Yes--just add 1000.00 hours of hard labor-- and it is still an Underpowered laughable POS That is best suited for an Anchor for your boat. Now if you look around, There is a Glut of old Machinists willing to be talked out of solid Iron that Repeats, Repeats, Repeats...Get it? Oh, did I say Good machinery REPEATS? Do Not waste Good Money on this Chinese Crap-- The guy who made it with a Gun Barrel pressed to his temple did not care if it worked, Why Should You? Spend your worthless Fiat Currency on quality machines. No shortage.!
@@anneinfurna8528 - Are you somehow of the opinion that the point of this project is to arrive at a hunk of "solid iron that Repeats, Repeats, Repeats"? It is not. It is CLEARLY a light-hearted journey to see what adding 1000.00 of hard labor to an Underpowered laughable POS will actually produce, learn stuff along the way, and enjoy the process. It's a hobby. Lighten up, Francis. ruclips.net/video/iN-aXzpQUdw/видео.html
@@somebodyelse6673 Isn't the average cost of one of these chinese lathes about 500 dollars? All i am saying is that this money is better spent elsewhere. Light hearted is 20 - 35 dollars, not 500.You get out of something what you put into it--and this venture is not worth the results. Not to me.
I was thinking the exact same thing whilst watching this too. The V-Ways for the headstock, Saddle and Tailstock are shocking!!! The Saddle Gibbs need completely refab'ing. I bet the headstock bearings are just 'Off The Shelf' Roller bearings an not taper roller bearings and, how do you grease them? Those plastic gears!! No trust in them at all. Looking around, these Lathes start at about £500, I'd rather invest in a used Myford Super7 than one of these hunks of junk!
@@anneinfurna8528 these lathes can be purchased new for as low as $350 USD (Shipped!), and can usually do some decent work for less than 10 hours of fiddling, cleaning, and adjustment. From what I've read of other's experiences and my own, this lathe had a shocking number of issues right out of the box. For most people just getting into the hobby, as I was, these machines are a good starting point. As well, even in my area where larger quality metal lathes are regularly for sale I haven't been able to find one that runs for less than $3k. Anything under $2k would require so much work that the restoration itself would need to be your hobby. Yes, when compared to real machines these aren't much more than a toy that'll turn brass, aluminium, and plastic. They can still be a great learning tool for people new to machining, and the process of improving the machine is a valuable opportunity for learning how they work and machining useful parts.
Been waiting with baited breath for this, my mini lathe that I bought 10 years ago was still in the box until the last video ... its now disassembled, clean and deburred... Just waiting to get put back together :-) Thanks a LOT for this.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Your level of detail and step by step format pushed me over the top. It was definitely worthwhile from my stand point :-) I needed THIS video... I have watched and re-watched hundreds of them and read and printed out 3 or 4 guides in my various aborted attempts to get a level of comfort from a knowledge perspective to get it done. I definitely needed the level of detail visually you presented apparently b/c after the 2nd time through it the box was back on the bench the lath was unpacked and after the 3rd or 4th time through the video it was disassembled and clean. De-burring took some more watching and courage :-) But Im going out to the shop to put it back together shortly. Again thank you sincerely.
@@grumpycat_1 I'm glad to hear that including plenty of detail is worth the effort. I'll keep doing my best to do that. Best of luck with your lathe, and I hope i brings you years of productive fun.
I hear ya, bro! I have been holding off purchasing one because of the cheapness...and I would only be utilizing the lathe as a hobby, not for a main income.
I have a similar lathe. Nothing is right. I highly recommend treating everything like a raw casting. My bed was not flat nor parrallel, the headstock was not aligned, the tailstock is an abomination, the bottom of the bed is not parallel with the top, etc. That being said, highly recommend as a project. I'm currently fabricating a flexture type tool post right now for it
I'm sure I heard Stephan Gotteswinter say once that Chinese machinery is fine as long as you treat it as a kit of parts that need finishing and assembly before you use them.
