Abstract Chatter and non-chatter cutting states, associated with the orthogonal cutting of stiff metal cylinders, are identified through an analysis of the ratios of the mean absolute deviations of details of the biorthogonal 6,8 wavelet decomposition of cutting force measurements. Sequences of cutting experiments were performed in which either depth of cut or turning frequency was varied. For light and medium cutting the mean absolute deviations of the ratios of detailsd3andd4is less than 7 while for chatter it is greater than 15. The kurtosis of detaild3is shown to identify transitions to chatter.