Wooden Wheel Barrow

 This is going to be a long-term project as I intend to use greenwood for the wheel. A good book giving some details of an early wheelbarrow design written in 1917: "The Complete Woodworker" edited by Bernard E. Jones on pages:349-352. Interestingly he starts by saying that "the greatest drawback to the ordinary wheelbarrow is that more than half the weight of the load and barrow are borne by the arms and shoulders of the user." The design he illustrates allows the greater part of the load over the wheel and "is much easier to handle, and therefore more suitable for female farm-workers and gardeners and amateurs generally, the greater part of the load being carried over the wheel, thus taking much weight off the arms. In fact, in some Chinese wheel barrows the wheel is placed in the centre so that the load is directly over the wheel. The barrow illustrated in Bernard Jones's book, is also shorter than modern versions, and narrow enough to pass through a 2 ft 6 in. doorway with deep sides, being desirable features for stable use. Unfortunately, he does not give much information about the construction of the wheel (the author advises to get the wheel from a wheelwright) but does give some dimensions and that it is constructed as four spokes (or two straight through spokes) one rectangular and the other square rather than round.

I chose to adopt Bernard Jones' design with minor modifications in construction and materials. As the wheel components dried over the summer, I purchased kiln-dried ash for the chassis elements (excluding the main barrow). The design intent for the wheelbarrow was to enable easy disassembly for storage purposes when not in use.

Making the Felloes and Spokes.

The felloes are the pieces that make up the rim of the wheel. The four felloes were crafted from green ash that was felled in January 2024. The trunks of the ash, approximately 16 cm in diameter, were split  and then fashioned into rectangular slabs, roughly 9 cm wide, 5 cm thick, and 33 cm long, using a carving axe and a froe before being set aside to dry.

The green felloes left to dry.

I had originally planned to use eight spokes to connect the felloes and the hub but after reading the account by Jack Hill ( The Complete Practical Book of Country Crafts, David & Charles, Newton Abbot, UK, p 133.) about traditional wooden wheel barrows in England made with four spokes, I decided to follow that design. Although there are four spokes, they are really two pieces of wood that pass through the centre of the hub to connect to the four felloes. These two pieces are quite different. One is rectangular in the centre (3 inches by 1 inch) passing through the hub and then tapered at both ends to cylindrical spokes that pass through the felloes. The other is one spindle that passes through the hub and the rectangle section of the spoke to fix into the rim. 

I made the rectangular-sectioned spoke from a single piece of ash, split from a trunk and roughly shaped with a drawknife and axe. I levelled one wider face with a roughing plane and a smoothing plane. The opposite face was reduced to a thickness of 30 mm using a kerfing plane and a rip-frame saw, then finished with a smoothing plane. The narrower faces were planed to achieve a final size of 60 mm in width, 26 mm in thickness, and 450 mm in length. The final shaping will occur after the ash has dried. Although narrower than the 3 inches (75 mm) specified in Jack Hill's book, I believe this variance is not critical. The spoke ends will be trimmed to 25 mm on the pole lathe once the wood is dry.

Rectangular spoke left to dry. The two ends will be shaped to cylinders after is has dried.

The other spoke was prepared from a section of cleaved ash by cutting and shaping on the spindle lathe. This was about 30 mm diameter and will be adjusted to 25 mm after it has dried.

The spokes were made from the air dried ash that had previously been  roughly shaped. The rectangular cross-sectioned spoke was shaped at each end ready for mounting on the pole lathe. The ends were turned down to 7/8 inch diameter for the first 3 inches and then shaped using a spokeshave being careful to keep the rectangular section in the middle that will go through the hub mortice.

Shaping the ends of the rectangular spoke.

Spoke when near completion. The ends are 7/8 inch diameter.

When dry, the felloes were cut to shape. This was aided using a piece of underlaid plywood with a drawing of the wheel and 1/8 segments. Another piece of plywood was cut to the shape of a felloe and was used to mark the shape onto the ash dried sections. One face of each felloe was chosen to make flat and planed and checked with a ruler and winding sticks. The shape of the felloe was then drawn onto the flat face and then the outside edge was sawn leaving a little waste to plane to the exact shape needed. The outside edge was then planed to the line making sure it was perpendicular to the other edge. After this the inside edge was drawn, sawn and planed as needed. Finally the width of the felloe was marked to 40 mm and sawn to the line and then planed smooth.

A felloe clamped for sawing.

Sawing a felloe, hard work with a lot of further planing to get the right shape.

A felloe prepared and compared with the plywood underlay to check the shape. The underlay will also be used to mark the centres of the felloes and the positions of the axle through the hub.

The rim of four felloes braced to check the size before marking the spoke positions.

 

Drilling a felloe for a spoke tang to fit. 

Making the Hub and Connecting the Spokes and Felloes.

