On Oct 18, 8:16 am, "Noddy" wrote:
"Bill Schwab" wrote in message

...

About the lathe itself, are you happy with it? Where did you buy it? How
does it stack up on DoN's questions:

Hi Bill,

I read through those links, and DoN's questions pretty much described my
machine to a T. I bought it from a local industrial tool importer, but I
should add at this point that I'm in Melbourne, Australia, so that might not
be in your neck of the woods

As far as "import" 12x36 lathes go I think they're all pretty much of a
muchness if most of the stuff I've read on the net about them is anything to
go by.

Their pro's are that they offer quite a bit of machine for the money, but
that's about it. Their cons are many, including appalling attention to
detail with things like headstocks full of sand and swarf, spindle oil that
looks (and smells) like it used to be cat urine in a former life, V belt
pulleys that have more run out than a circus clown's bicycle wheels, handles
and knobs fitted incorrectly and the like.

The accuracy out of the box makes a junkyard lathe look great by comparison
(which was certainly true of mine and that of a couple of friends who bought
similar machines from different manufacturers), and the fit & finish of the
things is about as bad as you could possibly make it if you were
deliberately trying to.

Unfortunately for us down here, good used quality equipment is very hard to
come by, and when it does eventually pop up now and then it's usually worth
a small fortune. To give you an example, a local used machinery dealer not
far from me has a couple of Colchester Student lathes that look like they've
done a world tour as deck cargo on a submarine, but he wants 7500 bucks each
for them and he says he'll get it without any problems at all.

For a home hobby guy like me that's way too much for a machine that probably
needs as much again spent on it to return it to active duty. The only real
alternative if you want something of a useful size that doesn't cost an arm
and a leg is the Chinese stuff, but from what I've seen thus far their new
stuff is almost as bad as the worn out old junk

In short, I'm reasonably happy with mine (which may sound strange), but only
because I own it and have spent a couple hundred hours fully rebuilding a
brand new lathe turning it into what is now a reasonable, but not brilliant,
machine. Out of the box it was terrible, and within 5 minutes of it's first
running I thoroughly regretted selling my little Hercus (which is a locally
made Southbend copy) and buying this thing.

If I lived in the US and had access to the huge variety of cheap quality
machines that you guys seem to have, I wouldn't go near a Chinese machine
even if they were giving them away for free.

George.


Hmmm, glut of used machines in the US, glut of shipping containers,
dearth of good affordable used machines down-under, seems like the
thing to do is to take 'orders', find a containers worth of machines,
and ship.


Dave