Rope molding

"Practical" and "home" ? Well, if you mean "possible to make" and "no-one is counting the labour costs" then yes.

You do a split turning, where two pieces of timber are stuck together across a layer of brown kraft paper. Then you dry it (doh!), then you turn it, then you split them apart again. This is fairly common for a lot of Jacobean oak work - half spindles as decoration on the front of cabinets.

As to the ropework, then it's a form of "barley sugar" turning, which I'm sure you can find through Google or that paper-book-stuff. It's less carving, and more like carving a piece held in the lathe and turned gently by hand. The spiral is marked out in pencil beforehand, then you shape it with a gouge. There are also router lathes (a fairly simple jig) to hog off much of the timber under power, if you're making big stuff.

Inside This Old House recycles some of the TOH shows from the 80's. A few weeks ago they showed this same thing. Started off with half round stock, pencil marked the rope lines and started at it with a handsaw. Cut maybe half way through and then took at it with a chisel and finished off with sandpaper. Looked like a fair amount of work.

TomL