Setup Help For Absolute Beginner

[thomseninc]

You can't get any more "new guy" than me. I just joined the forum today, and I won't take delivery of my new tool until October. Already I have problems! Here goes:
My best friend passed away and his widow is giving me his Smithy 1324. It will get delivered to my workshop (i.e., my heated/cooled garage filled with woodworking tools) in October. In planning where to put it I have two options. One is along the wall, giving little access to the back side of the machine. The other is in the center of the workspace. The floor of the garage has a built in slope - about 6" over 20". How critical is leveling the machine? My woodworking tools are OK with the slope, but this is a new game for me. If I put it along the wall the left end will be about 1" high. If I put it in the middle of the shop (turned 90 deg) the front will be about .6" high. The stand it is currently on doesn't have leveling feet. The widow really wants me to take it. It also is not built to catch coolant. I can buy the stand that Smithy makes for the machine that has leveling feet and a coolant catching tray, but that means $$$. I need to have this figured out before the tool shows up in my driveway. Help!
BTW, I'm really glad to have joined this group. I'm sure to get a lot more out of it than I will ever contribute.
Kurt

 

[Wreck™Wreck]

Level is only important if you plan on using a level for indexing parts.

 

[T Bredehoft]

Welcome to what is arguably the best, most friendly Hobby Machinist forum on the internet.

So long as it doesn't rock, there should be no problem working on a slant.

 

[Bob Korves]

You can use leveling feet to make it level if desired, and can make the lathe higher if that gives you a better working height -- or just leave it on a slant resting on the floor. You can make the leveling feet on the machine, a good starter project. Flood coolant is pretty messy and has other issues as well. Save that decision for much farther down the road. Various cutting oils will do a good job for you without having provision for catching coolant.

 

[AR. Hillbilly]

Welcome from another newb and carpenter by trade. I've found this place to be very informative and friendly. Not once has anyone made me feel stupid for my simple questions. I've also found this place to be addictive. I read a lot and learn a lot on here. Glad you found this place and hope it works as well for you as it has for me.

 

[brino]

Hi thomseninc,

Welcome to the group.

My condolences on losing your friend.
Using his equipment will be a good way to honor and remember him.

As stated above:
1) try it on the slant. If you find a reason to, you could always shim it level later, but I doubt you'll bother. (unless it rocks)
2) in the home shop it's unlikely you need more coolant than you could catch with a small cookie sheet

This equipment will add new capabilities to your shop.
Be sure to get all the sundry pieces that make it so useful. Just as the machine is more useful with them, they are not very useful without the machine.
(chucks and keys, faceplates, centres, tool posts, tool bits, manuals, etc.)

-brino

 

[talvare]

As stated by others here, being level isn't that important, but insuring that there is no twist induced into the bed of the machine is. Leveling the machine is probably the quickest and easiest way to give some reasonable insurance that the bed is straight. Properly setting up a lathe is more complex than just leveling and there are some good articles here and on other machinist forums that will educate you on the process.

Ted

 

[Bill W.]

Kurt,
First of all, welcome to the forum...
A couple of thoughts. As far as location for the lathe, try putting it along the wall first.
That way you can figure out how often you will be using it and it's not sitting out in the middle of the shop where you may have to "work around it."
As far as the coolant issue goes, if it's not equipped with a coolant tray now consider what type of machining the previous owner did and if it was hobby work, like brino said, more than likely, a cookie sheet will work. Get into it, get your feet wet, and as you progress, figure out what you need.
Bill