Mini Lathe Harbor Freight Question

[sharps4590]

Wow....just reading this thread confirms what I already knew...that is how much I don't know.

I bought a 9 X 19 Grizzly, with stand from an acquaintance worth the money to me. 90% of what I do on it has more to do with working on brass cases than anything else and, it works fine for that. The few projects I do in steel are both small and not very complicated so I just go slow. If any of you guys ever watched me work I'm 100% confident I would provide comic relief.....

My "in house" basement shop is about 1100 sq. ft. and I'm very grateful. About 2 years after we built the house I went up the hill about 50 yards and built me a 24 X 20 shop that houses my automotive stuff and, believe it or not, 3 MG's, a '55 TF, a '56 A and a '74 B. 'Course I have to back one out to work on anything but there's a plan to add 12 more feet to the back. Then I QUIT!!!

[Scrounge]

Are any of the Harbor Freight Mini Lathes capable of barrel threading?
Any books out there for using a Mini Lathe for Dummies?

https://www.amazon.com/Mini-Lathe-Wo.../dp/1854862545

https://www.amazon.com/Mini-Lathe-To.../dp/1854862650

The first book is a basic how to unpack, clean up, and get to know it book for the mini-lathe, and the second is how to make it do more than the basic out-of-the-box mini-lathe is capable of. Both well written, and photographed.

Here is one guy's work done on a mini-lathe: http://www.packratworkshop.com/pdf/m...e%20rifles.pdf

Not saying the mini-lathe is the ultimate gunsmith's lathe, because it is not. Am saying anyone who says they're useless is quite wrong.

Bill

[country gent]

Thats a loaded question asking if a mini lathe can thread a barrel many things come into this equation. Spindle bore size barrel od bed length and barrel length. A 3: pistol barrel they will do a fine job in a skilled operators hands a heavy sharps barrel to finish at 34" long probably not.
They will cut threads but will be much slower and more care will be needed then a bigger heavier machine. What I mean is instead of .015-.020 roughing passes it will be more like .003-.005 per pass then .001 finish to clean up and size.

But as stated in this post the hobbyist isnt interested in time as much as what can be done and the project. My concern of these small lathes is weight and overloading the bearings.

[oldred]

Been reading this whole thing and I have quite a bit of experience with HF lathes just not the little 7" outfits. An important point that no one has mentioned so far is that from about 12x36 machines on up the Chinese lathes make a huge leap in quality! They certainly won't equal the heavy American or European industrial iron but they are not junk either and are more than capable of doing anything a hobbyist might ask of it. The point is just because it came from China does not automatically make it junk nor does the Harbor Freight name either if it's one of the larger machines. These lathes can be a real bargain and unless they have been neglected (left outside, etc) they usually have seen little use and thus little to no wear. I have seen many discussions about these machines and all too often we see people insisting that a person is much better off with an old industrial machine than a new, or little used, Chinese machine but is that true? Almost all of the old industrial machines in the same price range as the Chinese outfits have significant wear while it's rare to see that on the imports, Chinese machines are also likely to have many desirable features that won't be found on the old iron. From 12x36 on up Chinese lathes are pretty much the same regardless of brand, Enco, Precision Mathews, etc and even the discontinued HF heavy machines are the same except for color. Sure you can find older iron in decent shape sometimes but it's hard to find and rarely cheap these days, do you really want to buy even a nice 10" older American lathe when the same, or nearly so, money will get you a 14" swing, a longer bed, larger through hole and a quick change box? It makes no difference how much better quality the old iron is (was) if the job won't fit, and that's even if if the ways are not worn! I had a lot of people tell me, at least in "sugar coated way, that I was stupid for buying a new Harbor Freight 14x40 lathe but I had done my homework! That HF lathe was IDENTICAL in every way to Birmingham, precision Mathews and several other more expensive lathes that were different only in color and price, the HF lathe even came with a Birmingham YCL 1440 manual but at far less money. ALL of these machines were a lot more capable than any used "old iron" I could find at anywhere near the price, besides I got a new machine with a lot more desirable features and zero wear to deal with.

But it will just fall apart in no time doncha know, all that Chinese stuff falls apart!