My similar lathe's worst part was probably the chuck that came with it. Seeing its interior, I thought it must have been cast in sand. I had to rework a good portion of the teeth so that it would not block when opening or closing.
Great video! This is exactly what I need to do to mine, I have cleaned and deburred it a while ago but there are no videos out there that go into enough detail to inspire enough confidence to actually make changes to it. You manage to do this with your attention to detail. I will be waiting with bated breath for each episode in this fantastically informative series. Thank you
well it's a lathe ruclips.net/user/postUgkxN9zrzkkhnjUF5PQbuA_B1gYdsfCu9k6z but it wasn't what i would have anticipated. Headstock, tailstock, carriage apron are manufactured from aluminum now not cast iron. The spindle diameter for the bearings is too small allowing for a few play in the spindle so I am using some blue Loctite to take out the play.
Hi from Montreal Quebec. Thanks for nice video. I am by no mean at all a machinist but my sister is and she is working as a 3D software specialist for the avionics industry. I asked her to check on this lathe as I want to do some small parts for my other hobby, ham radio and automation. Getting to retire soon and need to setup my man cave with cool tools to play. After seing the video she told me to continu on listening to your stuff, you seem to know enough to help me going on.. So thanks again for the nice video and I am eager to see more coming!
You may encounter a motor no-start or spasmodic speed jumping which is not related to failure of the electronic controller. If there is no other apparent cause, check the brush holders on the motor. They seem to be a press fit in the motor case on my machine, an older Taiwanese version with slightly better apparent build quality and tidier castwork. It has with most of the problems you identified. The brush holders had crept out when the motor became hot and one brush had lost contact once the motor cooled down. I could not think of any other way to secure the brush holders so I glued them back in place. It has been fine since. Two MOSFETS blew out in the controller and a replacement I bought. With good help from RS Components, I replaced them with parts of a higher load rating or voltage tolerance I don't have a strong understanding of electronics. I was told they would work and they have. Failure of the controller seemed to be provoked by selecting a slower speed while the spindle was running faster. Since then my preferred practice when wanting a slower speed is to stop the motor, then roll back the speed controller, start the motor and ramp the power up to the desired speed. This bug may have been solved long ago as the lathe was bought in 1994.
Thanks for the info dump, lots of really useful info. I'll adopt your practice when wanting to a slower speed, as i'm not keen to have to fiddle around re-soldering MOSFETs. Do you recall the part numbers of the higher load rated MOSFETs RS sorted out for you?
I have had the exact same lathe (right down to the paint scheme) for about three years and went through this playlist when I first got it. Your videos were a great help in getting it to be useable. I am now in the process of doing a very thorough cleaning and so have gone through your videos again to make sure I don't forget something. My biggest issue was the getting the tailstock to align with the headstock. It is still not as perfect as I would like, but at least useable. I have made so many improvements that it is almost not the same lathe (collet chuck, qctp, homemade milling attachment, etc). I want to thankyou for your videos, I would have likely have given up on this lathe without your very detailed videos to guide me.
Cool, glad to know you found the videos useful. I still have aligning my tailstock to look forward to, but you can be sure I'll make a video on it when I do.
Thanks for a very interesting and ib´nstructive 2-part video. I bought basically the same type, from Warco in UK ca 1 year ago. They have obviously specified the lathe in some respects. They also unbox the lathe and check it up, maybe adjust things. In the shipping box I found a manual "CJ0618" but my one is 14" long. Warco supplied an excellent, UK made, manual. Most of the parts are the same as You show. The controll box is told to be American made so the controlls are differently situated. The geartrain for threading is all metall. At the time 17:00 You adjust the cross slide nut. I wish You had told how You did it, how You thought. Using the lathe for some times adjustments are likely needed. Adjusting gib screws feels okey. Time 35:45. Note the difference, between QCTP and the edge of the compund. When needed to lower tool holders extra they have to be milled off.
