I'm falling in love with the wrong lathe!

Robo_Pi

Robo_Pi

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I currently have a Chinese HQ-400 lathe/mill. (also sold as an ENCO 109-1005)

290763

I've been tooling it up quite extensively over the last couple months. All the while I've been flirting with other lathes. I've been looking at various South Bend and Sheldon lathes. And drooling over the thought of owning one.

In the meantime I've been doing quite a bit of machining using this little combo lathe/mill. I've been using both the lathe and the milling head extensively. Thus far I've had very good results with every project I've done. My biggest complaint with this lathe is that it doesn't have a quick-change gearbox. But I've been discovering that changing gears out manually isn't really all that bad.

Today I needed to use the lathe. I had previously done a milling operation so it was set up to be used as a mill. So I had to convert it back into a lathe. No big deal, but the thought came through my mind how nice it would be to have two of these machines so I could leave one set up as a mill and the other as a lathe.

I looked at the empty corner next to the lathe and thought to myself, "Boy another one of these would fit into that corner just nice. Sure would be nice to have two of these!"

Then I started thinking that this isn't such a bad idea. This machine has a very small footprint, it runs on 110 without the need for a VFD, it has a large swing of 17.5". It does both milling and lathe work. And thus far it has been more than capable of handling everything I'm likely to do. Having two of these identical machines makes a lot of sense too as all of the tooling would be interchangeable.

Then I started thinking, "I actually like this lathe. I like it a lot. Darn it, I think I'm falling in love with it!"

So now what do I do?

Should I start looking around for another one like it and just have two of these instead of dreaming of buying a more expensive larger lathe?

From a practical perspective having two of these would actually be more realistic for the type of projects I actually do. :grin:
 
Use what you like, use what makes parts good enough for you needs. End of story.
 
Why not get the better lathe when get the chance and then just keep your current machine setup as a mill as the default setting! You may even get lucky to find that most of your tooling would be interchangeable with a better lathe as well.
 
Latinrascalrg1 has a good point and I as an owner of 2 lathes and a mill drill that are not interchangeable am hard put for a good answer. One thought did come to mind however, you stated you do like your present machine for both functions, it would seem to me that you would gain a lot of pleasure in planning your projects and work by utilizing the interchange ability. At this time I enjoy figuring how to hold the work to accomplish the project but know some time is lost in alignment on different machines.

Perhaps you could up date to a different machine in the future if you outgrew one of the pair you are currently thinking about.
Enjoy and have a good day
Ray
 
rock_breaker said:
Perhaps you could up date to a different machine in the future if you outgrew one of the pair you are currently thinking about.
Click to expand...

I think that's what I actually came to realize today. What I want and what a need are two entirely different things. :grin:

I want to play with bigger machines. But in truth the projects I work on simply don't require them. I build robots, and it's highly unlikely that I ever need to machine anything that this little lathe/mill won't be able to handle. So as a practical matter sticking with these smaller machines that have more versatility (i.e. being able to serve both as a lathe or a mill) actually makes far more sense.

Dag blast it. I really had my heart set on getting some bigger machines.

I watch too much Abom79 I guess. :grin:

I need to find some lightweight machinist videos to watch.

I was watching a guy who makes model steam engines. He has a lathe smaller than mine. I should watch more of his videos. That will make my lathe feel huge.
 
Robo_Pi said:
I think that's what I actually came to realize today. What I want and what a need are two entirely different things. :grin:

I want to play with bigger machines. But in truth the projects I work on simply don't require them. I build robots, and it's highly unlikely that I ever need to machine anything that this little lathe/mill won't be able to handle. So as a practical matter sticking with these smaller machines that have more versatility (i.e. being able to serve both as a lathe or a mill) actually makes far more sense.

Dag blast it. I really had my heart set on getting some bigger machines.

I watch too much Abom79 I guess. :grin:

I need to find some lightweight machinist videos to watch.

I was watching a guy who makes model steam engines. He has a lathe smaller than mine. I should watch more of his videos. That will make my lathe feel huge.
Click to expand...

I moved up to a 13" leblond from a 9x20, it only took up about 2" more in one direction than the bench I had the 9x20 on.

:)

Stu
 
If the machine works well for you, why get bigger unless you have cash laying around that you don't know what to do with. Have you watched Clickspring videos? That guy makes incredible stuff on a small harbor freight type of mill lathe and in a shop that is smaller than my master bath.

You might find that having a dedicated mill and larger lathe is advantageous, but unless you buy a Taiwanese unit ($$$) the quality is not going to be there. I purchased a Precision Matthews 833T and a Precision Matthews 10-22 lathe. The mill is made in Taiwan and the quality is much different than the lathe which is made in China.
 
Do you find the machine long enough to put a drill chuck and full-length drills in the tailstock? That is one weakness you may encounter with the current rather short bed. Even a small Atlas is longer I think. Making robot parts you will need to use the tailstock for drilling I'm sure. This is also a limitation with the small Harbor Freight mini lathes. Another issue with the combo machine is that the compound is so tall with respect to the width of the ways that you may find some flexing and movement of the carriage and cutting tool on such a high "perch"
Mark
 
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