Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Lathe question

Mine as she sits this moment. Paid $4200 for her in, I think, 2012 and have run almost 100x that amount of biz through her since. A very simple, very stout, very accurate and repeatable machine. Makes me look good. I run it from a VFD. All controls are mechanical; just hook the VFD straight to the 5HP spindle motor and away you go. (As opposed to the Feeler/HLVH. I think I misspoke yesterday; I think it has FOUR motors, not three. Hence the RPC. )

It’s got that old keyed Albrecht chuck in the tailstock because I was power-tapping a centered hole in the stainless discs I mentioned. Can’t really do that with a keyless chuck. One thing I love about using a VFD is I can have the lathe gearing set to a fast spindle speed, but slow it waaaay down with the VFD at like 12 hz or so. Then, when I flip the switch to reverse the spindle, it slows down, stops, then reverses quickly because the VFD is only spinning it down from 12 hz instead of 60 hz if that makes sense. You CAN add brake resistors to the VFD to achieve a more aggressive spin-down from 60 hz (the VFD has to absorb current from the motor as it’s slowing it down) but this works great if you don’t need the full torque the lathe can deliver. Which I never do.

Pal, note the risers. It looks like your (gorgeous) Okuma also sat low. I’m tall; I had to raise it. I raised it by myself, by hand, all 4800 lbs, with long pinch bars from good ol’ HF and squares of thin plywood “shim stock”. Took a couple hours.

Here’s an uncomfortable question. Have any of you protected your machines against earthquake at all? We found out about 10 years ago that this area gets a big one every few hundred years. Oh, and it’s periodic, and we are overdue….. “Who knew”. I feel like I’m being an idiot for not strapping them to the wall or SOMETHING.