I've heard really good things about Warco, and they're definitely high up the list of places I'll go when I'm looking to upgrade to a bigger lathe for real work. (This Chinese lathe is for practice projects). At 17:00 I'm not really doing anything too clever, or accurate. The centre screw pushes the nut down, the two on either side pull it up, so I was trying to get it straight along the lead screw, at the right height that the screw is parallel to the movement so it doesn't get stuck. All I did was fiddle with these screws until the cross-slide seemed to be able to run smoothly from end to end. For the QCTP I haven't yet had a need to set the tool holder below the level, so haven't had to worry about that. I can see a need for it though. What tools in particular have you been using when you needed to do that?
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe So You're not giving the leadscrew a slight angle, in the axial respect, to lower play/backlash from the nut? The toolholder I think of is a 250-007 part off holder. The blade is directed upwards. Parting of thick material the blade is sticking out more and more. Then the height of the cutting edge becomes higher and the holder had to be milled off by some 4 - 5 mm.
@@Stefan_Boerjesson No, I didn't think of setting the nut at an angle. Most of the backlash comes from the way the leadscrew flange is held by a pocket that is too large, so my first priority will be to fix that. I see what you mean about the 250-007. I've never tried using it, but I've heard from others that it is very limited by the way the tool slopes up.
Go to 2:32 and hit pause.......the two inner bolts are for leveling the blue assembly. Screwing them up through the bed will hold it level. When you tighten the outer Allen screws it will pull downward locking the blue assemble level and tight against the inner bolts. I don't think those bolts are for the motor. .
The 2 screws that you thought were for the motor adjustment i believe they are meant for adjusting the headstock not the motor. They make up for the gap on the flat surfaces and perhaps some angular adjustment....
I'm absolutely certain that's not the case, because they line up with voids in the headstock casting. No matter how much they protrude above the bed, they can't affect the position of the headstock. On the other wise, if the motor is not supported from above, the belt tension causes it to flap around and vibrate, because the main mounting studs provide almost no vertical rigidity.
I read a few comments on chinese laithes, like the belt broke only after 2 weeks, the on and off swich blew off ecc. So I decided to build my own. After waching this video I know I made the right decision. My hat goes up to you for your effort and the time you took to do all this. Great job.
At that point the lead screw was loosely in place, and free to move around. After I opened the half nuts, I had to nudge the lead screw until it was at the right height to pass through the half nuts without snagging.
What about phosphor bronze washers to take up the slack in the adjusters? They would hold oil and you could change the thickness to get all the backlash out and not be too tight.
Very detailed video. I have a similar lathe and will use your info to dial mine in. One thing I already did was to replace the cap screws that hold the handles on the saddle and compound with stainless button head socket screws. The rounded head of these helps to keep from scrapping your knuckles in the cap screw head.
I recently received my chinese mini lathe, and it has the exact same feature where the headstock does not ride flat on the ways opposite the v-groove. However, after taking everything apart, cleaning things up, and reassembly, using a 0.002mm test indicator I've found that the headstock is within 0.01mm of being true to the ways in both axis and this is using the 3-jaw chuck and it's the chuck that has the small amount of runout, not the alignment. Yes, the head has a small tilt as a result of this, but not on an axis that matters in the least. The important thing, the v-grove runs almost perfectly parallel to the shaft in the headstock. Of course each person's mileage will vary with these lathes.. Someone commented that they must have gotten one of the laths that was built with all the reject parts.
