And so it begins: Turn, turn, turn!
Hi All,
I was on here a while back, asking about which lathes to buy, and received some good advice. Having just moved house, and finally started setting up my workshop/shed/mancave, I got talking to a family friend and fellow woodworker... Who said;
"I have a lathe that's in a bit of a sad state- It's been underwater... take it, have a play with it, see if you can get it running a bit better."
It's one of those generic lathes that Gasweld/Supercheap/whoever else sell; i.e; Not exactly the last word in quality.
It's also old. And has been for a swim.
Even so, it spun up just fine, if sounding a bit rattly (bearings methinks).
Problem 1; The tool rest spindle has cracked sometime in the past, and a previous owner has put a HSS pin(Possibly a drill bit shank) through it, but it still rotates a bit under pressure.
I grabbed a bit of firewood from the pile, cut the ends square, tapped it onto the headstock drive spurs, wound in the tailstock, and hit the go button... All the youtube tutorials I'd watched didn't stop me getting a mega catch in seconds. The corners of my roughing gouge dug into the work... Higher tool rest next time!
Fortunately, being the gutless wonder it is, that immediately stalled the motor. I was able to resume turning for a few minutes until...
Problem 2: The bottom plate on the tailstock clamp cracked just next to an old weld.
So now the bottom clamp plate and the tool rest are with my neighbour who is a model train engineer(The steam/diesel ride on ones), and his mate who apparently is a whiz with cast iron.
Hopefully, I'll be back at it this afternoon, and I'll throw up some pictures of my little adventure into turning!
