Thread: How to turn pens using a GMC 4 speed lathe?

Unless he can remove the drive centre and fit a morse taper mandrel into it, it is going to be pretty difficult to turn pens. It may be possible to find a faceplate that will screw onto the shaft if it has an external thread on it.

Unfortunately these things are not very pen friendly I made about a hundred pens with something like this . They don't have a morse taper in either the headstock spindle or the tailstock . The tailstock just has a threaded bolt that screws directly into the housing, the centre is a bearing pressed onto a turned section of the threaded bolt ,eg Fixed in place ,the angle of the point is also too sharp to seat properly in a standard mandrel .
The headstock end has a threaded bit that allows a face plate or chuck to be screwed on.the toothed drive dog also screws on to this thread. All up a challenge for mandrell turning. I was able to modify it all as I have a centre lathe to do bits and pieces with.
Good luck with it though ,there are some things you can do though if you can get access to a machine shop to get an adapter made for the spindle . cheers ~ John

Thanks Treecycle and gawdelpus, pen turning doesn't look promising for him! .
But I will pass on your comments and he may be able to chase up one of his engineering mates to have a look and see what adjustments could be made.
He still has to figure out how to attach the face plate!! The manual was not really helpful.
Thanks again!

The spindle is threaded about 18 mm Dia I think ,it has 2 flats on the shaft ,shifter on one and unscrew the drive dog with another (unless he has the right size open enders ) That should allow the face plate to screw on in its place , I bought a cheap chuck and made a thread adapter for it , my lathe is a Dynalink, sheet metal construction quite flimsy overall, I think they were generics just a label change hehe. Mine is still setup as it has a long enough bed to do other things ,but rarely fires up , cheers ~ John

You can get a 4 jaw chuck for them as I did have one. If you get hold of Timbecon they maybe able to get you a chuck for about $250. If you put an extra $50 you can buy a new lathe that will turn pens.
David