[Splint]

Hi,
I've noticed there seems to be a growing trend in the area of slant bed lathes, I'm curious to know what's the advantage of a slant bed over a conventional lathe?

Regards
Splint

[ISO Coder]

The slant bed have better chip flow and you get closer to the chuck when excanging parts and setup (when you have one or two upper turrets with lower turret theres a long way to the spindle ). The guideways are more protected from flying chips and dirt.

[Alan B]

You also get a longer X axis travel for a smaller machine footprint.
Alan B

[tim-tbl]

But they are not as rigid as a conventional straight bed and usually the tooling is always pushing down on the stock which is adding to the natural effects of gravity
Tim

[keitholivier]

Something seen more often now is the vertical lathe. A conveyor indexes stock into position below the spindle and removes the completed part. The entire spindle and chuck moves in 2 axis to take the workpiece to the cutting tools, which are turret mounted.

These machines have an even smaller footprint (provided there are no vertical constraints) than a slant bed lathe and are even more convenient to load and unload. see: http://www.hardinge.com/usr/PDF/turning/1194.pdf