Well I have run this thing unmercifully for about 12 years now almost everyday but weekends and I am still waiting for the first part to fall off! It's accurate and with 5 HP has all the power I need, I use it to do farm machinery and logging machine repair in addition to my hobby work, anyone who has spent time turning heavy weld buildup usually on badly balanced parts can attest to the punishment that kind of work deals out to a lathe but my Chinese HF "junk" machine has yet to let me down. Well I have to admit about five or six years ago I did have to weld together the engagement lever assembly after it broke, I can't imagine why the darn thing could not withstand my backing into it with a fork lift I mean this was just a small fork lift carrying a few hundred pounds! Chinese junk I suppose.

[RC46]

My $.02, no won't work for what you want to do. We had one in the shop that we used to make compression posts (pillars) for stock bedding. Worked great for that. Small head stock, 3/4" as I remember.

A friend uses online 'used tool sellers', you might check there: machinesales.com, hgrinc.com, budsmachinetools.com, + many more. At least worth a look - a cautious look, probably a good time to be a buyer.

[Drm50]

The first threads I ever cut on gun barrel was on a heavy 1919 Brn MG. I still have them fron 50yrs ago. I had to part them off and redo. You could use that cutoff as a barrel inlet tool today, still ragged and sharp.

[brstevns]

And all I want to do is make up some bullet sizing dies and maybe make a firing pin. What tools would I need besides the hobby lathe?

[ulav8r]

And all I want to do is make up some bullet sizing dies and maybe make a firing pin. What tools would I need besides the hobby lathe?

A set of good drill bits, a drill chuck for the tailstock, a few square bits to grind for external turning and a small boring bar or two, and tool holders for the turning tools and boring bars. A few chucking reamers and homemade lapping tools would also be handy.

This is a quick reply, so short. More tools would be better.

[Dutchman]

Bought this Enco vertical mill 8x36" table used for about $2,000 and that included the $300 freight from Madison, Wisconsin to northern California. Knew the seller, a fellow gun collector so bit the bullet, as it were. Having only a lathe and no mill is a lot like trying to play baseball with only one arm. I made 3X what it cost me making scope mounts (many sold in this forum). It was a very good investment and an excellent improvement over the Index Model 40 mill I'd used for 30 years in my home shop.




The old Index Model 40 was a very well built machine but it started life in 1942 at Douglas Aircraft building airplanes for the US Navy in Long Beach, Calif. The leadscrews were very tired but I made do.



My life as a lathe owner started at the LARGER end of the spectrum with this Von Wyck 15x60 10 speed belt driven monster that weighed about 3,000 lbs. It was very worn on the bed but it cut beautiful threads and would run and run and run with a tiny 1 hp motor. It was made in Cincinnati circa 1905.



Somewhere along the way I traded into this ancient Atlas-Craftsman 10x30 lathe. It wouldn't cut threads as the lousy gears were too wore out. But with 3C collets it would turn out accurate work and all manner of gun/reloading items. Considered a "light" duty lathe but if you come across one that isn't beat to death and you can score it for a decent price I wouldn't pass it by. This one had plain cast iron spindle bearing but later models had Timkin.



Drawbar for 3C collets made from 1/2" pipe and a piece of aluminum. Worked great.



In 2005 I bit the bullet again and made the decision to go for a new 12x36 Birmingham lathe. It has a 1.5" spindle hole and is fully tooled with 5C tooling and now has a new 8" 3 jaw chuck. Cuts threads just fine although if the truth be told the old ancient Von Wyck made better threads. This lathe is just like (identical to) the Grizzly G4003 (I think that's the one).

https://www.grizzly.com/products/gri...le-lathe/g4003

Yeah... they doubled in price since I bought mine. $5,000.
https://www.penntoolco.com/birmingha...he-ycl-1236gh/



Arbor for holding 98 Mauser action in order to face the front surface of the receiver, if necessary. This arbor was turning "between centers" for ultimate accuracy. The center is held in the 3 jaw chuck and is trued each use. Then the side of the jaws drive the lathe dog. Can you spot the cast bullet in this picture? The action is FN Venezuela 24/30 in very raggedy condition. Served as a model for making the arbor. And it served well in that capacity. Never turn down beater or junker guns as long as they're vintage and you can see a use for it. I have several that fit that category.



