# Thoughts on wine stoppers



## monophoto (Apr 18, 2018)

Let me preface my thoughts by saying that I don’t sell stoppers.  Instead, I give them away – whenever we go to someone’s home for a party or dinner and take a bottle of wine, I also take along a stopper.  So my objective in making them is to have fun.



  1.  Plated vs stainless vs silicone vs cork –  lots of options to choose from.  I ruled out cork because I’m not sure they can be cleaned adequately between use – cork seems to soak up wine (especially, red wine).    I have used plated metal stoppers – they initially look nice, but eventually, wine does attack the plating.  That leaves stainless steel and the silicone sleeve and dowel design.  A big differentiator is price – stainless steel stoppers are really nice, but they are about five times as expensive as silicone sleeves.  I tend to use far more of the silicone sleeve design, but I do keep some Ruth Niles stainless steel shoppers for special occasions.  But if I were to make them for sale, I would probably favor stainless.


  2.  Dimensions – pretty much anything goes, but it is possible for stoppers to be too big.  I think 3-4” is about as tall as I want to go – anything beyond that looks strange.  And if the overall height of the bottle and stopper is too tall, that increases the risk of inadvertently tipping over a bottle of wine.  Likewise, the diameter needs to be reasonable – typically 1-2”.  



  3.   Tooling – You really don’t need special tooling.  I use a mandrel that screws onto my lathe spindle, and I have a second (shop-made) mandrel that I use if I need to finish a stopper on the lathe.  But a 3/8-16 bolt held in a Jacobs chuck, or a shop-made screw chuck would work just fine.


  3.  Design considerations 


·      A big no-no is to have a pointed top.  When you insert a stopper into a bottle, you tend to press down with your hand, and a pointed top hurts. So the top must be either flat or rounded.
 

·      I’ve done simple round turnings, turnings with captive rings, turnings involving segmented wood, and multi-axis turnings.  Because I make them for fun and to give away, I can afford to spend as much time as I want on each one.  Obviously, however, if I were selling them I would tend to think more in terms of production efficiency.
 

·      I prefer to have a recess on the bottom of the turning so that the seam between the turning and the stopper (and bottle top) is hidden behind the lower edge of the turning, but this does take time to do and could be a concern for a production turner.
 

·      An interesting specialty is to do an inverted stopper in which the steel or silicon stopper is contained inside the turning, and the turning then comes down over the top of the wine bottle.  This design is ideal for white wines that have to be refrigerated – because the top of the turning only needs to be thick enough to contain and hide the thing that attached the stopper to the turning (the threaded stud or the dowel), the inverted design can be much shorter than a standard design, and therefore requires less head-room in the refrigerator.
  4.  Finish considerations


·      Most of the stoppers I’ve made in the last couple of years have three coats of a shop-made wipe-on varnish, and then are buffed and waxed.    Wipe-on poly is also a very good finish for wine stoppers.
·      I’ve also used pure tung oil on a few stoppers.  
·      I would not use shellac or a shellac-based friction polish out of concern that the alcohol in wine could affect the finish.


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## TellicoTurning (Apr 18, 2018)

Interesting observations.... I do make and sell bottle stoppers at my local Farmer's Market and Craft show during the summer months... some months they sell well, some not so well, but I usually show about 50 each show.... I have two carousels that I exhibit the stoppers on... one for the stainless steel and one for the silicone/dowel styles... and at different pricing for each style... no particular style sell better than the other.
Although her stoppers are very nice, I don't use Ruth Niles stoppers... they're too expensive for the price I sell my stoppers at.... I buy from a company in Seattle and I am aware that the stoppers aren't made in US as Ruth claims hers are...but they are the same 304 stainless steel and undetectable from hers.... I usually buy a couple of dozen at a time for about 1/2 the cost of the Niles stoppers.  I also buy most of my silicone stoppers from either PSI or Packardwood (a PSI reseller)... 
I don't use a mandrel, as you stated, I have a 3/8" steel rod fitted in to my Beale Collet system, that I have ground a flat on one end and use a small nail as a pin to make a pin chuck... work very well and with it I can turn out a bottle stopper in less than 10 minutes per each, including recessing the bottom to cover the top of the stainless steel and slip over the top lip of the bottle to hide the junction of the silicone.  I will often just drill an indent with a forstner when I drill for the pin chuck.
I've also made the stoppers that cover the neck of the bottle.. I call them my "Hidden cork stoppers"... they do require a bit more prep work. 
I use a lot of scrap wood from my bowl blanks and or pepper mill blanks as well as I bought a box of Spectraply bottle stopper blanks that went over extremely well... though was a little pricey.


