Suitable lathe for 'smithing?

[303Guy]

I'm looking at getting a lathe and working from home.

Is a 600mm (24 inch) between centres long enough for gunsmithing work? Spindle bore is 38mm (1½ inch). Spindle speed 1600 RPM.

[leftiye]

Long enough for most things unless you need to put a barrel between centers, or chuck one end and steady rest the other end for chambering or crowning, etc.. The hole thru the spindle should be plenty big to allow you to put barrels through the headstock and do chambers etc that way. Most other work is 12" or less in length.

[Char-Gar]

Most gun work in a lathe is done at the low end of the spindle speeds. 200 to 400 will get far more use that anything faster. You will also drop in the back gears and get down to 50 to 100 or so many times.

[deltaenterprizes]

What is your price range? Buy quality and you will never regret it, buy junk and you will regret it every time you use it. That is never truer than when buying a tool to do precision work.
I started with a 12x30 Pratt & Whitney Model B, a graduation present from my machinist teacher, made in 1943. That lathe had been through hell and the ways had .030'' wear near the headstock but I could still hold .001'' with no problem. Then I picked up a 12x36 Southbend G-26 T that had been neglected but it had no wear on the ways it did good work for the short time I got to use it.
I now have a Victor 14x40 Model B in good shape and it does very well also.
All 3 of these lathes are "toolroom" lathes made for light close tolerance work. The 30'' bed was kind of tight to do barrel work, the 40'' bed is a lot nicer to work with.
You will need to spend almost as much for tooling as you did on the lathe.
What brand are you looking at?

[303Guy]

Thanks for the input. I actually bought this lathe. It's the best I can afford. It's a HAFCO AL-320G and is the biggest lathe I can accommodate and the only bench lathe with a half decent spindle bore. It is shorter than what I would have prefered. I would certainly have to look after it carefully to get any real life out of it.

I have developed an allergy to the use of emery tape on a lathe! We had a basic and cheap lathe which very quickly got bed wear due to that abhorent practice. Even then I was able to get it to take repeatable and predictable 0.0004" cuts - 0.01mm to some of us.:mrgreen: (Of course it helps to have a digital display. The longitudinal accuracy was of course comprimized by the bed wear over longer shaft lengths but still within acceptable tollerances. The best I could get out of the three jaw was within 0.002" runout with zero angular runout. I'm sure that error was in the volute). This is why I won't buy a second hand lathe on auction unseen.

With the inadequate speed for 'polished' finishes, I plan to build a 'polishing' machine using a second hand chuck and a variable high speed motor.

Now to find work for my Lathe!

Would you folks mind me asking for advice, ideas and tips as I develop my skills?