MandJ
24th August 2018, 12:38 PM
My wife purchased an older lathe to replace her smaller Woodfast 280, which she has to sell and I'm guessing that will be left to me, preceded by "please-hug-please" con that seems to work for her most of the time.
I was told that the lathe she bought was a Carba-Tec CT-25650 with VSD, digital speed readout, rotating / sliding head stock and some extras including two chucks, one a hardly unused Vicmarc VM120 and various other parts.
I hadn't seen much on these Lathes and only a few comments about a tendency to rock due to less than optimal footprint.
The lathe has seen little use, minimal dust in the headstock housing and almost nothing in the VFD. I dismantled the lathe, checked all wiring, added a few cable casing supports and checked the VFD, it's a Delta unit and I was able to find an PDF manual for it, Carba-Tec kindly sent me a PDF user manual for the lathe to complete the Lathe manuals.
Only a few nicks in the head unit paint, after a clean up it looked almost like new and the Lathe bed cleaned up like new as well. Because of the size of this thing, I had to reposition the lathe to the other side of the workshop, that meant modifying the dust extraction layout for other equipment and this bigger lathe. As the lathe is taller that the smaller Woodfast, the typical 100mm high platform was quickly build for short-stop (wife).
The Lathe also came with some sandbags that had been in the lower cabinet support housings, I filled 12 big plastic containers I had and fitted them into the lower housing in each side, along with another small sealed sandbag on top of the containers.
The secret to getting most heavy machinery stable starts with correctly adjust the isolating feet to share the load, there are four on each side and once they were correctly load sharing, the stability was good even without the sand, once the weight of the sand was added it really felt solid, I could bolt the lathe down if needed but at this stage it's not necessary.
I added a sealed door to the lower cabinet enclose to keep dust ingress out, most often used tools are wall mounted. I will need to make a new chisel cabinet as well - sigh.
The Lathe is very quite, quick up to speed and stops quite fast, wife started on the first bowl and loved the variable speed, the thing she was really after.
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe01.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe02.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe03.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe04.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe05.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe06.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe07.JPG
A platform for little people :D
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe08.JPG
Door seals the lower shelf - Except for the two boxes of jaws, some of the stuff that came with the lathe.
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe09.JPG
I was told that the lathe she bought was a Carba-Tec CT-25650 with VSD, digital speed readout, rotating / sliding head stock and some extras including two chucks, one a hardly unused Vicmarc VM120 and various other parts.
I hadn't seen much on these Lathes and only a few comments about a tendency to rock due to less than optimal footprint.
The lathe has seen little use, minimal dust in the headstock housing and almost nothing in the VFD. I dismantled the lathe, checked all wiring, added a few cable casing supports and checked the VFD, it's a Delta unit and I was able to find an PDF manual for it, Carba-Tec kindly sent me a PDF user manual for the lathe to complete the Lathe manuals.
Only a few nicks in the head unit paint, after a clean up it looked almost like new and the Lathe bed cleaned up like new as well. Because of the size of this thing, I had to reposition the lathe to the other side of the workshop, that meant modifying the dust extraction layout for other equipment and this bigger lathe. As the lathe is taller that the smaller Woodfast, the typical 100mm high platform was quickly build for short-stop (wife).
The Lathe also came with some sandbags that had been in the lower cabinet support housings, I filled 12 big plastic containers I had and fitted them into the lower housing in each side, along with another small sealed sandbag on top of the containers.
The secret to getting most heavy machinery stable starts with correctly adjust the isolating feet to share the load, there are four on each side and once they were correctly load sharing, the stability was good even without the sand, once the weight of the sand was added it really felt solid, I could bolt the lathe down if needed but at this stage it's not necessary.
I added a sealed door to the lower cabinet enclose to keep dust ingress out, most often used tools are wall mounted. I will need to make a new chisel cabinet as well - sigh.
The Lathe is very quite, quick up to speed and stops quite fast, wife started on the first bowl and loved the variable speed, the thing she was really after.
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe01.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe02.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe03.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe04.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe05.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe06.JPG
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe07.JPG
A platform for little people :D
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe08.JPG
Door seals the lower shelf - Except for the two boxes of jaws, some of the stuff that came with the lathe.
http://www.brisdance.com/Wood/CT_LATHE/CTlathe09.JPG