Spoke Pointers and Hollow Augers

During the course of the Windsor chair class we needed to make some 11/16 round tenons on the bow for the back of the chair. We decided to tune up some hollow augers and give them a try. You start with a spoke pointer (also called a fore auger), a cone shaped device that shapes the end of a square piece of wood to a cone. This gives you a round place to start your hollow auger from. Then turning the auger the same way as you would a regular auger bit you make a round tenon. The cutter at the end of the auger works somewhat like a block plane on end grain. We tried out a couple of different ones we had on hand. I find these an interesting tool. At one time they were fairly common because every wheel had wooden spokes in it.