--Well it's happened: I'm getting to the point where I need a lathe with more capacity than my Super 7B. But now I'm spoiled! ;-) Can anyone suggest a brand/model that's got, say, 1-1/2 times the swing and similar 'mutability' that won't break the bank?
In no perticular order: Harrison L5a - the later models are larger (5.5" iirc) than the early
4.5", Colchester Student, CVA, A 'baby' 13' DSG :)On or around Thu, 14 Aug 2008 10:50:58 -0700 (PDT), dave sanderson enlightened us thusly:
that's fecking big. you'd need a power station to run it. :-)
I've not been that disappointed with the Student. Paid 360 for it, since when it's had a new 3-jaw (about 350), and I've done some work on the crossfeed.
Oh, and it had an inept motor on it. 2HP high-torque 240V one has enough grunt for what I want, although it's down on power compared with the 3HP
3-phase it started with. A 3HP single phase would doubtless be better.
If you have the space I would say a larger one for the odd big job, and keep the beast you know. However big your lathe is, you will always find a task that is too big for it (same for milling), and then it may be easier to sub it out rather than change what you have. I use a 1950 4.25" Winfield as my main lathe at the moment. It was cheap and almost as new, but still a crude tool (though I am still learning so it it good to work with old tools, so you appreciate a good one). There was a couple of Myford 4" precision lathes recently on e-Bay which are a half way house - but I am sure the guys are right - if you really want to step up then you get into serious machinery - not always expensive, but damned heavy. Perhaps your need could be fulfilled by a gep-bed lathe with more capacity in the gap ? It all depends what you need to do.
Steve
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I've also had very good experience with my Southbend clone (S&B Sabel) and the larger SB's would seem good value with (reasonably) easy availability of accessories, although admittedly a fairly old design of machine.
I also have a Stanko Russian mill (Deckel copy-ish) which is a fine machine. A lot of the Eastern bloc (rather than far eastern) machines were built to a spec rather than a price as they wanted to forex and to my mind represent good value for money, especially as there's a fairly widespread tendency to look on them as 'just some old Russian junk'. Some probably were, but there was a lot of good stuff as well, maybe not as finely finished as German, British or American, but no worse in underlying mechanical competence .
Richard
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