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## mmayo (Apr 18, 2018)

Ruth Niles has great stopper components and they are worth every penny. Great advice too and a very nice person to deal with. My stoppers will almost all be acrylic as the shoppers have spoken. My Spectraply ones look great to me, but that glossy acrylic seems to be their favorite. 

What works for you is what you should do.


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## dogcatcher (Apr 18, 2018)

monophoto said:


> 3.  Design considerations
> 
> [*]·      A big no-no is to have a pointed top.  When you insert a stopper into a bottle, you tend to press down with your hand, and a pointed top hurts. So the top must be either flat or rounded.



That is the best info, I am amazed the number of stoppers that I see at craft shows that are pointed on the top.   I usually ask the seller if they have used them, they answer yes, then I ask about how it feels to push that pointed top.  They finally get it.  

I mostly used the silicone stoppers, a lot of mine were donations for auctions for various non profit groups in town and stuff like fundraisers for family reunions.   I used to make well over a 500 a year, now, if I make 2 dozen I have had a busy year.


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## LouCee (Apr 18, 2018)

dogcatcher said:


> monophoto said:
> 
> 
> > 3.  Design considerations
> ...



I've seen the comment several times before about not doing stoppers with a pointed top and I don't get it, just grab it like a screwdriver handle. I understand some people may not be able to grip it tight enough to push it in, obviously a pointed top would not be a good choice in that case.


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## Charlie_W (Apr 18, 2018)

Good thoughts and replies I will address the size.....my first ones were up to 3” - 3 1/4” tall and some almost 1 1/2” diameter. These were too tall and clunky. I found over time that a more petite stopper was more pleasing to the eye......and you can get more from a 12”spindle.

I do prefer Niles stoppers and will pay the price to support the small business person who provides an excellent product and service. I also use her mandrel...3/8”/16tpi. I drill and tap my stoppers first.

Good luck!


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## randyrls (Apr 19, 2018)

I have made "recessed stoppers".  These fit over the top of the bottle.  The stopper is up underneath the stopper.  Allows more material to show without being too tall.


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## monophoto (Aug 23, 2018)

Two additional thoughts for the 'knowledge base':

1.  In most cases, stoppers are turned in spindle orientation - the grain of the wood is parallel to the rotating axis of the lathe.  Occasionally, I have made stoppers from glued-up blanks, and have worried about the strength of glue joints involving end grain.  I know that the stress applied to stoppers is well within the limited strength of those end-grain joints, but I still worried.  A solution to minimize that worry is to glue up the blank, and after the glue cures, mount it between centers and turn a small tenon on one end to mount it in a scroll chuck.  Then, drill a hole up through what will become the bottom of the stopper to receive a dowel that passes through, and is glued to, each of the segments in the glue-up blank.  Obviously, that hole can't be so deep that it extends through the top of what will be the finished stopper.  After the dowel is glued into the hole, proceed with turning the stopper knowing that a hidden dowel is reinforcing all of the glue joints.

2.  Because most stoppers are spindle turnings with the grain in the timber parallel to the axis of rotation, there can be a problem threading the hole used to mount the blank to the typical threaded mandrel.  The hole in the blank is parallel to the direction of grain, so threads are relatively weak.  The usual solution is to thread the hole, reinforce the threads by soaking them with thin CA, and then running the tap back through the hole to clean up the threads after the CA cures.  But with some timbers, that isn't good enough - the threads are so weak that they won't even withstand the initial threading.  

A solution for this situation is to use a threaded insert.  In fact, some brands of stoppers come with threaded inserts to avoid the need to thread the hole, and most well-stocked hardware stores sell threaded inserts in a range of sizes.  But it's also possible to make your own.

