Mini Lathe For Next To Nothing

[William Young]

There seems to be quite a bit of interest in turning in this off topic board so I thought some might be interested in seeing this message that was posted in another site where a person recently made his own mini lathe . .

He even shows a picture of a spindle he turned on his home made lathe and a picture directly behind it of another stick that has been has been turned from square to round and all ready to make another finished one. .
Those are sliding dovetails that he cut with his router for both the tool rest and the tail stock. With patience like that I bet it won't be long before he makes enough items to sell to be able to buy a real nice new mini lathe with lots more features than what he has now. By starting out the way he has it will make him appreciate the features of a factory made lathe much more than some of us do that just take the features for granted.

My first response to him was. . . . . .


I must say that the lathe you made certainly is ingeniuos and just goes to show that where there's a will there's a way.
W.Y.

[JohnB]

G'day Bill,
That looks mighty simular to one I built many many years ago, just a bit flasher.
I needed some thing turned so knocked up a quick and dirty lathe. It did lots of work after that.
Then a bloke gave me a bed and tail stock that you clamped an electric drill into.

The motor of he original lathe I built came from an old washing machine, and when I'd finished with the lathe, it was put to use as a boring machine and then a drum sander. It only gave up the ghost last week.