Dunlap lathe should I get it? $150

There's a little Dunlap lathe probably 3 feet long, looks to be all there, with motor, for $150. I wondered if I should get it?

I'm not sure we can answer that for you right now. First you haven't expressed your interest with respect to use and the size of the projects. You really want to find out what the capacity between centers is and the lathes Swing. These numbers roughly define the lathes capacity, though things like rigidity comes into play.

In a nut shell the lathe has to have the capacity to turn the projects you expect to work on. Some to do fine with a Taig others need a 2 ton lathe with a 14" swing.

Then again another way to look at this is that $150 for a functional lathe is a steal, you should jump on it right away.

I'd just use it to get started turning anything. I've had a Craftsman circa 1940 or so for over a year, but I've been too distracted to run it yet, and like the idea of the tiny lathe just to get started noodling with.

A gigunda engine lathe would be ideal, but I'm not really set up for that lol.

I supposed this kind of lathe would be all right to build a weensie steam engine.

Are you sure that it is a metal turning lathe?

All I could find were wood Dunlap wood turning lathes.

Also the amount of tooling that is included is important.

There is info here on Dunlap : http://web.archive.org/web/20170629180220/http://www.lathes.co.uk/craftsman/page5.html

WOB

The lathe has flat ways. My father had a Craftsman lathe years ago. Similar flat ways. The bed casting was fairly soft and wore rapidly where the carriage traveled the most. It was impossible to adjust the gibs so they were tight near the headstock and still allow full traverse of the bed. It was impossible to hold dimension on a turned part. W flat way machine will be inaccurate when the bed is worn. A V way lathe can still do accurate work even with a worn bed.

john_reese said:

The lathe has flat ways. My father had a Craftsman lathe years ago. Similar flat ways. The bed casting was fairly soft and wore rapidly where the carriage traveled the most. It was impossible to adjust the gibs so they were tight near the headstock and still allow full traverse of the bed. It was impossible to hold dimension on a turned part. W flat way machine will be inaccurate when the bed is worn. A V way lathe can still do accurate work even with a worn bed.

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On the other hand a flat bed lathe is very easy to hand scrap in! As for soft ways they will wear faster than hardened ways but many a lathe has been sold with plain cast iron ways. That and the fact that box ways are used on very rigid machines kinda highlights that not all is lost with flat ways.

If someone is willing to scrape in the ways that is a different picture. He also needs to b aware that if the top of the bed is scraped the position of the feed pinion with respect to the rack changes.
similarly the po9sition of the half nuts with respect to the lead screw changes. These changes need to be accounted for.

I doubt if screaping the ways would affeft the feed pinion and
halfnut locations to any discernable extent

Not a flat way machine, but I owned a Pratt & Whitney 14 x 30 lathe with a badly worn bed. The bed was worn near the chuck where the carriage would ride doing short work. It had never been scraped. The travel pinion did not engage the feed rack full depth. The feed rod and clutch rod dragged against tops of their respective bushings and there was obvious bow in both.

When the bed of the flat way machine is scraped the headstock, carriage, and tailstock will be lowered with respect to the bed. The rack and the outboard bearing for the lead screw will not. The rack and bearing will both need to be shimmed down equal to the amount taken off the top of the bed + what is taken off bottom of the carriage.

I saw it again. It has V ways and is a Craftsman. The seller told me it was a Dunlap. He must have meant made by Dunlap. It has a 3 speed gear box, motor and belt drive. Dead center. And a nail to adjust the angle of the cutter lol.

You are quite correct John.The point i was making is how much needs to be scraped off. Scraping to my mind involves removing a couple of thou only
If it is more and the feed screws are already out of position then you are correct
and they will need adjusting.If the small area of worn bed is say 10 thou low
then it will take an awful lot of work to scrape down the rest of the bed

Putt-Rite,

I have been following this thread and I have watched many work with the Craftsman Dunlap Lathe (If this is the one you are looking at it should have a serial number beginning with "109" or have a model number of 109.)

These lathes are being used, and even have an interest group somewhere. (Sorry, I don't have the link.)

However, they do have a reputation of being not very precise without a lot of fussing. I have seen one, but I have not used one and the one I saw allowed me to identify several points where problems could exist in the design, fit and finish.

At the time these were being sold, their competition was probably the Unimat lathe. Those are still out there and have interest groups and support sites, too.

If you absolutely have to get going, you might be all right to get this one if it is in good shape, but you will probably spend at least another $150.00 to actually start turning and more than that to actually "tool up."

For close to the same money you could get a Taig lathe, which would be smaller, but more in line with engine modeling if you want the "weensie" lathe.

Close to $500.00 or therabouts would get you one of the Chinese 7X lathes, which would still have to be fine-tuned, but would have the advantage of a wide range of other users for support, many parts and accessories available, variable speed and forward/reverse of both spindle and leadscrew, bolt-on chucks, and the ability to do single-point threading.

Let us know what you decide.

--ShopShoe

At the time these were being sold, their competition was probably the Unimat lathe. Those are still out there and have interest groups and support sites, too.

Yes I think you are right that Unimat has a interest group, A few years ago I was going to bid on a Unimat lathe on ebay, {had one years ago but sold it} but the price was way out of sight..I did see a nice little Craftsman lathe at a yard sale in June this year, with lots of tooling and like new for about $300.00 as I remember the asking price.

I have had to read the original posting before comment. The only other information given is that a second viewing indicates that it is a vee bed. So far our poster has not carried out anything but a distance examination- and there, for better or worse, is where we are.

The other salutary information is that the OP has- but not used- another lathe.

Me, whilst all this is going on, has run off a a specimen test sheet applicable to a vee bed lathe and generic for a SiegC4 which I have recently been involved.

So armed with a pair of stands and clock gauges and a test bar, I can check my acquisition to see what has happened over the --- last TEN years.

But there is a sting in the tail, IF my lathe 'mikes' up pretty close to the test sheet, my lathe will never be a precision lathe, merely a very ordinary affair-- for which I have literally gambled. A LOT less than the original price

Our poster would be well advised to see what he has been offered.

Caveat Emptor - and all that Jazz.

Regards

Norm

Putt-Rite said:

I saw it again. It has V ways and is a Craftsman. The seller told me it was a Dunlap. He must have meant made by Dunlap. It has a 3 speed gear box, motor and belt drive. Dead center. And a nail to adjust the angle of the cutter lol.

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Offer him $75!

If the lathe runs, it is better than nothing and even at a $150 isn't a lot of money down the drain. Personally I would be searching for a larger lathe and if I needed something for extremely small work, would look for a Taig or watchmakers lathe.

One thing to note, that was mentioned above, the price you pay for this lathe or even a brand new Taig or larger machine is not your final investment. All of these machine require a layout of cash for tooling and expendables. For the most part you can do very little with a lathe without tooling, machinist tools and a bunch of accessories.