As noted, threads in end-grain are weak.  Conversely, threads in face grain are stronger.  And some woods produce stronger threads than others.  I make my inserts from ash (which is really strong), but maple also works.  Using a leftover bit of wood, I drill a series of 5/16" holes in facegrain, and then thread using a 3/8x16 tap.  I soak the threads in CA, and after it cures, use the tap again to clean out any excess CA.  Then, I cut the wood to create a collection of small scraps, each with a threaded hole.  I mount those scraps on a stopper mandrel and turn a short cylinder - the cylinder must be a bit longer than the threaded stud on the mandrel (I typically aim for 3/4"), and obviously must be larger in diameter than the stud, but smaller than the diameter of the finished stopper.  I've made them as small as 1/2" diameter, but that doesn't leave a lot of 'meat' around the 3/8" stud; 5/8" is probably better.  Turning that cylinder is a bit tricky - there's not a lot of wall thickness, and because of the grain orientation, the walls are fragile.  I find that the most successful approach is to use a gouge to make it round, and then a square scraper to sneak up on the desired diameter.  I fine tune the final turning with 80 grit sandpaper.  But once the cylinder with its threaded hole is glued into a hole with an appropriate diameter in the stopper blank, it becomes quite strong.


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## monophoto (Aug 31, 2018)

I've recently created several stopper layouts that might be interesting to other turners.  Let me preface these comments with the qualification that both of these designs are pretty labor-intensive, so they are  probably better suited for those who turn for fun rather than those who turn for profit.  That's not meant to be pejorative - it's just that if you turn for the purpose of selling the finished product, one of the design objectives has to be to minimize the effort that goes into the product.  Both of these designs take lots of effort.

The stopper on the left in the photo is a spiraled cone.  Fig. 1 shows the overall layout of the cone before spiraling.  Other layouts are possible.  My experience is that it is best to turn the blank to roughly the finished shape before spiraling, but with the expectation that it will be necessary to fine-tune the shape after the spirals are applied.

The challenge in this design is cutting the spiral.  The stopper shown in the picture has three spirals - it is possible to do a stopper with only two spirals, but given the typical diameter of a stopper, attempting more than three spirals probably would not be very successful.  

There are several helpful You-Tube videos on spiraling.  The first step is to lay out the spiral pattern.  The layout requires drawing a number of longitudinal lines on the rough-turned blank - if there are to be three spiral grooves, then six lines are required.  I used the indexing facility of my lathe to equally space these lines.  

Next, it is necessary to lay out a series of pencil lines around the circumference of the rough turning.  I chose to use the maximum diameter of the rough turning as the base dimension for the spacing of those lines (as shown in Fig 1), and then draw intermediate lines at one-half and one-quarter of that base dimension.  By the way, this isn't rocket science, 'eyeballing' those dimensions is good enough.  This step results in a pattern of rectangles drawn on the surface of the rough turning.

Next, spiral lines are drawn around the rough turning by joining the corners of those rectangles.  For the three-spiral design, there will be six lines, three defining the bottom of the spiral grooves, and three defining the top of the bines.  I'm easily confused, so I used a white pencil to draw the spiral line for the groove bottom, and a regular black pencil for the lines defining the bines.  

Next comes the time-consuming part - cutting the grooves.  Start by using a fine-tooth back saw to cut shallow kerfs along the white lines.  This kerf is only needed to guide the next steps; if you cut too deeply, the grooves will need to be deeper to remove the kerf.  I then used a v-shaped carving gouge to start cutting the grooves, holding the gouge against the tool rest and guiding it with my right hand, while turning the lathe spindle using my left hand, and using the kerf as the path that the gouge followed.  Then, I switched to a round file to shape the groove to its final depth  Finally, I used sandpaper wrapped around a dowel to finish shaping the groove and smooth the interior surface.

It is probably possible to power-carve the grooves using a round bit in a rotary tool.  My experience is that round files are more controllable - YMMV.  Incidentally, the choice of timber is important - the wood used for the stopper in the picture is ornamental plum and is fairly soft.  I've had good success with mahogany and sapele, and I would expect that walnut would also work well.  Very hard woods would require more effort to carve.

