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steveG
11th January 2014, 10:28 PM
Found this site tonight: $150, 12″ Swing, Metal Lathe/Mill/Drill | MAKE (http://makezine.com/projects/the-multimachine-150-12-swing-metal-lathemilldrill/)
Its a modern take on the award winning 1915 Yeomans concrete lathe which was designed primarily as a cheap lathe for the production of artillery shells.

This modern version is targeted as a DIY option for developing countries and I found some of the solutions to the design/construction challenges quite fascinating.
In particular, some of the setup ideas might be useful to those of us without the luxury of a decent workshop.

Hopefully some of you also find it interesting.

Steve
Basil135
11th January 2014, 10:57 PM
Certainly does look interesting.

Only issue I have, is I am running out of room in the shed to put one... :(
DoubleChevron
13th January 2014, 12:02 PM
The other problem of course is the tooling. Even if you buy a heavily worn old lathe. It's likely still close enough for anything a DIY'er will make. And more imporantly will come with the tooling. Just add up buying 3/4 jaw chucks, dead/live centers tool holders, tail stocks etc.... :(

The hardest bit will be learning how to it once you have one!

seeya,
Shane L.
Bigbjorn
13th January 2014, 12:48 PM
Given the low prices of Chinese hobby lathes these days, why would one bother.
isuzurover
13th January 2014, 01:34 PM
Given the low prices of Chinese hobby lathes these days, why would one bother.

It is intended for the 3rd world - where they don't (necessarily) have cheap chinese imports...
steveG
13th January 2014, 03:00 PM
I agree - you wouldn't bother making one here unless you wanted a project for project sake.

There were a few things in the construction that I thought were quite clever. One was the method of setting up the main ways and then permanently locking them in position using non-shrinking grout.
Maybe I'm just not working in the engineering space on a daily basis, but I found it got me thinking in a lower-tech way than the usual "everything needs to be welded/machined with expensive equipment to produce a reasonable result" mindset.

Steve
Bearman
13th January 2014, 03:52 PM
Certainly does look interesting.

Only issue I have, is I am running out of room in the shed to put one... :(

You know the answer - BIGGER shed.