Ash trunk used to make the hub.

The hub was made from a trunk of ash using a draw-knife and axe in preparation for mounting on the pole lathe. Traditionally, the hubs were made using elm but this is now hard to come by. The size was adjusted so that the central part of the hub was 77 mm in diameter and the ends were 58 mm in diameter. Final refinements will be made after the wood has dried.

Hub after initial lathing. The cylinder on the left is just surplus wood. The central cylinder is 77 mm in diameter for a length of about 80 mm. The ends are 58 mm in diameter and the total width of the hub is 300 mm.

The hub was left to dry in the workshop and the mass measured at intervals over the summer of 2024. All greenwood parts had their end-grain sealed with wax before storage to reduce the chance of splitting and to minimise distortion. 

3 rd May: 1425g and 4 th June: 1290 g indicating a loss of 1350 g, i.e. 9% of original mass. On 8 July it weighed 1230 g and 1234 on 23 July indicating about 13 % loss in mass. It weighed 1236 g on 15 th August indicating it had equilibrated with the atmosphere and was ready for further work. For this purpose, the piece was returned to the lathe and the diameter was reduced to accommodate the fitting of the steel rims as shown below. I attempted to heat them before installation but discovered that it made very little difference to the fitting. This is probably because of the small diameters of the rim and so their expansion on heating was small.

Hub with the steel rims fitted and ready for the axle stubs to be fitted. The piece of wood on the right is the wood that will be shaped for the first through spoke.

The positions of the spokes through the hub were marked by drilling a hole in the underlaid plywood (see the description of making the wheel felloes below) and setting the hub upright through the hole so that the spoke positions were diametrically opposite and at right angles to each other.

Marking the hub for drilling and morticing for the spokes.

The hub through-mortice was started by carefully marking the rectangles on both faces of the hub and then drilling 1/2 inch auger hole through the centre, starting from each side and meeting in the middle. Further smaller holes were drilled to roughly define the mortice. The rest of the mortice was chiselled from each side and then the spoke inserted in stages to get a close fit.

The hub with the first spoke in place.

The second ash spoke was finished on the pole lathe and adjusted to 7/8 th inch diameter. The mortice for the spoke was drilled using a number 13 (13/16 th inch diameter) auger being careful to meet in the centre of the hub. The spoke diameter was trimmed to get a close fit in the mortice

Having drilled the hub for the spokes, the felloes were drilled for the tangs. The rectangular spoke was fitted into the hub and the felloes laid in position for the tang positions to be marked and then drilled as shown above. Once the rectangular spoke was fitted, the cylindrical spokes were marked with the felloes in place. Great care is needed in getting the correct angles, positions and level of the drill holes. The wheel was then assembled, tightened and planed to its final shape ready  fitting the steel rim.

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Finished wheel without the steel rim fitted.

The iron rim for the wheel was cold bent to a circle of approximately 400 mm diameter. To do this I made a semi-circular former of thick pine and using clamps bent the rim around the former as shown:

Forming the mild steel rim using a former and clamps.

Construction of the chassis.

The plan for the chassis was drawn from the information given in "The Complete Woodworker". The angle of the strines (the two arms of the wheelbarrow) was calculated as 5 degrees from horizontal. 

Sketch of chassis of the wheel barrow. Dimensions in mm.

Kiln dried ash was purchased as follows:

Strines: 50 x 70 x 1200 mm @2

Sloates: 34 x 67 x1200 mm @1 (these are the two bars on the bed between the strines).

Legs: 50 x 50 x1200 mm @2

Standards: 34 x 45 x 1200 @1 (two standards to support sides at the front sloat).

In addition the following ironware was purchased:

Bolts for hub/wheel: 2@ M16 by 150 mm long, stainless steel.

Bolts for legs and standards:4@ M8 by 110 mm, stainless steel.

Tube for trunnion block (block below strine that carries the axle): 20 mm OD and 16 mm ID, 100 mm long and stainless steel. The M16 bolts fit through comfortably).

Mild steel tubes for hub: 76.2 mm OD, 3.2 mm wall thickness, 50 mm length. These were cut in half to provide rings for each side of the hub.

57.2 mm OD, 1.6 mm wall thickness, 50 mm length (www.metals4u.co.uk).

Black mild steel flat bar for wheel tyre: 40 mm width, 3 mm thickness and 1300 mm length (www.metals4u.co.uk). This mild steel has a black scale formed by oxidation during hot rolling. It bends well when cold.

 Although it was tempting to make the chassis before the hub and felloes were dry, I decided to wait as the dimensions of the frame and axle mounting blocks depended on the width of the hub. 

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Sketch of the mounting blocks showing the position of the steel tube for the axle and also the position of the hub. The height and width of the block is 50 mm and will be attached to the frame by bolts. The hub will run parallel to the frame and mounting blocks.

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