[Rickady]

I know this may have been asked MANY times but this new guy wants to put a mid sized mill and lathe in my garage for hobby and "side jobs" 12-36 on the small side and 14-40 is the largest I will go.
I have sen several threads on stuff from China and Taiwan, but I don't know were all of these came from? Anyways I would like some input on these lathes and even mills from the same brands if you could, please.

I will some day add DRO and even look into a CNC retrofit? Can it be done on bench top lathes?

I know this could irritate some people seeing the same question asked over and over, But I search and could not find these brands mentioned in depth.

Thanks Rick

[widgitmaster]

I have a new Birmingham 14x40 lathe, and its wonderful!
I had first bought a Jet 9x20, it died in less than one year! So I gave it away to someone one here on the zone! It was such a weak toy, it could not do the tasks I needed!

I also have a New mill made in Tiawan, it has not given me one bit of greif, and I work the heck out of it!

Eric

[Rickady]

Thanks for the reply. How much was the mill and lathe? Can they be fitted with CNC? So the Birmingham is Tia?

[RICHARD ZASTROW]

Rickady My experience with a Birmingham 14x60 was eye opening and sickening. Never have operated a worse pc. of **** in my life. Turning towards the chuck, when attempting to disengage the feed, the machine would start feeding the cross slide. The gears that are changed for metric threads wore out in about 80 hours. The locking mechanism for securing the square turret had to be rebuilt in a few weeks of use. The pin hole for 90 deg. indexes has no hardened bushing so it wears rapidly, allowing the turret to turn clockwise in a moderate to heavy cut. The electrics for the work light failed instantly. I refused to work on it anymore so I don't know what else failed after that.

[widgitmaster]

Would you like to buy a grease gun?

My Lathe is tight and quiet, and I never used the turret tool post, I bought a real Quick Change tool system!

[Rickady]

Are these lathes made by a contracted company and sold to distributors with different names? Badge engineering?
Do you have to remove gears and install "change gears" for metric?

[RICHARD ZASTROW]

Rickaday After my experience being so bad and widgitmasters being good, I asked myself the same question. I suspect there are multiple suppliers to a trading company selling machines under that brand name. I don't know where widgitmaster's machine was made but the one I'm refering to is Korean. This machine had to change gears for metric. The gears supplied were soft cast iron (well greased I might add). As soon as I detected the rapid wear they were replaced with well greased steel gears. While replacing the gears, I noticed a loose belt on the oil pump. There was not enough adjustment to take up the slack so I replaced it with a shorter US made belt. In order to disengage the apron feed lever we kept a lead hammer head handy to knock the lever into neutral. This was there to keep the tools out of the chuck jaws. If this was a case of "Badge engineering" and it very well could be, that would explain the disparity between widgitmaster's experience and mine. My personal experience with manual lathes tells me the best course is to get your hands on an older high quality machine and rebuild it. Not always the least expensive. Check with Adobe and his Pratt & Whitney.