Yeah… it was obvious to me as well that I didn’t know what I was doing (that has never stopped me though) but I’m getting there. A lot was learned on this exercise.

For sure

As Georg Schlesinger said in his works some 90 years ago.

That’s a great idea. I think at this point I am punching above my skill and am content that this lathe is plenty accurate for my current projects. I will definitely keep this in mind.

I recently leveled it with the help from a local machinist. I may recheck in a year to see if it settled.

Thanks Joe!

heck yeah! Go for it. So far the people who received them have really liked them. Merry Christmas!

That thought hit mid project - if I were making 100’s of these I’d find a 1” center cutting end-mill and find a way to chuck it on a drill press. A bit geeky, but they cut very clean and don’t try to grab and move the part like a Forster bit. Could even drill out after glue up with no problem.

I’ve only ordered three China tools for machining. Drill chuck and dividing head were machined very well and just needed a tear down, deburring, and greasing. This was the first thing where the machining was poor. I will continue to look for a rotary table but because of its size I think I will avoid Chinese made. 2 out of 3 is an OK record I think… and all 3 were able to ‘tune up’ nicely (thankfully).

I might have submitted this video to house finance committee (my wife) shortly after to show how useful this new machine is.

I would love to find a Dake. I looked for a year for a Dake or similar. Where I live it’s extremely hard to find anything like that used within 300 or even 500 miles and shipping would be a lot beyond that. I don’t know how 100lbs of metal can be produced and shipped for the cost of the Vevor but for the one or two times a year I’ll use it its pretty nice (after the tune up). I am open to replacing it if I manage to find a better one locally in the future.

Thanks! And good catch, it should say “part 2: painting” - that’s my bad. Too late to fix it now. I’m glad someone liked seeing what all the levers do. It took me a while to sort it all out, having never used a metal lathe before, and I was fairly excited to have just figured it out.

Very cool channel! I can relate; my Monarch lathe and Bridgeport are from my wife's Grandfather's home shop and he was a machinist prior to setting up his home shop.

I was under the impression cable and ball bearing is better than ways and gears like I have. Somewhere I read gears can sometimes lift if cranked too forcefully - but I have not been able to produce this effect on my grinder (yet). I simply replaced the rack and pinion so all I had to do was measure each part and order replacements.

I'm not sure if you can see this listing (or how long it will be visible) but this is what I purchased and I did have to modify them slightly to accommodate the arbor nut. They now work perfectly. www.ebay.com/itm/156472313960 I took a risk since there was limited info. These are not balancing hubs like the one that came on the machine. I've read that balancing is not needed on this size machine (though it can be done my moving material from the wheel with a carbide drill once mounted on the hub). I believe it is standard taper if you are searching. It may be useful to go to the sopko website and look up how arbors are described, measure yours, and then compare model numbers to the sopko website if looking for used.

Thanks! I have been practicing with some test pieces and working to improve my technique. So far, I learned that I was pretty terrible at first go, but have been gradually improving and am nearly to the point that I am comfortable grinding in the table flat. Early on, I was amazed how much better a clean table holds the peice.

​@@samuelwiltzius I once had a part fall off my magnet because I tried to sand off too much at once. The thing flew through the room like a missile and got in a lot of trouble with my boss for it. :) I was more careful after that

Thanks! No bearings needed work. A few things needed adjustment but all the running gear was perfect.

I have a 14kwh LiFePO battery that powers the cabin via an inverter. There is a separate fuse panel for low voltage appliances in the cabin that bypasses the inverter. The whole panel is on a 10 amp fuse. Don’t remember exact wire size but I followed a readily available reference chart. I think 14 gauge stranded.

Thank you!​@@samuelwiltzius

Thanks! It was a quick build - it’s getting good use too. I just followed up with Dad after he visited Dennis.

I only know enough about electricity to keep myself from getting hurt. Twin 4500w is a lot of power. My 15 gallon barrel heats up plenty fast and at 4500w x 2 you are getting to an outlet/plug/wire that is out of my comfort zone.

@ makes sense. I’m dealing with turkeys twice a year and am using about 30 gallons. I got really nervous seeing your chart of 30 degrees every 10 minutes with well water that always starts at about 52 degrees. It would mean I would still be waiting over an hour to go from fresh water to shrink bagging. I’m still doing some research into conductive heating elements rather than resistive heating elements. I’ll share anything I learn here with you.

@ I just did turkeys yesterday… I have the luxury of 130F hot water in my outdoor hose bib. Once hot there is enough power to keep it hot without waiting for recovery. My largest bird was 15 pounds and it filled my scalder - probably max for this size setup.

That sound could be a bunch of things, not sure where to start. I had a weird sound from the pulley slipping on the shaft. Might have to turn it off and turn stuff by hand to try and find the source of the sound.

Thanks! 1” x 1.5” tube

Thanks! I had no clue how it would go before I started that repair and am still surprised how it turned out.