Once I was satisfied with the grooves, I finished the turning using a skew to smooth the transition between the grooved portion of the stopper and the round portion near the bottom, and also to round off the very top.  Finally, I sanded the circumference to remove any remaining layout lines and produce a smooth surface.  The finish is a wiping varnish.


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## dogcatcher (Aug 31, 2018)

Here is an idea for you monophoto, add twisted wired to the grooves.



how to screenshot on windows 7

This one is a game call, but the principal can be used on your design.  To add the wire will require a cap on the bottom and top of the turned blank.  You will need to drill small holes at the top and bottom so the ends of the wire can be inserted and glued in the holes.  These holes and the end were then capped with the walnut that is also tenoned into the maple blank.  

This principal can also be done in a crosshatch, but each time the wire crosses another wire it needs to be weaved through the 2 strands.   I only did a few of those, way too much work and too little monetary reward.   Sorry, I could not find the pics.


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## monophoto (Aug 31, 2018)

The other design is a multi-axis turning.  I've done a number of multi-axis stoppers that involved four axes - the main axis through the center, and three off-center axes.  In some cases, the off-center axes have been parallel so that the finished stopper was essentially a three-sided cylinder, and other cases I rotated the three axes to introduce a 120 degree spiral.  

This design is different - it involves three non-parallel axes that come together at the bottom of the turning, and separate at the top.  The axes are in a common plane (when viewed from the top, the points where the three axes penetrate the top of the turning fall on a straight line).  The result is a shape where the front-to-back dimension is tapered from bottom to top,  and that is symmetrical in two planes - sort of a tablet shape.

Unlike the spiral stopper discussed previously, this stopper is produced entirely by turning on the lathe.  But the steps in the process are different from conventional stoppers.

1.  Start with a blank that is about 1" longer than you want the finished stopper to be.  Mount the blank between centers and turn it round.  To avoid confusion, mark the center at the bottom of the blank as C, and the center at the top of the blank as C'.  Then, draw a circumferential line around the blank about 1/2" up from the bottom.
2.  Using a parting tool, cut a groove at what will be the top end of the stopper, leaving some waste wood at the top end for use later.  That waste wood will be removed later.
3.  Draw a circle on the top end of the blank (on that waste wood) with a diameter to produce the designed shift in the axis.  I generally make that circle 3/8 - 1/3" in diameter.  Draw a line across the end of the blank that intersects that main axis of the blank and the circle; the points where that line intersects the circle will be the points A and B for the alternate axes.
4.  Now, mount the blank between centers C and A.  Orient the toolrest so that it is parallel to the axis of rotation, making sure that the blank doesn't hit the toolrest when it rotates.  Using a roughing gouge, turn away the asymmetrical portion of the blank.  To assure symmetry in the finished stopper, stop turning when you see that the turned face touches both the line that you drew around the circumference at the bottom of the blank, and the bottom of the groove that you cut at the top of the blank.
5.  Remount the blank on axis C-B, and without moving the toolrest, repeat the turning, again stopping when the surface you are cutting joins the line at the bottom of the blank, and the bottom of the groove at the top.  Note that to stopping these two off-center cuts when the plane touches the line at the bottom, and the bottom of the groove at the top, is what assures that tapered portion of the turning is symmetrical from front to back.
6.  Remount the blank on the original axis C - C'.  Cut a mounting tenon on the waste wood at the top of the blank.  
7.  Remount the blank in a scroll chuck that grips the tenon, and drill and tap the 3/8"x16 tpi mounting hole in the bottom (or drill a hole and glue in a threaded insert as discussed in an earlier post).  I also make the bottom slightly concave so that the seam between the turning and the actual stopper will be hidden from view.  
8.  Remount the blank on a bottle stopper mandrel, part off the waste and finish  the top of the 'tablet', and also finish the area where it joins the bottom.  The picture shows a top that is simply parted off, but options include rounding the top, cupping the top (leaving a couple of 'ears' at the end of the off-center portion of the turning), or even getting fancy by converting some of that waste material into a knob.  I generally finish the bottom by rounding off the portion that mates with the stopper, and then cutting either a v-shaped groove or a cove to visually separate that portion from the off-set-turned tablet.

