Help with mini lathe choices,and mills

[Retired_Army]

Hi, this is my first try at this so excuse me if I blow it.
I am looking for a mini lathe 9or 10 X 19 or 20 in. I need it capable of left hand threading. I perfer one that does not require changing the gears to cut the threads.
Guess I should tell you a little about myself, since the message I get when I sign on is recommending it.
So, here goes: I retired from military (Army) in Dec 04. I am also retired, but like to learn new things, and do some inventing. Served in Special Forces (Green Berets) total of 28 years service. Am an ex-POW from VN War yes you can go to POW sites that list names and mine is on it. Served in VN 42 months, went in to Grenada, did the Panama thing, Desert Storm, did some Counter Drug stuff in So America, and went in with first group into Afgahnastan. Finally got to old so instead of hold my guys up decided to retire.
Hope to get some recommendations on the mini lathes from you guys. Thanks Don Martin

[cjdavis618]

First and foremost.

Thanks for your service to our country and have a happy and safe Memorial Day weekend. We are proud of what you and your brothers in arms do. Regardless of media hype and the idiots say.


Now for your lathe, I have the Grizzly G0519 mill/ lathe combo. It is a 9x20 but you have to change gears to do anything with it. It is a nice machine, but limited due to that. I have never cut any threads at all on it at this point. And probably won't until I cnc it at a later date.

There are several that Grizzly.com have that are in the same price range that would do the job for you. I would check out the 10x22 they have or even step up to the 12x36 if you have room. Even though it is more money, the larger work area and rigidity will help and the cost isn't that much greater. It is always the tooling that costs the most.

[PoolQ]

I have the 9x30 from www.lathemaster.com and love it. All metal gears.

"This lathe will cut left hand threads and make cuts away from the chuck with the easy installation of the included feed reverse gear " from their 8x14

More $$ than some, but check the features before you decide.

Welcome

[Retired_Army]

To both PoolQ and Cjdavis618. Thank you very much for your recommendations. Hope I can get a few more from others that have different equipment. As of now the Lathemaster seems to be the better choice. I went on line and most of the items are not available. Hope they are not closing. Again Thanks for your help.

[PoolQ]

He is on vacation until the 1st. He has been around many years. If you do a search on CNCzone for lathemaster you will find that many "old timers" have his lathe and I have heard no complaints. That and all metal gears and ready to run without mods is what sold me. His after sale support is great, sometimes "a little" slow by todays terms, but great to deal with.

[MichaelBurton]

Don,
First for your service to our country, I respect your sacrifices for our freedoms.
"Thank You" just dosen't seem to cover it. But Thank You just the same.

I'm about to make a lathe purchase myself, I've done a ton of research in the past year looking for the right lathe and right guy to buy from. The trail always leads back to Bob at www.lathemaster.com

Yes, I've been tempted by Grizzly, and the Shop Fox 10x22 looks very nice, HF comes in third. But I want to have support if necessary. It seems, after all my reading, and all the E-Bay searching I've done, LatheMaster is the "Right way to go". So I'm patiently waiting until Bob gets back from vaca and updates his stock on the 8x14. It's size perty much fits my needs and it leaves a bit im my budget for tooling.

I'm not new to machining, been at it on and off for the past 30+ years (50 now), last year I purchased a KT2514 from K2CNC, And love it! I recommend them to anyone willing to listen. It's not a regular Mill but it will cut alum, HDPE and hard woods with ease. I scratch build R/C Aircraft and whatnots. I figure if I have a lathe to round out my shop I can build just about anything my busy mind imagines.

My bet is we both will be happy with a LatheMaster.

Stay intouch !
Michael