When I first built this lathe, I made a video
of it's construction, and then I made another video
where I changed a whole bunch of things to improve
on this lathe, in this video, I edited it together
to make it look like I built it right in the first place,
though there will be some discontinuities, because
there will be, for instance the motor mount there before I
actually built it for some parts. But, if you want to
build this lathe, this is the video to watch,
and if you are building this lathe, you might want to buy
my plans, which has got detailed drawings and dimensions
for everything. I printed out the end profile
one to one using my Big Print program.
The bed of the lathe is gonna be these two pieces of hardwood.
And then the head stock is gonna be these pieces
like this, and the shaft is gonna mount
on wooden bearings on top, and then the tail stock
is gonna go together almost the same way.
For gluing the head stock together, I scraped off any
varnish off this used plywood, where I'm gonna glue it,
and I also made some spacers to hold the middle part
at the right height, and I almost forgot to drill
the hole right here.
I'm squaring up a hole for a carriage bolt, which will be
for holding the head stock on.
And, now to make the bearing blocks.
First I drilled the screw holes for mounting it,
then I cut the block in half,
and then I clamped it back together, and then
I drilled a hole through it.
I round the corners a bit on the belt sander, just to save
my knuckles on it later.
Instead of having wood screws here, I'm gonna use some
hanger bolts, which screw into here, and I have a machine screw
thread up here, which doesn't wear out.
Now, if you don't have hanger bolts, like this,
you can just use pieces of threaded rod, and just
make sure it's a tight fit, and screw that straight in there,
add a bit of wood glue, and that gives you plenty of hold.
So, I want to put this on here as a pulley,
but I really should have a bit more thickness, so I thought
why not just add another step pulley here.
I drilled the holes slightly undersized,
but to make sure these won't spin on the shaft,
I'm gonna cut a keyway, right here.
I'm using a nail as a key, to keep the pulley
from slipping on the shaft.
I just realized I forgot to put glue between
those two discs, so I pried them apart again,
and now just putting the glue in there.
I still need to keep the shaft from sliding side to side.
This shaft can just go back and forth,
and that's what this block on here is for
to lock it in place.
That's a much better point. Now I need a way to
spin a work piece that's up against this point here,
so my thinking is to put a wooden sleeve on there,
and some screws in on the edges
to have some prongs here.
So, these two washers here, are gonna act as
a thrust bearing, and I have to put those on now,
because this part is not gonna come off.
I've got the hole lined up close enough I can see through it,
so I should be able to just drive this nail in there.
I drilled the hole in the bearing blocks a little large
so I have some wiggle room, so I have to sand the top block
to tighten that up.
So, I'm gonna use my lathe to spin-up this shaft,
and I made a sacrificial bearing block here,
because the threads are just gonna chew it up.
And, then this needs to attach on here
and I've made an adapter that goes on here
and fits on here.
I needed a tool brush for my angle grinder.
I made these blocks for a tight fit on the twelve millimeter
shaft, so my half inch shaft is actually
twelve point seven millimeters, which means that makes
for an interference fit, but I just cut a keyway into here
and I'll use that to, kind of, grind a thread into the blocks.
This little screw will act as a key to lock the wheel in place.
With the work piece spinning against this, this screw may
gradually undo itself, so a wing nut, or any sort of nut
in here, can lock that.
Now, I just need some kind of a tool rest,
so I'm figuring a board in here,
and a block that attaches here, and then this goes on here,
and a metal strip in here to protect it against the chisels.
So, the nut is tight in this orientation,
so I'll just mark so that I can input the lever on, like so.
I need to make a better way to mount that motor.
Now, I need to join these things to the back of the lathe
but I also need to be able to move it, like this
if I use different steps on the pulley,
and I figure if I just join them in here,
into a board like that, and that gets screwed on here.
The best way to join these pieces onto here, of course,
is with a mortise and tenon joint, so I just, kind of,
cut an open mortise with the table saw, and then these go
in here, and then to close off the middle,
I've got another piece, which I've made a little bit bigger,
and I figure, then I might as well glue another piece on here
and that'll make it really solid.
After I finish building the lathe, I painted it green
and I also made this 4-jaw chuck
and the faceplate, and to get to the faceplate, you just
swap this thing backwards to get the faceplate here,
and to switch back to spindle turning, you just swap out
the whole drive shaft.