This basic design results in a tapered 'tablet' with rounded faces that is thinner at the top than at the bottom (such that it looks oval when viewed from the top) - with the taper from the front face to the back face.  A variation is to also make that tablet slightly tapered from side to side.  This seems to work best if the front-to-front taper (created by turning on multiple axes) is visually much greater than the side-to-side taper.  This can be done either by giving the original turning (in step 1) a slight taper from bottom to top, or by introducing a slight taper toward the end of the process in step 8.  The difference between these methods mainly affects how the side-to-side taper joins the front-to-back taper.


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## eharri446 (Aug 31, 2018)

One idea on the threaded insert.

I use thread inserts which are just under 1/2 inch in diameter and about 1/2 inch long. I get these from Peachtree USA and the are around $6 for ten.

For wood or opaque blacks there is not issue with the insert. However with worthless wood and translucent or transparent blanks I mix some black Mixol tint into my 5 minute epoxy and make sure that I cover the insert so that no brass shows through the black.

I am planning to start making some cast blanks using Liquid Diamond and will be casting the insert into the bottom of the blank. What I plan to do is to pure about 5/8 or 3/4 of an inch of opaque colored resin into the bottom of my molds to hide the insert. Then when they are set, I will add the remaining colors and additives to make the design that I want. This allows me to have a strong point for attaching the metal portion of the bottle stopper which allows it to be unscrewed and ran through dishwasher between bottles of wine.


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## monophoto (Sep 1, 2018)

eharri446 said:


> This allows me to have a strong point for attaching the metal portion of the bottle stopper which allows it to be unscrewed and ran through dishwasher between bottles of wine.



I just rinse off the stopper after finishing the bottle - no need to send it through the dishwasher.

I've often thought that bottle stoppers are actually a really bad idea - they encourage NOT finishing the bottle of wine.


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## TellicoTurning (Sep 1, 2018)

monophoto said:


> eharri446 said:
> 
> 
> > This allows me to have a strong point for attaching the metal portion of the bottle stopper which allows it to be unscrewed and ran through dishwasher between bottles of wine.
> ...




Along that line, one of my sales lines for my stoppers is:


"This is the most useless thing I make."


Generally gets a laugh and sometimes a sale... although sometimes I do get a blank stare from the customer...:biggrin:


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## monophoto (Nov 4, 2018)

In late August, I posted a note in this thread about shop-made threaded inserts.  I tried to explain how I made them, but later realized that a picture probably would help (duh).  

The picture here shows these inserts at three points in the process.  One the left are two rectangular scraps of ash with 5/6" holes threaded at 3/8x16tpi.  These started as a single scrap of wood that was 1 1/8" x 1 1/8" x 4 1/2".  I drilled four face-grain holes in the wood spaced to allow them later be cut apart, threaded the holes using a 3/8x16tpi tap, soaked the threads in thin CA, and after the CA cured, ran the tap back through to clean up the threads.  Then I cut the wood into eight smaller scraps, each about 1/2" x 3/4" x 1", and each with a threaded, face-grain hole.  

My tap is 'tapered', so the threaded hole is slightly smaller at the 'out' end compared with the 'in' end.  While I could correct for that but running the tap back through in the reverse direction (ie, start at the 'out' end), I actually like to have the hole slightly tapered for this application - it assures a snugger fit.  But to identify the 'in' and 'out' ends, I used a black sharpie to mark the 'out' end - when I eventually glue these into a stopper blank, I insert the marked end first so that the hole is tapered into the blank.

In the middle is a single insert that I made by screwing one of the rectangular scraps onto the stud of a stopper mandrel, and turning to produce a cylinder (plug) that is 5/8" in diameter.  I use a scraper for this turning with a go/no-go gauge to fine-tune the diameter.

On the right is a stopper blank with an insert glued into a 5/8" hole bored into the bottom.  Note that I always recess the bottom about 1/16" so that the seam between the turning and the stopper is hidden behind the edge of the turning.  Also, I sand and finish the bottom of the turning using CA as a finish.  The bottom won't be visible after the stopper is completed and assembled, but the CA seals the bottom of the wood so that nothing can penetrate the end grain of the wood and potentially discolor the stopper.  I think that's especially important if it is used with red wine.