Interesting. Good to hear that despite the issues the headstock is straight where it counts. Did you also find that the saddle has the same issues? One of my concerns is that the poor fit to the bed reduces the overall rigidity of the machine significantly, and tightening all four bolts holding the headstock would add a twist force to the bed.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe In my case I didn't find any issues where the bed warped when tightening the headstock. I put the most tension on the front and back bolts on the side where the v-grove is, and then just snugged up the opposite side which does not really sit flat on the bed just as your video shows. Once adjusting the lateral (x) adjustment on the tailstock I get a good alignment on the tail stock with the chuck. I suppose I got lucky on the Y axis (elevation) of the tailstock I think one way of fixing that if it doesn't align (hopefully it would fall too low) would be to run a shim to compensate along the back side of the head stock to get the proper Y alignment with the tail stock. The saddle (cross slide) seems to run true to the bed. It seems that the dimension between the top of the bed and the machined underside where the adjustment plates rub seem to be ok. I did find them a bit tricky to adjust properly.. I've seen a number of mods to the way they're configured on youtube. For now I've left mine stock. I noticed that both the plates had a slight curvature to them so they tended to come in contact with the underside of the ways on the ends. I found that adjusting the grub screws first and then tightening the center bolt first tended to flatten out the curve and then drawing up the two outside screws seems to work the best to get a good even tension on those places and increase the contact area. I get a nice smooth even drag on the cross slide all the way up and down the ways. In all of this I'm assuming that I just happened to get extremely lucky compared to what some others have received with this particular versions of the mini lathe.
Really like these type of videos. I was a mechanical fitter in my former years. I think I understand why you are doing this. I think there are several reasons. Firstly because you can, you want a better lathe. you need a project. So is this a cost-effective way to do it. That is not counting your time.
The usefulness of this video can't be overstated! ;-) It really exposes many of the down sides of these inexpensive lathes. On the other hand it also open the doors for a lot of fine tunning and adjustments who can easily and cheaply turn it (no pun intended) into very capable machines. Over the years I encounter these issues many times. Making an inexpensive machine a perfectly functional piece of equipment is mostly on the end user hands. ;-) Cheers
How does someone assemble a lathe with so many parts that just doesn't fit together in the first place? I kind of want to believe it was manufactured on a production line in some kind of factory, and that it wasn't a one off design. So how did they end up with for instance all these pieces where the holes for the grub screws doesn't line up? What was that, four of these pieces for the different slides? And not one of them really fitting... And that's just one of the problems with this lathe. Boggles my mind... Question about the added grub screws added to align the flanges holding the slide to the bed. Won't these work their way out when the lathe is being used, or will they be secured with locking nuts or/and locktite when the fitting has been completed?
The bad fit is very frustrating. The gibs are the most obvious, and the most mysterious. I can only assume the design was changed at some point, but there were surplus parts, or the production specs weren't correctly updated. I think you're right to be concerned about the grub screws in the hold-down plates, but those aren't a good long term solution anyway. There are a few ideas out there to improve this, from shimming the plates, to completely replacing them with tapered gibs.
Great video! I've had one of these for 10 years, they're great. I've done quite a bit to mine but still have more to do. if you ever take the saddle off again, open the half nuts then slide it off the end of the leadscrew and vice versa. edit, I've just seen that you might not be able to take the leadscrew off the tailstock end, however you should be able to take off the 80t gear at the feed end and pull the leadscrew out through the control box and through the saddle.
Thanks for the edit, I was just about to ask about that. I've tried a few ways to take the overall leadscrew assembly apart, and I've not found an approach I'm happy with yet. I haven't removed the large plastic gears yet because they've been forced and tightened onto the shafts so hard they're cracked, and they may not survive the disassembly.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I think its a very common issue with these unfortunately, I cracked one of the 20t gears because the part which joins gears "B" and "C" together was too large, I made a new part from phosphor bronze to remedy the issue. Arceurotrade sell a set of metal gears (part no 090-020-01800) which really are quite good, I bought mine in 2012 for £38, they have gone up in price but they are worth it in my opinion. The plastic gears which came with the lathe didn't give me any issues though to be fair. On my lathe, the bearing blocks and leadscrew are three separate components, does yours not come apart? maybe try to clamp the leadscrew between two bits of wood, and see if that hex bit will unscrew. If the right hand bearing block doesn't come off over the end of the leadscrew then your only option will be to bite the bullet and remove the gears if you need to remove the saddle again. Not that the saddle needs to come off regularly.
