Thread: What is a good wood lathe bed length?

Hi Ed, I'm only new to turning but have a home made lathe from the wife's grandfather, he obviously had the same delema the lathe is approx 2m between centres (collapsed) with another 1.8m extension. To my knowledge he never turned anything over the meter and neither have I. But, if you have the space and material, why not build it bigger than necessary?

Ed,

I lean toward longer just in case. If you are going to do spindles, at least 1 meter between centers. If you mostly do shorter things make a platform to fit on the bed for your grinder and / or turning tools.

What is a good length, depends. Here is a lathe that was sold as surplus by the Washington Navy Yard some years ago:

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb...er-no.-18-.jpg

Retired's long lathe from Woodwork Forums with extra length used for storage:

https://stusshed.files.wordpress.com...127-225506.jpg

https://stusshed.files.wordpress.com...127-225645.jpg

Only you can answer that.

Do you ever want to turn furniture parts? If so, then I'd go at least 900mm. If I had room I'd probably go 1200 or a little more. I can't imagine needing more than that unless you want to turn bedposts in single lengths or coatracks.

Swing height is also dependent on what you want to do. If you want to turn bowls, I'd go for something at least 400mm. It's only a matter of time before you want to go bigger so, really, just go as big as you practically can. Just be sure you include enough HP in the motor to compensate for the added torque on large diameter pieces.

Hope that helps,
Luke

Originally Posted by Paul39

Here is a lathe that was sold as surplus by the Washington Navy Yard some years ago:

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb...er-no.-18-.jpg
Oliver no. 18 .jpg

Wow 62 feet long! I'd need a loo in-built halfway down the bed-length just in case...

How long is a piece of string?
The short answer is what do you want to turn? This will govern the whole design of the lathe, swing, speeds, bed length and any else you need to consider. Also, do a search on this forum as there have several threads posted on building your own lathe and its associated issues.

But I will run through a couple things I have found as I have built a couple of lathes.

RHS or SHS for a bed as handy as it looks its not very good as it will vibrate it just isn't stiff enough. Maybe you can stitch weld it several pieces together this will stiffen it up. But will add to the width to the bed.

Tailstock, if you doing bowls this probably wont be needed . But the tail stock is one of the hardest parts to build and is a must for spindle work

The headstock is quite easy a couple of plummer blocks with self-aligning bearings will do just fine.

https://www.facebook.com/pg/TheWoode...17575875070731

Look here for as the older post on this forum have had the images stripped off

Option: make the bed around std. length (will allow 900mm) but while you're at it make an extension bed of about the same length.

I gather you have a welder and aren't afraid to use it? There's nothing to say that you can't have several different length extensions to suit different jobs or make the extension in such a way that you can daisy chain more on later.

Thanks for the replies guys, I just had a look this morning in Bunnings at the Ryobi wood lathe, was not impressed! I suppose you get what you pay for though.

This lathe will only be for smaller stuff as I do have a large wood lathe that I can turn up to 1m diameter bowls on, currently setup and in use as a drum sander as in the pic., below. Just need to unbolt all the bits you see here and put the tool rest and faceplate back on and it's back to being a lathe.


I suppose I will just leave the bed base at 2m., saves making further attachments as making some bed posts may be an interest in the future. I think that I will make the spindle height 300mm above the bed as anything requiring higher clearance will probably need to go on my bigger lathe. As for the motor, I will see how this one copes with the jobs I give it before looking for a larger motor.

Cheers

Looks like I have solved my problem about the bed length, will be picking up an old Vicmark VL300 tomorrow morning, it has a long bed length but not sure how long it is though, it is 3 phase although not sure if it runs as it has the plug removed, but is was really cheap. Spent a few hours today rearranging things in the shed to make room for it.

Convinced the missus that I need it as it will be much easier to replace a motor if it doesn't work, than to build an entire lathe from scratch again, and if I have to replace the motor will most likely get a 3 HP one, currently it has a 2HP? in it. It may be a 3 speed unit, don't know much about it or even how to control the speed as I couldn't see anything to control the speed apart from the stepped pulley. Having said that I can use my VFD from the other wood lathe to vary the speed on this one if necessary. Had a look on the web for info on the VL300 and the new ones all seem to be much shorter in bed length than this one.

Unfortunately still have to get a chuck for it as it doesn't come with one and will have to save up for a while to get one, at least now I will have some time to find a used one.

Later on I might still build a lathe, as I have most of the parts just gathering dust in the shed, and then sell it off to pay for extra bits I would need (like).

Picked it up today and had a proper look at it, it is a 1997 model and can hold a 1.2m spindle, the 1.5HP motor is a dual single/3 phase motor which is dated 2006, 6 step pulley in the head stock and 5 steps on the motor. The spindle has a 30mm x 3.5mm thread on it so any bits that I end up getting for it (such as the chuck) will directly screw onto my big wood lathe that I made.

So just have to rewire it, give it a clean and remove the rust on the pulleys and it should be good to go, hopefully the motor will run, as judging by the rust on the pulleys it hasn't been used for quite a while.