The fact that the hole is slightly tapered means that the threaded stud of a metal stopper fits very snugly.  If I opt to use the silicone sleeve style stopper, I bore out the threaded hole using a 23/64" drill bit, and glue in the wooden dowel that holds the silicone sleeve.


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## ajollydds (Nov 4, 2018)

Out of curiosity and inexperience, how does epoxy hold up to being tapped for the stopper?  

My thought is drilling a hole in the wood slightly larger than the tap. Completely filling the hole with epoxy and then tapping the epoxy for the stopper hardware. 

Will this method be stronger than just tapping end grain in the wood blank?


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## monophoto (Nov 5, 2018)

Ankur -

Very good question.  I've also never tried it.

Epoxy is a plastic resin.  We know that plastic resin blanks can be drilled and tapped successfully, so I would assume that drilling a large hole in a timber blank, and then filling that hole with epoxy, would produce a composite blank that could be drilled and tapped.

I've drilled and tapped high density polyethelene - that works very well.  Unfortunately, HDPE doesn't play well with adhesives, so it would be a challenge to make a threaded HDPE plug stay in a hole drilled in a timber blank.

Having said that, I suspect that there could be differences depending on the specific variety of epoxy/resin being used, and also on the ratio between resin and hardener.  The ideal solution would be a resin that cures to form a rigid yet somewhat flexible solid.  A resin that cures to form a brittle solid could be a problem.

Another solution here would be to use cast resin pen blanks to make threaded plugs for bottle stoppers.  The problem would be cost, but if you are simply using cutoffs from a pen-making process, cost would not be an issue.


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## philipff (Nov 5, 2018)

One thing to consider, and this drives someone (?) in my house up the walls: the height must allow the stopper to fit in the fridge!  If it will not then a simple silicone stopper does the job.


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## monophoto (Nov 5, 2018)

philipff said:


> One thing to consider, and this drives someone (?) in my house up the walls: the height must allow the stopper to fit in the fridge!  If it will not then a simple silicone stopper does the job.



Phil -

I understand that issue.  Influencing decisions made by the spousal half is always a challenge.  After 46 years of marriage, I've learned that the best approach to some situations is to simply remain quiet.

One solution is red wine, but I know that's not for everyone. Another is to not leave leftover wine.

As noted in the first post in this thread:

An  interesting specialty is to do an inverted stopper in which the steel  or silicon stopper is contained inside the turning, and the turning then  comes down over the top of the wine bottle.  This design is ideal for  white wines that have to be refrigerated – because the top of the  turning only needs to be thick enough to contain and hide the thing that  attached the stopper to the turning (the threaded stud or the dowel),  the inverted design can be much shorter than a standard design, and  therefore requires less head-room in the refrigerator.
This could also be done using threaded inserts.  The only issue would be to do careful measurements before drilling a hole to receive the threaded insert.  I use a forstner bit for that task, and the challenge is to make sure that the tip of the bit doesn't penetrate the top of the 'show wood' turning.  If that were to happen, a possible solution would be to add a 'design feature' in the form of a small turned button to cover the unwanted hole.


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## TellicoTurning (Nov 5, 2018)

As noted in the first post in this thread:

An  interesting  specialty is to do an inverted stopper in which the steel  or silicon  stopper is contained inside the turning, and the turning then  comes  down over the top of the wine bottle.  This design is ideal for  white  wines that have to be refrigerated – because the top of the  turning  only needs to be thick enough to contain and hide the thing that   attached the stopper to the turning (the threaded stud or the dowel),   the inverted design can be much shorter than a standard design, and   therefore requires less head-room in the refrigerator.
I've never used the threaded inserts, although it sounds like a good idea... on my stoppers, I use the pin chuck to turn them and then a couple of drops of epoxy or CA on the threads keeps them tight..  the "hidden" cork styles that fit over the neck of the bottle work very well for wine in the fridge... here are a couple that I made some years back, haven't tried any lately.... they are fun to play with.