I would have liked to see how you re-mounted the chuck because after doing this myself on this type of lathe there is a bad loss of concentricity ever since🙁
That's not good, how bad is the runout? I didn't do anything special at all. I just placed the chuck onto the register, and threaded on the three nuts. Can your chuck shift slightly against the face plate if the nuts aren't quite tight? The inner diameter of the back of the chuck should be sitting snuggly on the spindle plate register, ensuring that it can't really move.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe the register has 0.1mm runout, the chuck 0.23 mm. Before removing the chuck it was much less I remember. However I guess the runout of the register was there before. I conclude that the manufacturer has a procedure to somehow set the combination register-chuck in a way that the flaws of the register can be egalized when fixing the chuck.
Glad I found this video again, I watched it way back when thinking of buying a mini lathe. I have now bought one that has had the control PCB blown, a common fault I understand, but that's no problem to me when I can buy it very cheap with little use. Whilst waiting for parts I will now strip it and follow you video, thanks.
I really appreciate the video. My own mini lathe shares nearly all of the same issues, and I will be cleaning and aligning it just like you show. Thanks again.
I see you had a problem with the gear shifter, it won't disconnect from the gears below. I had that same problem during my assembly. I resolved it by pushing down the belt cover before tightening the cover screws. I just got my mini lathe yesterday, and i disassemble it to clean and removed those factory applies lubricants. Thank you for your 3 videos regarding this mini lathe. Your videos is a great help.
I have a new mini lather and appreciate the video - thanks - Just one niggly point - by the time I got to 1:30 seconds I had already sat through two sets of 2 ads each by RUclips PLUS the sponsorship ad for skillshare - is getting to be too much. Keep the good content coming 🙂
Wow, that's annoying, thanks for the heads up. It looks like RUclips has automatically added a lot more mid-roll ad breaks than I realised. I've deleted most of them from this video, and gone through a bunch of others too. I do really appreciate the bit of ad revenue I get and it helps me fund more projects on this channel than I could otherwise do, but I don't want it to be annoying or pestering. Thanks for helping me improve this.
Well spotted, yes; I replaced them with shorter grub screws in my more recent video "Five Quick Mods to the CJ0618 7x12 Mini Lathe that Anyone Can Make"
Great video.I would say that the best thing one can do to the mini lathe is to harden the bed because my lathe has some years using, and it needs repaired.
Tapered headstock bearings a must , as I have the same lathe. I had to shim my tail stock and spend sometime getting it on center along with indicating the barrel so it runs out straight. I recommend a halfway decent Quick change tool post not the eBay $40 aluminum Jobbie. OXA Wedge type tool post will do the job.
A steel OXA wedge type is the one I have. You should be able to see in this video at 35:42, but if not I did a review video which went through the installation.
I'm simply amazed at how many things that are wrong with this lathe. It will be super exciting to see you try and fix most of them. And very satisfying :D
It seems to me that two screws with nuts should level headstock in proper position. Motor has threaded hole (for missing screw) on upper side for belt tensioning (10:16 in previous video).
The tone and cadence of your voice reminds me of my grade school shop teacher, Mr. Day. Thanks for the great video and keep up the great work. My son and I look forward to watching all your videos. Cheers.
I have a warco wm180. Its technically a mini lathe I guess. Im blown away about how capable these little lathes are. It also blows me away about how creative people can be making the most out of their tools.
Wow just Wow! It's like a representation of a lathe and it's anatomy but the parts that are there aren't really made to be used under any kind of working pressure.
wonderfull mate, u thought me a lot am an age pensioner,and i did maintained my lathe too, also i had to change my motor into 2 hp, BUT i use belt and 5 ways pullyies, easy for me, many thanks
are you sure the "spacer bolts" weren't meant to be used to jack the headstock into alignment? I have seen that kind of thing before. I agree that there are better solutions but that is quick and cheap so may have been the case here.
