7 X 12 Mini Lathe

[esai]

I was looking for a mini lathe for awhile myself. I used google to look up information for me. I stumbled across the Yahoo! 7 X 10 mini-lathe user group. I then found out about http://www.mini-lathe.com and read the reviews. What I came to decide personally is that most people buy there lathe and that one becomes the best one to them. I also found that the Grizzly mini-lathe is ready to use out of the box. I did checkout the Micro-Mark lathe then realized if I needed a spindle speed indicator that I could get one from: http://www.littlemachineshop.com The Grizzly came with allen wrenches change gear set, steady rest, face plate, oil bottle, dead center. You have to clean packing grease from all of these machines when they arrive. I purchased carbide tipped bits until I learn the art of grinding my own. I also bought a live center (a better quality one)and a drill chuck to mount on my tailstock. I also got a boring bar set (1/2 inch shank) I bought alot of carbide tipped bits of various types (this I believe lets me know how the different angles work before I grind my own). Most of the extras I got from http://www.LittleMachineshop.com
I got my carbide tipped bits from http://www.use-enco.com these lathes take 5/16 bits or toolsteel. Next is a Grizzly Mini mill. Oh....I got a dented chip tray and simply e-mailed Grizzly and they replaced it no questions asked! I did not have to hammer mine out with a hammer. Yes, it looks jut like the original an exact match.

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Anthony D. Davis

[BillH]

I bought the micromark lathe, if you add up the prices of all the addons needed for your grizzly to make it comparable to the 7x14, it would cost way more. That is ok though, most people say the features my micromark has are useless and not worth the money. To me, the longer bed and cam lock tailstock were the big differences I wanted, not to mention the true inch dials.
I just sold most of my R/C airplane equiptment so I could buy tooling for my lathe.

[hgreen111]

The Homier is a good compromise, at 299 it is a decent buy. Mine has required very little tune up, and since I also have the Lathemaster 9X20 they both use mt3 and mt2 tooling.

Hank