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Greetings to a "former Neighbor". I'm originally from about 50 miles east of you in Fergus Falls, MN. Unfortunately, now living out in the east coast in Virginia.

So many great suggestions, thanks everyone.

What is the go-to method for protecting the finish on a small part when turning it in a lathe. This is mainly when you already worked on one end and then have to flip it in the chuck to work on the other end. I've seen suggestions such as wrapping it in the think aluminum from a cut up soda...

What is a good small vacuum to use on a lathe to clean up the chips. Currently I mainly use a whisk broom and our house vacuum which is a good Oreck hand vac. But I know that my wife isn't pleased with me using it this way and I am sure it isn't that good for the vac. It would seem that the...

The old web pages from 2010 can be pulled up by using the "wayback machine": http://web.archive.org

It is one of those cheap $500 7x-14 chinese lathes you see all over on eBay. I went through a multi part YouTube series that was posted by the "Aussie Shed" which I found interesting because I have the very same lathe. All the issues he talked about in this series I have on my lathe.

Thanks for the replies, they do help and it sounds like I might be making this more complicated than I need to. As to where I am located, it is in rural, central Virginia in the US. One interesting detail about my location, I recently found out that Frank Hoose, the host of mini-lathe.com...

I have a cheap Chinese lathe that didn't come with a thread dial. I've been looking at various YouTube videos and want to try and make one similar to what many of these videos show. Most, however, seemed to be based upon an imperial based lathe lead screw. My lead screw has a 1.5 mm thread...

I'm a total newbie, so take any of my comments with a grain of salt. When I retired, my wife and I moved down here to Lake Anna, Virginia. The house we bought had a large (24' x 24') garage that we converted into a shop/work room. Since we weren't going to use it as a garage, we polished the...

Oops, I did it again, let me try again:

This becomes more interesting all of the time. :) I'm loading a few more pictures that show my tailstock. It does seem to match the one in the link from LMS. If need be, I can buy that one. I doubt it is worth me trying to pursue anything with that Ebay seller. I do want to follow the...

My images didn't show, let me try again: And the second one: Hopefully it will work this time. I still nee d to align everything. I have a #2 dead center, but still need to get a #3. Thanks for reading

I have been reading all these responses to my original question with a great deal of interest. If nothing else, I am learning a lot. Mainly that I have a great deal more to learn. I can see that a large part of my original problem is that the tailstock wasn't sitting level on the ways. I...

Boy! Those pictures are bigger than I meant them to be.

Thanks for all of the replies. That GadgetBuilder site is great, not sure why I haven't encounter it before. Obviously, there is a lot of reading I need to do there. I have inserted a couple pictures to show the end of the tailstock that shows it leaning to the left. I also inserted a...

The tailstock for my 7x14 appears to be pretty standard for this level of lathe. It is attached to the bed by a bolt the goes through the bed and uses a small square metal plate with a nut to secure it to the bed. I have noticed that if I tighten the nut too much it won't slide along the bed...

I used a cutoff wheel in my dremel to cut off the end of the taper. so far everything looks OK, but will known for sure when I first try to use it. Thanks to everyone for their help and comments. Craig

Thanks for your response. So I take it that cutting an inch or so off the end won't cause any problem? Thanks again

I recently got a drill chuck and arbor to use in my tailstock, but have a question about using it. (I warn you that being a newbie, I would have a lot of dump questions). If I have cranked the quill all the way out, the arbor fits tightly in. However if I start to retract the quill, I reach a...

Hi, I've been lurking for several years now but now want to get into all of this. I have virtually no experience on lathes, other than a small amount using a small, cheap lathe that my employer had. That was mainly using Delrin to create some bushings for my motorcycle. I retired at the...