Starting in 1970 I took tool machine engineering at Los Angeles Pierce College. Took it 1 year. Teacher was ex navy machinist mate WW2 pacific theater and he could sure tell the stories.. but his greatest skill was that he was the most excellent teacher I ever had in any school. Laid back slow talking slow walking east coast Italian. His gift as a teacher was humbling to witness. I can't stress enough the value of a mentor to help guide and give council for the fledgling machinist.

Dutch

[Scrounge]

And all I want to do is make up some bullet sizing dies and maybe make a firing pin. What tools would I need besides the hobby lathe?

To amplify a bit what ulav8r said, I'd want a 4-jaw independent jaw chuck, and that is exactly the first thing I bought for my 7x10 mini-lathe, and/or a ER32 or ER40 collet chuck. And I have one of those, also. Plus a full set of collets. I got both metric and imperial ER32 collets for my mini-lathe, though you probably don't need both. Also you need a 6" dial caliper (or digital, though my school prefers the dial models) and at least a 1" micrometer. Then you need to practice using them a lot. I found that most of my troubles with my mini-lathe were because I hadn't developed the right feel for for measuring things properly with the micrometer and caliper. You can easily spend more than the lathe cost, regardless of which lathe you buy, on tooling so I'd buy what you need, as you need it, once you have the basic kit.

Send me a PM with your email address and I'll send you a pdf of a few rifles that were build with a mini-lathe. Also you should know that if you get one of the Atlas 10" or 12" lathes, that the accessories for the 7x mini-lathes will mostly work with it, too, as it has essentially the same spindle ID and tapers, and the same tailstock taper. I've got a decent Atlas TH42 (10"x24") lathe, now, too. It counts as a mini-lathe, as well. Same limitations for through hole in the spindle, though longer bed and a threaded spindle instead of a flanged spindle. I had the link posted earlier for that pdf, but the link isn't working anymore. Though you could try it with the Wayback Machine at archive.org, and you can get a bunch of the old books on machining there, as well.

Dutchman has some good info on the Atlas (also Craftsman) lathes, too.

HTH!

Bill

[deltaenterprizes]

since selling my big lathe and Bridgeport before moving ive been looking at the smithy. the granite has chuck bore of 1.6", mt4, and specs as far as spindle accuracy and tolerances on it look pretty good.

I would pass on a 3 in 1!

[brstevns]

OK I no nothing about metal lathe work so was wondering just what would be needed for doing the few little things I mentioned. Guess I would also need to learn how to grind the needed tools as well. I was a wood worker used a wood lathe alot but I know this a different animal. Small SS income so the Harbor Freight would be all I could afford , still might have to sell a rifle to just get that.

[bangerjim]

OK I no nothing about metal lathe work so was wondering just what would be needed for doing the few little things I mentioned. Guess I would also need to learn how to grind the needed tools as well. I was a wood worker used a wood lathe a lot but I know this a different animal. Small SS income so the Harbor Freight would be all I could afford , still might have to sell a rifle to just get that.

A small lathe will do light small work. No 50 cal barrel turning!!!!!!!!! But you could make small parts and screws with the normal back gears they come with. And you find far more projects around the shop and home to make and repair than just a few gun parts!!!! My lathes make 95% other stuff and only 5% gun stuff!!!!!!!

Buy the next size up from what you think you need, if possible. You can always sell quality machine tools and go larger if needed. But being too small will sour on the process very fast! Been there...........done that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't grind your own tools! You may have sharpened your wood turning chisels, but metal working is far different. Just buy TiN coated carbide inserts and the appropriate holders needed for them for the size of lathe. Carbide will last the casual user many years before showing any signs of wear.

Plan on spending just about as much on tooling right up front as your lathe costs! I have 5 metal lathes and many MANY thousands of dollars worth of jigs, tooling, cutters, and adapters!

Good luck in your choice!

[Scrounge]

A small lathe will do light small work. No 50 cal barrel turning!!!!!!!!! But you could make small parts and screws with the normal back gears they come with. And you find far more projects around the shop and home to make and repair than just a few gun parts!!!! My lathes make 95% other stuff and only 5% gun stuff!!!!!!!

