On Fri, 07 Jan 2005 21:40:00 GMT, Aaron Kushner wrote:
I've got a 10" Senecca Star lathe that didn't come with a belt.

I read through many old posts on putting belts on lathes, but I
couldn't find anything definitive on what width belt to use. The
pulleys are 1 1/8" wide. One post mentioned that there should be
1/4" on each side, but that would leave only a 5/8" belt and that
doesn't seem very wide. Would a 3/4" - 1" belt work better?

For what it's worth, I used to have an old Bradford lathe (1910's
vintage or so I think) that used a 2" wide belt. The guy I got it
from put a final drive belt from a Harley-Davidson on it (smooth side
in), and it _never_ stretched. Might be worht considering,
but I have no idea how you could make it narrower if you needed to.
I can't imagine it'd be easy to slit.

I was planning on purchasing leather from McMaster and skiving
it, but I saw that they had NBR and SBR synthetic belts already
premade in the size I need. Would these be better than leather?

I was very happy with the synthetic belt in this application. Far
as I know, the guy I sold it to is still using it, and it's been
years.

Dave Hinz