They can be generic, but very unusual. When I bought my 10" SB new from SB in
'81, it did not come installed. This is no simple
task. In the end, I got it right, but it was truly a pain. If you do not get the
taper attachment as factory, you will be faced
with a whole series of mods for the carriage, which are not trivial. Secondly,
after using the taper attachment on the SB 10
without a differential crossfeed screw and using the SB 13 x 40 SB with a
differential crossfeed, there is no comparison. Give me
the differential variety any day, as it allows the user to dial in cuts with the
crossfeed AND the compound in a conventional
manner. Without the differential crossfeed, only the compound can be used as the
cross feed is disabled, which is not convenient.
Using the taper attachment on my big 18 x 54 Lodge & Shipley is even easier. It
is also factory installed.When you need one, there
is no substitute. I would not own a lathe without one.
Steve