Still use your minilathe?

[Cedge]

Congrats!!!

Let the modifications begin....LOL First suggestion is to drill a small dimple in the center of the cross slide nut. Extending the cross slide travel.... third is a 5 inch chuck.....(grin)

Steve

 

[TarheelTom]

Hard to tell.

Just bought a used Sherline long-bed this past fall. Haven't used it that much, as lately the mill has been getting most of the work.

So my ancient Unimat sits under the workbench collecting dust.

Tom

 

[rtp_burnsville]

Yes, I still find use for my 7x10 after buying a Southbend 9 inch lathe. Like one of the others mentioned I also leave a 4 jaw or collet chuck on the Southbend and a 3 jaw on the mini lathe. Would really like to have something like a 12x36 to add to the collection.

The same goes for mills. The X2 still gets used even though there is a Tormach to do the serious things with. The shop is over flowing but it sure is nice having the right tool for the job at hand.
Robert

 

[Quake]

Chuck -

Had about 15 minutes of heart palpitations and cold sweats a little while ago. I cleaned up the lathe and checked everything over, then went through the startup procedure, making sure to follow directions. First I set everything to off and plugged it in. Then I put the forward/reverse switch into Forward. Turned on the Off/On switch, light comes on, so far so good. Then I turned on the speed dial and wound it up a quarter turn... nothing. Checked things over and tried again, nothing. So I wrung my hands and ground my teeth and wiped the sweat from my brow for about 10 minutes. Finally went back to the instruction book. Funny how the actual operating instructions start on about page 10. The first 9 pages are warnings and disclaimers... Anyway, to make an already long story short, I discovered that the chip shield arm has an interlock switch. The lathe won't operate unless the chip shield is in the operating position (OK, that's got to go!) Anyway, fiddled with the chip shield arm until the little detent pin popped into place, tried the startup procedure again, and bingo, off it went.

It's all good...

Chuck

An HF 7x10 on sale is what got me off the 'thinking about it' boat and started building things.

I got a faceplate for mine - think its 5" (from LMS) - and that chip shield and the one on the back of the lathe both had to go. I altered the motor controller wiring just a bit to essentially short that interlock switch.

I had problems with my motor controller - so I bought the 350W controller LMS offers (some of the asian mini-lathes come with it I'm told) - it is also used in some of the X2 (I have the X2 from grizzly). Anyhow, on that motor controller it is very easy to wire around that interlock switch. And, knock on wood, haven't had any problems with it since so long as I didn't push the limits of the machine too much.

But man am I getting used to my new 10x22 ...

The other night I needed to clean up a 1" or so "cup" - it's about 1" deep, has a wall of maybe not quite .125 and a bottom of about .125. It wouldn't fit on (I mean fit over the outside of the inside jaws ...) the 5" 3-jaw I have on the 10x22 - I grabbed the mini off the shelf, set it on the bench and the part went over that little chuck just fine and the piece was cleaned up in no time.

Glad I decided to keep the little outfit. Very handy.