Hi everyone,
There’s an auction for a 12x36" metal lathe that ends in a little less than 8 hours, and I’d like to get a group-buy going. I expect after taxes and shipping from its current location it’ll all-in be around $1500. With VHS’s tool-purchase matching of 30%, we’re looking at raising around $1400 (was: $1000) ASAP!
Why do we need a new lathe? Our current one is broken, fragile, and we cannot get replacement parts for it (we’ve tried). See this thread for details: https://talk.vanhack.ca/t/metal-lathe-out-of-order/12897
This new lathe is a slight upgrade in every way over our current lathe (slightly larger, slightly newer, some nicer features).
We currently have a 11x22" (working area) lathe, and once you add in the chuck and live center, we’re talking more like ~16" of usable space work piece (and much less if you need to use a drill or boring bar). It has a non-standard half-metric and half-imperial spindle nose (where the chuck mounts), a similarly non-standard and small spindle bore, a tiny MT2 tailstock, and if it’s run in reverse the chuck will simply unscrew itself and fall off.
The candidate lathe is a 12x36" model so that’s over an extra foot of working space, AND it has a removable gap-bed for turning even larger diameter pieces than 12". It has a standard/modern D1 cam-lock spindle which not only means that we can easily buy additional chucks/faceplaces/etc but it can be run in reverse safely (used for reverse threads and safe “backwards” normal threading), but it also has a standard MT5 taper. There are various other upgrades also over our current machine, and it’s in very good condition from the looks of the photos. The only potential downside that I can see is that it may not already have a 4-jaw chuck (but it just may not be in the limited pictures), though that’s an easy problem to solve as it has a modern and standard spindle.
Simply put, this is the perfect lathe upgrade for us, at a price that cannot be beat (it would normally sell for $4000+, from my years of looking for a machine like this).
To get the ball rolling towards the $1400 (was: $1000) purchase, I’ll chip in $250. This is that amazing a deal and upgrade! Please reply below with a commitment if you’re able to chip in anything, and I’ll update this post.
*** UPDATE *** It’s currently at $1300, so I suspect it may end up going for over $1500 unfortunately (+ tax & shipping). It’d still be a great deal, but we need to raise more than originally thought - so please continue to chip in if you can. I feel an upper limit of $2000 is appropriate ($1400 + VHS match of $600), though even that is very cheap for this lathe.
- @rsim $250
- @Arrgh $100
- @Rob_MacKenzie $200
- @Stefan $200
- @Tamara_VA7ETR $50
- @miststlkr $50
- @Cantina_Dude $250
- @JohnC $100
- @winegummo $100
- @mirong $250
- @lukecyca $100
- @Janet $25
- @Majicj $100
- @Pat $50
- @Ivan_Erasmus $75
- Total: $1775. WOOHOO!
It’s in the