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## jxdubbs (Nov 9, 2018)

TellicoTurning said:


> Interesting observations.... I do make and sell bottle stoppers at my local Farmer's Market and Craft show during the summer months... some months they sell well, some not so well, but I usually show about 50 each show.... I have two carousels that I exhibit the stoppers on... one for the stainless steel and one for the silicone/dowel styles... and at different pricing for each style... no particular style sell better than the other.
> Although her stoppers are very nice, I don't use Ruth Niles stoppers... they're too expensive for the price I sell my stoppers at.... I buy from a company in Seattle and I am aware that the stoppers aren't made in US as Ruth claims hers are...but they are the same 304 stainless steel and undetectable from hers.... I usually buy a couple of dozen at a time for about 1/2 the cost of the Niles stoppers.  I also buy most of my silicone stoppers from either PSI or Packardwood (a PSI reseller)...
> I don't use a mandrel, as you stated, I have a 3/8" steel rod fitted in to my Beale Collet system, that I have ground a flat on one end and use a small nail as a pin to make a pin chuck... work very well and with it I can turn out a bottle stopper in less than 10 minutes per each, including recessing the bottom to cover the top of the stainless steel and slip over the top lip of the bottle to hide the junction of the silicone.  I will often just drill an indent with a forstner when I drill for the pin chuck.
> I've also made the stoppers that cover the neck of the bottle.. I call them my "Hidden cork stoppers"... they do require a bit more prep work.
> I use a lot of scrap wood from my bowl blanks and or pepper mill blanks as well as I bought a box of Spectraply bottle stopper blanks that went over extremely well... though was a little pricey.


What size fostner bit do you use?

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk


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## monophoto (Nov 10, 2018)

Jim

This is actually a very good question.

If the recess is only to hide the seam between the turning and a metal stopper, then the diameter only needs to be slightly larger than the diameter of the stopper.  I've found that 7/8" is fine for this purpose.  It's only necessary that it be 1/16 - 3/32" deep.

However, I have also found that it is easier (for me - YMMV) to turn that recess rather than drill it.  I typically start with the blank between centers, turn it round, and put a mounting tenon on the end that will become the top (which in my case is usually at the headstock end of the blank).  Then, I use a parting tool to clean up the tailstock end (that will become the bottom), leaving a nub where the live center sticks into the wood.  I actually move the handle of the parting tool toward the tailstock so that it cuts a conical recess around that nub.  The nub itself goes away when I mount the blank in a scroll chuck, and drill a hole in the bottom for the mounting screw (or as described above, a shop-made threaded insert).

When you are making 'inverted stoppers' that are used with white wine, you need to reduce the height of the stopper above the top of the wine bottle so that it will require less 'headroom' in the refrigerator.  In those cases, the turning is typically designed to actually slip over the top of the bottle, with the stopper 'works' (metal stopper or silicon sleeve' recessed into the turning.  In that case, the diameter of the recess has to be greater than the diameter of the top of the bottle.  I don't know if there is a 'standard' dimension for wine bottles (there are 'traditions' for the shapes of bottles - red wine goes into bottles with straight sides, white wine in bottles with bulbous sides), but my experience is that the recess needs to be at least 1", and larger may be a good idea to allow for variations in bottles.  However, if you make that hole too large, the stopper starts to look at bit 'chunky'.  Wall thickness is part of the equation here - I typically aim for no more than 1/8", but no thinner than 1/16".


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## monophoto (Nov 10, 2018)

"  I don't know if there is a 'standard' dimension for wine bottles  (there are 'traditions' for the shapes of bottles - red wine goes into  bottles with straight sides, white wine in bottles with bulbous sides),  but my experience is that the recess needs to be at least 1", and larger  may be a good idea to allow for variations in bottles."

Just went downstairs and made a few measurements - most bottles seem to be about 1 1/8" at the rim, so the minimum diameter recess would probably be around 1 1/4".


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## Woodchipper (Nov 10, 2018)

The best whine stopper is to buy her the dress, shoes, and purse and let it go.