When I took the lathe apart, these bolts were resting against the top of the motor, and if the bolts aren't there, there is nothing to hold the motor steady against the tension in the drive belt. I also don't think they're in the right place to effectively support the headstock. If you go to 1:37 you can see that there are voids in the headstock, and I'm pretty sure they line up with where those bolts are. I suspect a more effective way to quickly and easily fix the headstock height would be to use washers with the main fixing screws.
I absolutely thought the same thing and probably a ton of other ppl too. However. Without those two screws being the motor 'mount and align,' there's nothing else to do the *mount* thing. This is a brilliant design trick. The motor can overall diameter must be within a range. Important: there's no motor- or mfr-specific end bell geometry/holes/tabs/slots/whatever to adapt to! That yields a much wider range of possible motors. CON: the max motor power is limited, because the motor can itself becomes part of the structural chain of forces.
@@jimbarchuk I imagine they've been iterating the design of this lathe for many years, making small changes so they can manufacture them more cheaply, and expand compatibility with a greater range of parts for even more cost efficiency. I think you're absolutely right that this is a neat way of allowing almost any motor around the right size to be installed.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Another pro, align the motor shaft in parallel with the rest of the machine, so the belt doesn't lean to one side. I know you know this alignment stuff just wanted to point it out. A rigid, built in badly designed motor bracket could easily cause other alignments to be weird and hard to adjust, or force a certain motor style to be required. Less is often better.
I've sometimes wondered which would be the easiest route to a small hobby lathe... either taking the Chinese route and needing to repair, restore and/or rebuild it.... or going Gingery and building the entire thing from scratch.......
I've watched some of those Gingery build project videos, and they seem to be pretty major commitments, and require quite a bit of expertise. I feel like the improvement work I'm doing is quite a bit easier.
Good job very informative. Did you think about repainting the lath body before you reassembled everything? Where did you get the multicolored Allen wrenches they were your go to wrenches for the lath Assembly and takedown, seemed like great tools for this type of work. Thanks again for the video!
Thanks! I'll definitely be repainting the lathe at some point, but it'll be much later in the overall improvement process, so the paint doesn't get damaged by the frequent disassembly and reassembly. The allen wrenches are Wera, and many people call them the finest money can buy. You can get them from Amazon, or many other tool sellers. Beware of cheap imitations coloured to look the same.
I realize this video is 2 years old, but how is the 3-in-1 treating you? I'm using ISO68 hydraulic oil as recommended by the manual on my old Clausing.
I don't use 3in1 for day to day oiling. For the ways I use specially formulated slideway oil, which I also use for the other parts if they need oil. If I had more space I would get hydraulic or gearbox oil for the moving parts.
ON many of these gibs the design seems to be just to allow the centre one of the grub screws to engage in its detent for location, whilst the other screws just contact the gib itself.. The other detents may as well not be there, perhaps the gibs are used in other slides. Very common in Far east imports.
Onr of the first mods to the carriage is to replace the screws for the hold down plates with studs and shim packs. The shim packs keep the bars parrallel to the bed ways. Thanks
Adventures with a Very Small Lathe have you tried arc euro trade I get all my parts from them and it’s fast delivery hope it helps all the best stay safe
My 80+ year old lathe has shims that hold the cartridge slides off the bed so it doesn’t act like a clamp. There are multiple shims of different sizes to you can add and remove them as the slides wear. The apron is assembled first then the lead screw is inserted last. Not sure if that would help in your case Interesting video. I’m surprised by the way the head stock fits on the bed. Looking forward to seeing how you solve these problems.
Minute 18:42 : the spacing screws are used to get the saddle on slides without any gap. To be adjusted until saddle can freely run on guides without any gap, and not any friction due to the underside guides ( that is an antithesis ! ). I went on this work many years ago, when i bought my minilathe ( Einhell MTB 3000, very similar to the lathe been descripted ). Believing guides were ok, i had to file just a bit ( only with thin sand paper ! ) on the underside, till i got no gap and no friction ( or . . . very little gap and costant friction ! ). Untill today, it works ok, though i met in time other problems ( gear in the box broken, they were plastics ! and so on . . . ), . . . but i solved all . . . and i'm happy lathing . . .
