Our club meets at the local Woodsmith store and uses which ever lathe
we need. General 26020 or Delta mini lathe or Jet mini lathe or the
former Delta Reeves drive 12 inch lathe. Kind of depends on what
topic is being presented. For example when the Woodcut Bowlsaver was
being demoed, we used the General 26020 to turn a 14" chunk of maple.
For tops and yo-yos and Chinese balls we used a mini lathe I believe.
For demoing the Stewart type hollowing tools, we used the General.
For small hollow boxes we used the General. Didn't need to but it was
the lathe we used.

So a mini lathe really isn't a very good club lathe choice since many
woodturners love to see these high dollar, high falutin tools demoed
by their fellow club members who bought them. And you need a bigger
lathe for that.

But maybe when you want to demo something that needs a big lathe, you
can schedule the monthly meeting at a club member's house who has a
big lathe. And all of the smaller item demos can be handled at the
school using the mini lathe. As for variable speed, I don't think its
too essential. For the small stuff a mini lathe can handle, the
slowest speeds on a mini are slow enough. And keep in mind a club
meeting demo can only take so long before the audience loses interest
and starts making more racket than the lathe by talking to their
neighbors. So the club demo projects have to be fairly quick and
small. Something a mini lathe can handle with its pulleys.


"Bob Hewson" wrote in message le.rogers.com...
Our club is the Thames Valley Woodturners, London, Ont, Canada.

We meet in a local high school and use one or two of their old General
school lathes. These are OLD and beat up despite our attempts to keep one
in good service.

We have decided we need a mini lathe, with 10" swing, and handle 14" between
centres, 110V, and variable speed.

There seem to be lots of choice of lathes, but not with variable speed. To
add variable speed would be double the price of many minis. We have a mixed
vote on variable speed, some say "essential", some "nice", some an "non
essential luxury"

What has your club opted for and why?

Bob