Re: What do you think is the best small shop manual lathe?
I went from a 7X10 and Sherline to a 3-in-1 to a Monarch and Bridgeport.
For what I do hobbywise that's more than enough. I have more "serious" machines at my factory, like surface-grinders, CNC mills, a BIG K&T Ubermill and several brand new BP clones.
Funny story about the big K&;T mill. It came up on Craigslist, $1000 no kidding. I showed my wife and she cut me a check out of her bank account. I told her "this thing is HUGE I have no place to put it."
SHE said "well store it at my father's warehouse until you get the factory up and running. I'm not going to sit here and listen to "the one that got away" stories!" (*)
Smart woman.
No you can't marry her sister. Hands off my daughter.
Anyway, it all depends on what you want to do. For a casual machinist Horrible Frick machines are more than enough. They are fine to learn on, and if you put some effort forth you can make some fairly good parts on them. You CANNOT hold micron tolerances or hog 2" of hardened steel per pass with them... but seriously how many hobby machinists need to do that?
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(*) I had a HUGE mint-condition war-vet W-S turret lathe get away and I whined about that for months. No clue what I would have done with it really. The K&T mill can do engine work and mold work so that was a sound investment.[/size]