Lathe question

[Bope]

My 15 year old daughter is asking me if I could teach her to make pens. I have no lathe and never done any turning but have thought about pens in the past. I have come across an old 1920's era Walker/Turner lathe that looks to be restored. It has a 12" swing and 42" bed, for really big pens. They are asking $150. Would that be a reasonable price for a working lathe like this? The little I know about lathes is that they have multiple accessories to be able to hold the wood for differing methods. Would an older lathe like this be comparable with modern accessories? What other pros and cons would there be with this lathe?

[Alan S]

The main thing you'd look for is a Morse taper to attach a chuck or something. According to a search on the old woodworking machines site (owwm.org) it likely has a #2 Morse taper.

You might not have convenient speed variability on this lathe, but you don't really need that for small diameters, and you can move the belt on a pulley if you want to change speed. If it has been restored, the price sounds like a steal.

[Wildwood]

Depends upon the restoration and how well it runs and if complete (no missing parts). Think that lathe head & tailstock are MT1, not a deal breaker but be sure to ask about TPI on headstock. Depending upon threads on the headstock might limit screw on accessories.

If were me would take a look at this lathe. While only need three tools to turn pens their $80 tool set not bad for people just starting out

https://www.harborfreight.com/5-speed-be...65345.html

https://www.harborfreight.com/profession...61794.html

Pen State Industry sell good starter tools and recommend only buying what you need. They are known to be slow on shipping.

https://www.pennstateind.com/store/LX250.html
https://www.pennstateind.com/store/LX010.html
https://www.pennstateind.com/store/LX430.html

Only tips on tool buying: buy full size tools, and only as you need them. That $80 set linked will give you some tools will not need, but won't break the bank.

May find yourselves wasting lot of steel learning to sharpen your tools so don't really need expensive tools right off. Will also need a bench grinder or belt sander to keep your tools sharp. Sharpening jig whether homemade or store bought will give you repeatability at eighter grinder or belt sander.

Started out with a belt sander, bought a grinder, homemade jig and finally broke down and bought this basic system with optional vari-grind jig.

http://www.packardwoodworks.com/Merchant...=sharp-wss

[gear jammer]

Does this lathe have all sealed bearings or oil cup. Had one with cup and hated it. The morse taper is not a big problem. Just the MT2 is the more common size today. The threads on the spindle are something to keep an eye on. In todays market it is most common for 1inch shaft with 8 threads per inch. Some are larger. You can get adapters for the threads to make a chuck and different jaws for what you want to do. Drilling on the lathe is a breeze. I have made a lot of pens and given them away. I still do on occasion just to keep the cellulose flowing through my veins.

I showed my grandkids how to do pens. All the time I spent showing them how was the greatest time I could spend. They turn every time they come over. I enjoy watching them.

[Arlin Eastman]

There are afew here that know a lot about older lathes

Grey Mountain
MichaelMouse
IClark
AHill

and hope they chime in to help you.

[DFJarvie]

I am a big proponent of old iron but not for a lathe unless your doing spindle turning only. The variable speed that comes with new lathes is key. Being able to slow the work down or up with a turn of a dial will make your experience much more enjoyable.

I would recommend one of the smaller variable speed lathes from Jet, Rikon, etc.

[iclark]

There are afew here that know a lot about older lathes

Grey Mountain
MichaelMouse
IClark
AHill

and hope they chime in to help you.

Arlin gives me too much credit. Still...

$150 sounds reasonable if it is properly restored and it is fully assembled and ready to run on its stand or bench. That is assuming that there is a belt running from the pulley shieve on the motor t the pulley shieve on the drive shaft. Having an additional shaft with pulleys  (called a jack shaft) between the motor and the drive shaft is fine (and is actually a positive). If there is a crank that controls the working diameter of a pulley, that is called a Reeve's drive. The variable diameter pulley system is a mechanically weak point and can be hard to get parts. There are workarounds if a Reeve's pulley dies, but they can require significant mechanical aptitude.

If you have to build a bench to put the lathe to work, then it really makes it hard to get around to actually making shavings.

As others have said, you need to know whether the taper inside the drive shaft is a MT#1 or a MT#2.

For the tailstock, I do not remember when they started introducing the self-ejecting tailstocks. Some tailstock shafts have a hole in the center so that you can us a knock-out bar to remove whatever accessory you installed in the tailstock. Once the self-ejecting feature was introduced, some of the tailstock shafts were solid. The potential problem there is that some tailstocks require a longer MT on the accessory. A live center with a short MT can get stuck.

Can you post a picture?

Also, if there is an AAW club in your area, it is really a good idea for you or you and your daughter to go to a club meeting. They often have club members happy to mentor new turners. When WN switched to the new software, our locations got deleted. So we do not know where you are.

[KingwoodFan1989]

I've had a PSI (Penn State Industries) mini-lathe for about 10 years and it's served me well. I was told on this forum at least once (based on a picture I put up of it) that the tool rest was trash and needed to be upgraded, but that's about the only negative thing I've heard. If you're just turning pens, you don't need anything big and expensive. Heck, I've turned table legs on it and it handled the job very well (and with only about 1/2 horsepower!). If you're concerned about missing parts or something (since it sounds like you're looking at a used lathe), I'd give PSI a look. My lathe was less than $300 IIRC, although I did add a bed extension so I could turn table legs later on. A few of them still are under $300 10 years later. 

Check it out: https://www.pennstateind.com/store/mini-...2520Lathes

Also, not to derail the main topic, but since you said you yourself haven't turned before, I'd suggest starting with woods that don't have difficult grain to work with (Red Oak, with its intermittent layers of open, unsupported grain structure, tends to tear out on those layers quite a bit, so that's one common example). There are A LOT of great sources for domestic and exotic pen blanks out there, such as Bell Forest Products, which has a mail-order service if there aren't any yards near you that carry a lot of species: http://www.bellforestproducts.com/pen-blanks/

I'd love to get into pens as well...I just haven't gotten around to starting yet. Happy turning!

[Grey Mountain]

If it's in workable shape, the price is very good. However, cost of the lathe is the cheap part. It's the accessories that add up to big bucks. I have single chisels that cost as much as they want for that lathe. Some of the Walker-Turners have a 1/12 spindle thread, which could cause some trouble. Most accessories are manufactured to fit a 1/8 spindle. Just guessing, but the Morse taper is most likely #2, which again is pretty much a standard.
If the spindle thread is 1/12, you could probably get an attachment that would bring it to 1/8. My ONEWAY 2436 has a M33 spindle thread. I bought an attachment to allow me to use my 1/8 accessories.
Appreciate Arlin saying I know a lot about old lathes. The only reason is that when those old lathes were young, so was I.

GM

[Bope]

Thanks for all the replies. This used lathe looks to be all intact. I have posted the craigslist link below. I probably need to be smart financially and not get this at this time. This fall will be a better time for my cash flow to get turning equipment.

https://rochester.craigslist.org/tls/d/w...95609.html