I've been thinking of how to write this post for a few days. I am a member, and now (unbelievably) president of the Northeast Indiana Turners and Chiselers, a wood turning club near Ft. Wayne IN. Anyway, we had a visitor at our last meeting, a retired guy(are all turners retired?). He said he was trying to turn some table legs and they were "all fuzzy". He wanted to know if there was anyone who could visit his shop and show him what he's doing wrong.

It happens he lives about ten mile from me and I did visit his shop the other day. Where to start? He's trying to turn pine, about 36" long and 1 1/2" diameter and he doesn't have a steady rest. It would've been nearly impossible to do what what he was trying to do. It didn't help that his tools are very dull.

The really bad thing though, is his lathe, it's a Grizzly. I don't know the model number but it swings 14", with a very small variable speed motor. Worse, the ways looked to be 1/8" or less C-channel. Very, very light duty. If I had to guess I would say the lathe weighed less than 100lbs.

I'll admit I'm not a Grizzly fan but neither am I a basher. This lathe though, to me it's little more than stealing to sell such a piece of equipment. I'm not sure a person could even turn a pen on it, let alone a 12 or 14" bowl.

The guy told me he bought the lathe to see if he would like wood turning. I told him I could guarantee he wouldn't like it if he had to use that lathe.

It made me wonder, how many people have bought that lathe, or a similar product to see if they would like turning only to give it up and never know what turning is really like

 

Steve

Don't own a lathe (and no room for one), but know exactly what you mean.   Some inexpensive tools will do an ok job (like my old crapsman table saw), but others....well, they should have just saved the raw materials and not subjected people to it...  

 

Hope you were able to help him somehow. 

My first lathe was a Bridgewood (same factory as Grizzly, I think). It had a tube type bed. I bought it as I couldn't afford a better one at the time. I soon realized its' limitations- low power, difficult to create/mount jigs and limited speed settings. However, it did get me started and I turned some pieces that we still have. I sold it when I got the Delta iron bed- which is a lot better. I'd really like to go up to better lathe, now, but after looking at what they are selling for, I might be holding on the the Delta a while longer.

I started on a tube type lathe someone had given me.  It worked okay but I knew enough about machinery that there was better lathes out there and I needed to acquire one in order to advance in wood turning.  With todays communications in forums and on Facebook I believe it is easier for new turners to find more help than I and others my age had.  So maybe they will use it and find the path to better turning.

I started on a Delta Midi . Then upgrade to Jet 1442 and then PM 3520B. Guess you could say I was lucky to pick a good one to start. I do see lots of people start with the bad equipment and wonder how long they will last in the craft.

do Vega lathes (1596) count here??? or the 2600-INV???

 

On ‎2‎/‎15‎/‎2017 at 10:22 PM, HandyDan said:

  With todays communications in forums and on Facebook I believe it is easier for new turners to find more help than I and others my age had.  So maybe they will use it and find the path to better turning.

  Dan, your dead on with your statement. I've learn more about turning in the last few months than I ever knew.  I don't own a lathe but plan to purchase in the future, based on what I've learned here.