as others have said, isn't as rigid as a south Bend, etc.. That simply
means that you may have to take 30 thou roughing cuts instead of 50 or
60 at a time.

I use to own a 12 inch atlas. It could not take nearly as heavy a
cut as my 11 inch rockwell. The rigidity really limited interrupted
cuts; the machine would protest in many ways.

The only time I ever used carbide was turning cast iron flywheels.
That machine was just too flexable.

I bought and sold two 12 inch atlas lathes in the 1000 dollar range
depending on how much tooling was included.