Buy the next size up from what you think you need, if possible. You can always sell quality machine tools and go larger if needed. But being too small will sour on the process very fast! Been there...........done that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't grind your own tools! You may have sharpened your wood turning chisels, but metal working is far different. Just buy TiN coated carbide inserts and the appropriate holders needed for them for the size of lathe. Carbide will last the casual user many years before showing any signs of wear.

Plan on spending just about as much on tooling right up front as your lathe costs! I have 5 metal lathes and many MANY thousands of dollars worth of jigs, tooling, cutters, and adapters!

Good luck in your choice!

Sorry, but that's not really a good choice for someone with one of the 7x mini-lathes. Most of the mini-lathes don't have a strong enough motor to push the carbide cutters through a cut, as the carbide cutters aren't as sharp as High Speed Steel cutters can be. And honestly, grinding your own tooling is easy peasy once you learn how. Practice on keystock or square stock of the same size as your lathe tooling, and you'll do fine on the HSS blanks. With diamond hones, or other fine grit sharpening stones you can make them knife sharp. You can even use them on aluminum and plastic stock, if you want. Sharp tooling gives a better surface finish. You can buy sets of pre-ground HSS from Little Machine Shop, and Grizzly. They're not cheap, but you can get them. https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...ing+lathe+bits is a list of several videos on grinding your own bits for 7x and similar sized lathes.

Carbide can be a good choice if you can find stuff that is really sharp, or you can hone it to be sharp, and it works better on stiffer and more powerful machines. The 7x hobby lathes run somewhere around 100-150 lbs. An Atlas TH42, which is often considered a step up from the 7x lathes actually has a spindle about the same size as the 7x mini's. So do the 12" Atlas & Craftsman lathes. The headstock and body of the lathe are stronger and heavier than those in the 7x, so my TH42 weighs in at about 267lbs. The small lathe in my classroom weighs 2700lbs, or close to ten times what the TH42 weighs. All other things being equal, a heavier lathe will be a stiffer and stronger lathe, and better for serious work. Up to the point where you can't get one into your shop.

One of the other boards I post on about lathes had a guy mention his lathe, which has a chuck that weighs 100lbs. My HF 7x10 weighs a couple of pound less than his chuck. He mentions how scary it is cutting a small pin on that big lathe with the ginormous chuck. It would be a lot less scary on a 7x10. Though give a choice, a 7x16 would be better. If you can find a decent Atlas or Craftsman 10" or 12" lathe, they're enough bigger to be a bit more useful, but not greatly so, as they still have nearly the same size spindle.

On a limited income, I'd go for a 7x12 or 7x14, over a 7x10. When I got mine, there weren't all that many 7x lathes larger than 7x10, and they were a great deal more expensive. That is less of a problem now. HF has their 7x12 often priced a bit less than the 7x10, which was about $700 last I looked a few weeks ago. Micromark had their 7x16 on sale for $1000 a few days ago. It's normally $1500.

Unless you just absolutely have to have it right now, I'd also look at Craigslist, and Ebay, and find out if there is a model engineering group in your area. You might find a better older machine within your price range. There are more options available than when I got mine nearly 13 years ago. Within reasonable limits a bigger lathe will probably be better. One lucky soul seems to have found himself a 13" South Bend for $600 on one of the South Bend groups at groups.io, and I paid $950 for the Heavy 10L I got a couple of years ago as a restoration project. I do like the 7x lathes, and a lot of people get great use out of them, but they are also size-limited. Which is how I wound up with four, so far.

Hi! My name is Bill, and I'm a toolohaulic!

And the only thing bangerjim said that I disagreed with is about not sharpening your own tools. In my class, which is for professional machinists, they teach you how to grind your own as part of the intro. I learned how to do it well in one class period, about 3 hours. There are different angles you'll want for different metals, but you can get all the info you need on that from books and the internet.

[Traffer]

Turning wood is a good foundation for learning metal machining. It gives a person a good perspective on how things work...even aiding with shortcuts and improvizations for metal work. I like to watch the videos of a guy on youtube that goes by the name of "Rustinox" in Europe. Seat of the pants common sense machining. Good for novices like me to learn from.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCd...7WZLA/featured