On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 09:31:31 -0500, Joe Corona wrote:

I just got a 7x12 mini lathe,I want to practice on cheap plastic
meterial before I become proficient enough to work on metal.Do you think
plastic is a good material to learn basics of turning and if that is the
case what type of plastic do you recomend, and some suppliers. I tried
the internet,but the choices are limitless and many suppliers deal with
other companies

Find your local scrap yard and look for steel bar -- mine usually has
odds & ends that look like they're from a machine shop. They're not so
good with aluminum, but I've found some useful chunks.

If there's much surface rust grind it off before you use it to dull your
tools with.

Or find your local machine shop and ask if they have odds & ends that
haven't made it to the scrap yard yet -- some folks will be so tickled
that you're wanting to learn that they'll give you stuff for free, some
will chase you off with a stick (don't go to the latter kinds of places
more than once each).

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Do you need to implement control loops in software?
"Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems" gives you just what it says.
See details at http://www.wescottdesign.com/actfes/actfes.html