Emco Unimat 3 Lathe

[abunaitoo]

Anyone have one of these????
Opinion on how good they are????
Seems like they are an expensive mini lathe/mill.

[Jeff Michel]

They are very well made. I have a Compact 8 I keep in my RV. The drawbacks are few and you can work around them if your a bit creative. Kind of under powered, keep your cuts light. Try to acquire as much tooling with your purchase as possible. The spindle nose is a weird one and the faceplate/chuck back plates are a bit expensive. Due to the spindle range it's tough to do single point threading. Threading is best preformed with a die head mounted in the tail stock. Replacement parts are readily available.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

I've got the earlier rod-bed Unimat SL, and it is very, very good, unless you expect it to do what a larger lathe can do. I think the Unimat 3 could easily earn its keep for screws, pins, cartridge case conversions, and you don't lose much by the use of taps and dies for scope-size screws, as I would second that for just about any lathe anyway.

You should make your own tailstock centre with a concave 50 degree head to fit the rear end of most small taps, and hold them by a diestock while turning the headstock by hand. This will be more accurate than a well-used tailstock chuck. A circular saw arbor and a case holder of your own making are very useful for shortening cases.

There is quite a bit of non-original tooling for them on the internet, particularly eBay. But watch out to get the right ones for your lathe. The Unimat 3 has 14 x 1mm spindle threads, and the Unimat SL 12 x 1mm.

[bangerjim]

I have 3 Unimats and they are OK for clock works and other light work. Nothing is standard (for us in America). Everything is metric. I have no problem with that because I have a full machine shop and 3 other big lathes and mills to make any/all parts for it.

Like said....underpowered. Good for light hobby and model construction work. Not for rough hogging work. I do not think there is a Unimat that uses standard MT's or C3/C5 collets. If it comes with 3 AND 4 jaws chucks, you are ahead because backplates are costly. I made mine. Same with all the tooling and tool holding appliances.

I have only cut threads with mine using hand-held standard dies in custom holder.

littlemachineshop.com has things that will work with that lathe. The also sell small lathes and mills. I have used them as a source of parts several times with excellent success.

Good luck on your decision!

bangerjim

[nekshot]

I have a Maxi Mat V10-P. Were these made by the same company?

[Jeff Michel]

I have a Maxi Mat V10-P. Were these made by the same company?
Yes, Emco-Maier, out of Austria. You have a very good lathe.

[W.R.Buchanan]

I always wanted a Rod Way Unimat. The first one I saw was in 1962 when the hobby shop I frequented was making slot car wheels. They came in a nice Wooden Box which held the machine and all the tooling for it. There was a lot of capability in that box.

I have wanted one ever since. Never got one.

Had a Sherline Lathe/Mill once. It was junk and perfectly useless however I had not become a real live machinist yet, which was part of the problem, and could probably get it to do something useful now.

Then I found out about Levin and Schaublin Lathes. Levin's are good, Schaublin's are great! These are what are known as Production Jewelers Lathes and are made for the Daily Production of Precision Small Parts. Levin's are US Made and not cheap. Schaublin's are Swiss made and are really not cheap!

When I worked at Gaiser Tool Company, now Coors-Tek, all we made was small stuff. We made Ultrasonic Bonding Tools, and the biggest parts we made were 1/8" in dia. by .750 long, but most were .0622-.0624 in dia. and .437 long. with holes in them ranging from .0022 to .0004. The 22 tenth holes were the generic everyday tools. the .0004 tools were very specialized and the owner pretty much had to make them one at a time. I routinely drilled holes with twist drills down to .007.

I have personally drilled a .0007 hole .015 thru a piece of Aluminum Oxide a few times. It is pretty tedious work looking thru a microscope all the time just to get one done. All done on Schaublin 70 Series Lathes. We had about 20 of them and they were used day in and day out with virtually no maintenance. Great pieces of machinery, and you seldom see them for sale as they will outlast virtually any company.

Levin's are more of the same, they are just a a little smaller and a whole lot cheaper. And if you decided to buy a used Levin, make sure it is a square head version as the round head versions no longer have bearings available. They were made solely for Levin so you had to go to them for replacements and they are no longer. Also make sure to get every speck of tooling, as buying even used stuff will cost you dearly. Virtually everything Levin is controlled by Dale Waite. He buys up all used machinery that he can find and he is Levin's sole sales person, and only point of contact. Kind of a monopoly.

Levin Collets are $110 ea! I have made them and sold them for $55 ea and make a run every so often for a few companies here in SoCal.

If you are looking at these machines they are not really hobby machines they really need to be able to pay for themselves as they are not cheap machines and thus really can't be allowed to sit idle . They have to be making money or else they need to get sold to someone who will.

All that being said,,, If you can find a complete Rod Way Unimat in the wooden box with most all the tooling it would be a great addition to any shop,,,, As long as you understand it's limitations.

There was a European guy a few years back who was a Championship RC Plane Flyer. He made all of his own Engines on a Unimat! I was impressed.

Just remember Small Parts are best made on Small Machines, Big Parts on Big Machines. Don't think you can push the limitations of a small machine,,, you can't! However it is possible to make small parts on a larger machine very easily. This is where the Opti-Visor comes into use.

Randy