There should be a dog point grub screw with a locking nut underneath the quill end of the tailstock casting. That stops rotation and over travel of the quill
thanks for the informative videos on the CJ 0618, i have recently bought one of these and have found many defects that need addressing. i have a question on the feed direction selector lever, does it have 2 indents or 3, mine has 2 and cannot select neutral, is your the same or do i need to drill an indent for neutral.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe thanks for the reply, i guess i will have to try and drill an indent for neutral. i have to say i am disappointed in the standard of machining on the lathe. when i unpacked it i went over it to check all nuts and bolts, i found a number of them quite loose but on tightening the spindle locked up due to misaligned drill holes, the missing indent that i mentioned and saddle, cross slide and compound faces that had to be deburred. still i enjoy a challenge and am working my way through it with the help of your videos. thank you.
I don't think that can be true, because they are lined up with voids in the headstock casting. No amount of adjusting to those bolts makes any difference to the headstock or chuck. However without them there is nothing to keep the motor in place, or the belt tensioned.
Hi. That motor wiring laying on the motor is unsafe. The insulation is going to chafe through - motors vibrate - and if you should have a protective conductor fault (earth) on the motor or in your house wiring you are at serious risk of a possibly fatal electric shock. Don’t use it like this. A sheath alone does not really help, that too will wear through, it will just take longer. Re-route the wires so they are in a sheath and crucially do not lay on the motor. Where cables pass through the casting there should be a rubber grommet for much the same reason. Stay safe. BobUK.
My Mini lathe is almost exactly like this one in design. The tailstock is different, you have a much better locking to ways arrangement. I have a threading engagement wheel dial on my saddle My drive screw is 16T.
Welcome back, I’ve been looking forward to this video. The Aussie Shed channel has a playlist on improving a Chinese mini lathe, there may be some things of interest. Keep up the good work.
Thanks! I've already included all of The Aussie Shed videos into my playlist. Unfortunately RUclips doesn't provide an easy way for me to share a link to the playlist, but you can find it on my channel page, on the playlists tab, "7" Lathe Improvements from all over RUclips".
It's definitely bigger, heavier, and more powerful, and if I was doing larger work, I'd prefer a machine this size, but it didn't arrive in nearly usable condition, and it's still a long way from being ready to do really good work. It's hard to predict how good it's going to be once I've improved it to my satisfaction.
thank you for those two excellent vid's of this type of (Chinese) 'cheap' lathe's. I'm curious if you had already a solution for the plastic wheels where on was broken/cracked while it was still new !
Thanks for the tip! I'm actually considering something he mentions in this video, but doesn't do: trying out anglular contact bearings instead of taper roller bearings.
Keep these videos coming. My crappy lathe arrives on Tuesday, and I'd like to get quite familiar with its shortcomings so I can use it to build a bigger/better one.
That's one interesting shot for me with the Leggo(tm) men, the traverse half-nuts on mine were only a single half-nut and bent bit of metal retaining. There was a plate chip-cover over the leadscrew which got in the way of having both nuts on. We had to get a new set because they snapped turning a thickish bit of mild steel so we ditched the cover and just use a paintbrush-sweeper and a lot of care.. I've ordered the bronze for the bush, yeah will be nice. Considering putting a couple of steppers on for a bit of computer-numerical-control and this should help. Or even turning it with just a battery-drill. That's the only limitation for me of mine, the traverse just flies along too quick! Great lockdown video, good work. NEAL
I've never thought before but I suppose it can be a hobby in itself to get a broken old or badly made new machine and spend our free time trying to get it to run properly.... I've always considered these machines to be an inconvenience.... but it's a matter of perspective..... they can also be seen as many weeks of entertaining tinkering.
you must be getting a bit wiser to recognize this. Ditto crappy musical instruments made to sound wonderful in the hands of a competent player... and yes, watching and commenting on youtube videos... and of course commenting on the comments.... whew!
