Latest Harbor Freight purchase

Great Christmas present!  Harbor Freight gets too much of my money.  I've been thinking about a mini-lathe for a few years now to do things like turn venturis, thread .22 barrels, make inserts for APC props to fit a 5-40 screw, fountain pens. That sort of thing.  Waffling about buying the HF mini-lathe with the current 25% off coupon which would take theirs down from $600 to $450.  But it's still just too much, I think.  I keep watching Craig's list for a mini lathe in the 12"-14" range, but nothing comes up.  Ah, well.

Happy Carting!

The Budget-Minded Mark

Sadly this year...I focused on high end stuff and resisted all HF ads

I am sure I missed a few good deals but right now I have most of my needs

The good thing with HF

Next week it WILL BE on SALE again!

With the 7x10 (in reality a 7x8) mini lathe I have it was basically a kit lathe. All the parts were there but fit and finish of the ways were not the best. Lots of hours of hand lapping of the cross slide ways and wedges were needed. Fine tuning of the speed controller to achieve low speed high torque was needed. Lots of little added on goodies adds up quick to the overall cost. Expect to spend as much for that lathe as you do on tooling. What comes with the HF lathe was very crude. I added on a quick change tool post and lots of other goodies. 4 jaw chuck, faceplate, and follower rest. Made a milling attachment with a small 2" vice and angle block. If you snuff the lathe by taking too big of a cut expect to replace the 2 large MOSFETs on the motor controller. BTDT.

Although much more money, the lathes and mills at Little Machine Shop look to be of better quality. I have bought many accessories over the years from these guys. Lots of spare parts too.

www.littlemachineshop.com

You will get the bug for machining. I now have a Rockwell 14x40 lathe and a Jet 9x40 mill.

That's a nice cart Bob. I looked for something like that a few years ago. My shop is essentially a walk-in toolbox, as it is only about 11x18ft or so and the tools are mostly hanging on the walls. Actual work is mostly done right outside the door and it is handy to have a cart or a box to put the tools in during the work. I could not find a tool cart that was small and cheap enough, so I settled with an IKEA "Råskog" kitchen cart:



It is made of steel, and the bottoms of the boxes are perforated. Quite stable and heavy enough. Plus you can use magnets to attach stuff on it.

Here's my son hiding behind his Monkey bike while demonstrating the "working right outside the door". I am actually quite impressed how quickly he has picked up most of the knowledge and skill to maintain and improve the bike, and also happy that he is receptive to tips and advice his old man offers. Not many 15-year-olds do that



The shop is currently not so bad, we got all the bikes indoors and with some shuffling around there is also room to work on them too. The shop is still under construction, the airplane works will be located on the benches seen on the right.



Here is what Santa brought me: a Bahco 3/8" SAE socket set. I already had 3/8" set in Metric sizes but the recently acquired Harley obviously requires SAE. This set has the allen tools also. I've found 3/8" to be the best size for what I mostly work on. 1/4" ratchets are a bit weak, and socket sizes only go up to 1/2" or maybe 9/16", and the 1/2" size tools are a bit bulky and don't have much of a "feel" that I like to have while working on old machines.



Sorry for the hijack, just could not resist sharing what has been going on in my little (unheated) shop lately

Not a hijack Kari, I read every word, enjoyed the pictures and learned something.

I have become a fan of these smaller roll-arounds. Just roll the cart to your job rather than look all over for the proper tool. I liked my previous HF tool box (picture) that I use for my MG that I bought this one. My problem is that I have four different work shops - loft, basement, and 2 and 4 car garages and running between shops looking for the right tool was time consuming. This way I just outfit the roll-around with the tools peculiar to that location.