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Market Research Question -- Sakai ML 360 Lathe

HI Group:

I attended the Inernational Hardware Show in Las Vegas this week saw a "new" version of the Sakai ML 360 lathe and mill. This lathe was originally made in Japan and got quite a bit of press in HSM with Rudy Kaughupt (sp??).

Rudy wrote several articles on the quality of the lathe and mill, and my understanding was that the ML series was discontinued several years ago. Why, I do not know. Price?????

Seem like a Korean manufacturer has picked up the rights and the tooling to manufacture the lathe in Korea. They are looking to revisit the US market.

My question is has anyone in this newsgroup used the Sakai lathe, or have any comments on it?

Is there any interest in a Korean made "mini lathe" that is supposedly has much better quality than the now ubiquitous 7 x 10/12/14" Chinese Sieg mini lathes? Size is basically the same.. 6 x 14.

This lathe will be in the 1500 dollar range, so expensive compared to the Chinese made lathes, , but will be comparable (or better) than the German made Prazi line.

I must admit the lathe and mill (especially the mill) looked and felt very good. The paint color is an obnoxious green, but all the controls were silky smooth.

Anyway, just curious is there is a market for a small precision lathe made in Korea?

Steve Koschmann

Reply to
Steve Koschmann
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If I recall correctly, that lathe has always been a Korean made machine. Darn nice one too. Sakai was just slapping their name on it. When Sakai withdrew from the US market, the metric version of the machine remained available in Europe for some time (maybe still is).

There have been rumors for a couple of years that the Koreans wanted to directly market the inch version in the US, but there was some sort of problem preventing them from doing so. I don't know what that was. Anyway, if they've sorted that out and want to re-enter the US market with the inch version, I'm sure there will be some flush hobby folks who want a classy mini-lathe, and it certainly is that.

Gary

Reply to
Gary Coffman

On Sat, 15 May 2004 04:42:04 -0400, Gary Coffman brought forth from the murky depths:

I've seen Czech-made woodworking machinery and figure they also make metalworking machines. What do you guys think of that source? Any machines in particular you like?

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Reply to
Larry Jaques

I considered the Sakai when I was looking a few years back. It did seem to be the best deal of it's kind, but then I heard rumors of it going away so I did not buy one. The last thing I wanted was an orphan. That will be the biggest obstacle to its success now - the worry the supplier won't be around for long.

Reply to
Len S

Did you see what name was on the lathe?

Tim

Steve Koschmann Wrote:

-- tmanning

Reply to
tmanning

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