Show me your lathe bench, mount your bench lathe

[BCRider]

….My eventual chip pan is likely gonna sandwich between the stand and the machine.
the chip pan in post #19 and 93 grabs me

Strapping that on the side like that sure is redneck ! ! ! ! Around here I'm pretty darn sure it would rate me a ticket from the Gendarme!

The full size tray is nice in a lot of ways. But both the one in 19 and mine in 93 don't leave much room for sweeping things away. If you have the tooling to allow making them I would heartily suggest the riser blocks you were considering early on to raise the lathe up above the tray and allow easier working underneath. The trick will be making the risers such that the surfaces are dead flat to each other. If they are not on the same plane then the risk is that it will try to bend the bed into an "S" like shape.

Mine is so bad that I rely mostly on some raking sticks to clean out the swarf and bring it to the front of the tray. It's rather annoying to use them but makes the job workable enough that I'm not going to bother with trying to lift the machine off to install spacers at THIS point. These rake sticks are made from oak so they last reasonably long and are 1/4 x 1" with the edges "sharpened" by angling at around 20 to 30 degrees instead of being square.

[Ringo]

Not much to look at, but welding progress. I tried both rod 6013 & 7018ac, should have committed to 6013 from the get go, it looks better.
I had to try at levelling just to see, and I found the stretcher has to be slightly loose to let the main legs settle.
If the stretcher is hard tight, it will hike up on 3 legs when adjusted.
Glad I see this early on, though.

[nickel-city-fab]

Looks like a nice solid one.

[Ringo]

I been making some more progress. a update to keep this a bit alive. pics soon.

[nickel-city-fab]

What'll blow your mind is that my SB is around 450 lbs all tooled up, and its held up by some 50-yr-old 1x8 shelving and a sheet of poplar plywood. Course the plywood is doubled up 1-1/2 thick glued and screwed. The shelves were something my Dad made in 1970. So far the setup is as solid as I could want. I could move it again if I had to.

[Ringo]

my old bench now, is not glued & screwed, not doubled up, it flexes like a drum head on heavy cuts

[Ringo]

I got this far today. Got a price from a local fab shop on a chip tray and $64 later I like it.
The space under the lathe was supposed to be a tool chest but it ended up being rather small space. Perhaps there is a future hole cut in the chip pan, a trash can underneath, just push the swarf into the hole and empty the trash can, time will tell on that.
the lathe feet sit on a 3/4" steel plate, and all of that is thru bolted to the channel iron bench frame.


I put a small sheet rubber under the motor casting as a vibe pad.



The adjustable foot bolts are to sit on machine vibe pads

[Ringo]

[nickel-city-fab]

Oooooo nice! That looks like time and money well spent!