Thread: Choice of hobby lathe

Hi Terry,
I have the AL50A which is the earlier, non gearbox, brother of the AL50GA. It has been/is a good lathe to start on, (has a reversing switch) but doesn't cut lefthand threads without making an idler gear to go in the headstock. Are you going to have a go at the EQ mount?
Cheers
Graeme

I have had a H&F AL50GA for a couple of months now. it is a "9x20" lathe - sold under lots of names into lots of markets but essentially the same machine. There is a huge amount of info out there on this lathe including ways of adding a tumbler gear for LH thread turning. Steve Bedairs site is a good starting point http://www.bedair.org/9x20comments.html

Overall I find it great, it is a good size and doesn't seem tiny like some of the others. for the price (I got mine in the March sale for $990) it seems great value. It does need quite a bit of sorting out when you first get it. The ways are straight, the headstock is true, anything that really needs to be well fitted seems to be, but everything else.................... Most of the issues are annoyances rather than major problems and the ones I've tackled so far have been pretty easy to fix.

I think common to most hobby lathes it doesn't go fast (or slow) enough, so on small workpieces it is hard to get enough surface speed to get a good finish, at the slowest speed of 100rpm it is still too fast for thread cutting with the chasing dial. I am hunting for a DC motor to convert mine to variable speed to get around this. The compound clamp is weak and seems to flex a lot (a much improved replacement is quite easy to make using the lathe). The gibs on mine worked loose very quickly from the initial adjustment - I am hoping this was just bedding in and they will stabilise now. There is a clutch on the slowest speed to prevent over load - however it is set so light that normal threading cuts on a 12mm Aluminium thread are not possible. I believe this is an easy fix and will be the next thing I tackle on this machine (along with misalignment of the B and C pulleys)

With the low power and limited speed of this lathe (or pretty much any hobby lathe)carbide tooling is not really worthwhile - I bought a set initially but have had pretty ordinary results with it. I'm now using HSS bits.

Cheers
Damo

The speed problem can be (partially) overcome by buying a variable speed version of the 9x20.

See the link in my signature, not much more expensive than the H&F version and much more usable.

I would regard the 9x20 as a minimum size for a hobby lathe, particularly given the small cost difference to the 7x mini lathe, when you consider the extra accessories you get with the 9x20.

Terry its a shorter drive for you to the H&F Brisbane store isn't it??

Maybe contact the Tamwoth Model Engineers and see if one their members has one you can check out, some of those fellows are also members of the woodies group.

Ray

Terry , I have the TL180 v from Titan and have found them to be very good people to deal with. They back their products 100%. The owner Stuart Duncan is a fitter and turner by trade,and is very honest when giving advice about his products. My lathe is a mini lathe. I see you are looking at a 9x20 the next size up from mine,they are a good machine for practising basic machining techniques. the only thing is as you become more profficient at turning you will soon realise the limitations of a small lathe and may want a larger machine. The best advice I could give you if you are really keen on getting a 9x20 or similar machine, is to join a yahoo group dedicated to these machines and read up about them, there is a lot of information in these groups andlots of interesting reading

Thanks All. Some thinking to do.