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## TellicoTurning (Nov 10, 2018)

jxdubbs said:


> TellicoTurning said:
> 
> 
> > Interesting observations.... I do make and sell bottle stoppers at my local Farmer's Market and Craft show during the summer months... some months they sell well, some not so well, but I usually show about 50 each show.... I have two carousels that I exhibit the stoppers on... one for the stainless steel and one for the silicone/dowel styles... and at different pricing for each style... no particular style sell better than the other.
> ...




I think it's a 1 inch... same size or hair bigger than the top of the stopper insert.  



Sorry to be late with reply, have been out of town.


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## sbwertz (Nov 10, 2018)

Charlie_W said:


> Good thoughts and replies I will address the size.....my first ones were up to 3” - 3 1/4” tall and some almost 1 1/2” diameter. These were too tall and clunky. I found over time that a more petite stopper was more pleasing to the eye......and you can get more from a 12”spindle.
> 
> I do prefer Niles stoppers and will pay the price to support the small business person who provides an excellent product and service. I also use her mandrel...3/8”/16tpi. I drill and tap my stoppers first.
> 
> Good luck!



We make shorter stoppers for white wine and taller ones for red wine.  Tall stoppers on white wine make it not fit in the refrigerator door. This also allows our blind turners to tell red from white by touch.


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## Woodchipper (Nov 10, 2018)

Wine stoppers for Boone's Farm, Ripple, and Mogen David? OK, enough of the poor jokes.
Sharon, good idea as some refrigerators are limited in adjustment for shelving. Best to drink it all and recycle the bottle.


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## monophoto (Nov 23, 2018)

One last post in this series - - -

I mentioned in an earlier post the idea of a spiral cove.  I've been experimenting more with this idea and have further thoughts.

First, there is a difference between a left-hand spiral and a right-hand spiral (see the attached image - left-hand on the left, right-hand on right, both done in ash.  Left-hand spirals are a bit less common simply because, when done manually with gouges and files and with the work-piece mounted on the lathe, they are significantly more difficult for turners whose dominant hand is the right hand (ie, most of us).  Left-handed turners can more easily make left-hand spirals with manual tools.  In my experience, however, there is no significant difference in difficulty if the spiral cove is cut using a rotary tool (Dremel, Foredom, etc) with the work-piece off the lathe.

Second, most instructions for cutting spirals say to start with a saw kerf.  In my experience, that is useful when using a gouge to manually cut the cove, but if a rotary tool and burr is used, a saw kerf isn't necessary.  On the other hand, when power carving, it works best to start with a small burr, progress to larger burrs and then move to a diamond-impregnated burr to smooth the cove.

In my initial mention of spirals, I said that power carving was hard to control.  I've concluded that if you use a flex shaft attachment, that problem essentially goes away.  I think the problem is that it is difficult to have fine control over the bit if you are also struggling with the weight/bulk of the rotary tool itself, but that is not the case with a flex-shaft extension.

The character of the timer matters a lot.  Woods that feature distinctive differences in hardness between winter and summer growth (which typically also means prominent growth rings) are harder to carve because the wood responds differently as you pass from one type of wood to the other.  And this is the case regardless of whether you are taking the manual or power approach - in either case, the tool wants to 'jump' when you cross the boundary between harder and softer wood.

The main challenge with either manual or power carving is getting the interior of the cove smooth.  I find that files help a lot.  In particular, round files with a uniform diameter (commonly sold for chain saw sharpening) tend to work better than round files that have a tapered diameter and that are thicker toward the handle end.  But after that, it's down to sandpaper, and of course, we all love sanding.

When using a rotary tool, you can purchase 'bristle brushes' in various grits that can be used to smooth the interior of the cove.  Also, it's very easy to make polishing balls by mounting small scraps of Scotchbrite pads (or a generic equivalent) on a mandrel.  I make mine using three 1" squares with the corners clipped off, all mounted on a single mandrel.   Washers are essential, and the standard washers found on rotary tool mandrels are too small.  I make larger washers from the clear plastic material used for packaging spinach at the supermarket.  Spinach is good for you.  When using either bristle brushes or polishing balls, its important to operate the rotary tool at its lowest speed - high speeds cause the abrasive to simply skip over the surface.


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