball. Thanks for sharing.

Nice work Joe. Thanks

I love making Cannon it's so cathartic relaxing. I've made several very nice Cannon on my Logan switching back and forth between the Logan and the hardinge. one gentleman bought a whole bunch of stuff from me give me a lot of money for this and that and the other thing and I made him a cannon period over a little over a year's time I got to know him and we talked and bullshitted and blah blah blah and I figured this guy was just about like a friend to me only on the internet. He gave me the story about being a retired injured badly injured Navy guy so I made him a beautiful replica Canon out of cast bronze 3/4 inch bore every detail was to scale and perfect down to the small chains and ropes etc etc etc. Well he was a little short on cash and so I said I'm going to go ahead and mail this out to you anyway you just pay me when you can in a couple of weeks. He argued no don't do that excetera excetera finally said okay just go ahead and send it then and I'll pay you on such and such a date. That date came and went and he never paid me I can't believe I was so suckered I totally trusted him after all the money he had spent another things that he wanted then I'm just floored that a human being would do that. I even went so far as to get a stamp of the anchor with the Rope deal the insignia and stamped it in the proper spot towards the ball end of the Canon. I found out he was in D-Day injured retired Navy guy that made it all the more upsetting I did all this work for him and I was only going to charge him 300 bucks this press Cannon was a couple of feet long three-quarter inch bore and detailed like you wouldn't believe and he just ripped me off. I thought the fact that he was military would have put him above all that but I guess I was naive. I haven't been able to bring myself to make any more Cannon

Awesome Joe, many thanks, Will

Great demo on both videos

Another great video Joe... Crazy how the barrel looks like brass in machining part of video but on the table at the end of video (next to other unfinished one) looks like its stainless.

Once again great video!