Hello Everyone! So over this summer I will have 24/7 access to a full machine shop of tools (milling machines, lathes, grinders, bandsaw, welders, etc), and I thought it would be useful to make some of my own machine tools for the future. I remember many years ago running across (online) designs, with dimensions and all, for a desktop metalworking lathe made out of stock metal (not cast metal like the Gingery lathe). I have been looking around for quite a while without success to find the designs. I vaguely remember the designs were relatively old fashion looking (like an old popular science article, but I haven't found it there), the website had many sections for different metalworking projects, mostly garage and farm variety. Any idea what designs I was looking?

Or does anyone else know where I could get lathe designs for parts machined from stock metal? Thanks very much. Haha, I do have a job, and could probably easily buy decent machines, but I thought it would be more fun to make them. Thanks for the site! Australian Army Combat Survival Manual Pdf. First n1, welcome to the site! I fully understand your desire to make your own machines, I commonly build attachments and modest machines that I could find to do the job but am 'sure' I can build it as a better fit for my needs, and love the challenge, certain that I'm saving money but certainly not certain enough to do the math.

A SMALL LATHE. BUILT IN A JAPANESE PRISON CAMP by R. Bradley, A.M.I.C.E. ENGINEERING Magazine. January 7,1949. (ReprinteO wittr Permission). Later sent in a few hacksaw blades, files, twist drills, a quantity of aluminum rivets, and some. The only high-speed steel lathe tool the workshop possessed. Mar 10, 2010. Before you find plans why not estimate the size of the metal pieces you will need and look up the prices at an online metal supplier. When you total the cost of. File Type: pdf, 2681-HndShaper.pdf (395.0 KB, 3676 views). The late Dave Gingery has a series of book on building a shaper, mill and a lathe. To Whom It May Concern My name is Vincent Gingery, owner of David J. Gingery Publishing, LLC. Address: P.O. Box 318, Rogersville, MO 65742 Phone: 417-890-1965 Email: gingery@gingerybooks.com I own the registered copyrights to books contained in freely downloadable & viewable PDF files that are either linked to.

There is a well known myth* with a great deal of truth in it, 'you can build anything on a lathe, even another lathe.' *Noah would have turned it down to build the Ark with. I'm now very glad that I held off on the more sophisticated projects until I got my first lathe over 50 years ago, a well used but lot's of good life left, Robling (German) 12' engine lathe, still have it.

My first project: a milling attachment for the lathe, took one day if my rosey memory is accurate then look-out! Round stuff, flat stuff with grooves and ridges. With a shop built radius attachment, ball stuff, paired flat stuff with very accurately arrayed holes in it, on the shop built lathe face plate from an old flywheel, (so the gears on the shafts would properly mesh) serrations across stuff and grooves inside of stuff! Stuff that actually fit other stuff I made with my growing Swiss Army do-it-all magical machine! Life was very good. Because of that serendipity, I've come to realise that the price for a great used machine can often be scrap metal price, even less, which is the best price you'll find for the metal you will build your lathe from but wasting the 50% in scrap during the build process, the final project falling woefully beneath the utility of the $300 dollar lathe you passed up and only the rest of your life left to do the projects that you wanted the lathe for in the first place. Oh yeah, the irreplacable mechanical treasure trove is fast disappearing.

I've since filled my shop with absolutely delicious machines for scrap price and often less and moved straight on to the magical perpetual motion machines that I wanted to build that first lathe for and it had already been proven, millions of times before, so I would have proved nothing but skill, which I'm certain advanced far more rapidly than had I started with hacksaw and file. My moment of epiphany was the ad in the paper for my first lathe, just after I had priced the material to build a truly pathetic version.

Allthread lead-screw indeed! But hey, don't let anyone mess with your dreams, post lot's of build photos and if you want to really impress us, keep a close accounting of your costs, time and show the quality of your finished lathe and what it produces. But just remember, that in a tenth of the time and expense, you could have built all those dream machines to higher accuracy, then hidden the original machines you bought for a pittance and just let us all assume that you'd started from scratch, sitting cross-legged with a hammer and chisel, thereby elevating yourself from hero to super hero!