Aren't those two hex bolts ruclips.net/video/z2_WWE000SY/видео.html for actually pushing up and positioning the headstock right and not just for resting against the motor?
Listen up everybody.......the guy who says that this lathe cannot cut steel doesn't know a toss about lathes or any machine for that matter......many years ago in 1966 I built a small lathe, 50mm centre height and 200mm between centres......that is a micro lathe without doubt but it cuts steel like cheese.........those that dispute it have never used a lathe......I still have and use this lathe and it still cuts steel........probably mainly due to the headstock bearings being taper roller......I use HSS all of the time, hand ground and a bit of carbide occasionally. The biggest job it did was Morris Minor brake drums with the headstock raised up on a block to clear the bed.
I recently bought a 7x14 mini lathe that looks a lot like yours (same design, paint colours &c) but Vevor branded and while I won't say it is perfect a lot of the things that made you think yours was from a batch that failed QC appear to have been done right so maybe they aren't all so bad. I just subscribed and I'm looking forward to seeing the improvements you make to yours and deciding which ones I should do too. BTW, I see yours has the same red stripe down the bed that mine does. Any idea why that is the only red on the lathe?
Vevor seems to be the emerging big brand for low costs machine tools imported direct from China. I haven't had a chance to try their stuff yet, as every time I look at their site the tool I am interested in is out of stock.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Maybe I got lucky. When I ordered they had several models in stock; I picked the one I wanted and it shipped in a day or 2. Or maybe their Canadian warehouse is better at monitoring inventory than the UK branch.
@@SidecarBob The Canadian branch is probably better at _having_ inventory than the UK branch. It's not that easy to get imported stuff here any more. EU companies find the extra paperwork more trouble than it's worth, and the UK is a small market on its own.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe True, but there are almost twice as many people in the UK than there are in Canada so one would expect the market to be substantially larger too. If they are on top of things the UK warehouse should be bigger and better stocked. Or perhaps the machines you wanted to try were just popular enough the weeks you tried to get them that stock was depleeted and not many lathes sold in Canada the week I ordered mine.
@@SidecarBob I think I was assuming they coordinate warehousing across North America, but I don't really know enough about NAFTA to know if that's practical.
@9.20. Theres a small crack in the housing just below the RH attaching screw. A stop drill now will probably prevent this from propagating until you have time to fix it properly. Edit: just spotted this is a year old!😁
I've hunted through the video, and I can't find what you mean. Can you give me a timecode, or a more complete description of which housing the crack is in, and which attaching screw?
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Ok, if you stop the video at 9.46. Right where you are installing the attaching screw with the Philip's screwdriver.directly below the screwdriver head theres a small crack in the housing.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe No probs. I bought a little Crenex and did the same as you, probably not as good as you did as I just fixed things as they effected what I was doing. One thing that did help was when I removed an item I used low strength loctite when I reassembled.and I fitted a vacuum attachment which helps remove a lot of the swarf. I'm an aoro engineer and know very little about machining. Uploads like this help!
Personally, I would say the 'motor adjusting bolts' are really to compensate for the incorrect head to slideway assembly and should be used to adjust head-stock level and parallel to bed? Not a very good solution but better than having things clamped at an angle
They could be used for that, but then there would be nothing to keep the motor stable, and tension the drive belt. Without them the motor is very unstable, and the belt tension would likely eventually rip the mounting screws out of their heads.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I've got an EMCO 7x12 and it doesn't have the 'motor adjuster bolts' which is why I speculated they are to adjust head-stock. The bolts haven't torn out of motor in the 17 years or so I've had it (which actually surprises me as they are only inserted 2~3 threads) I very rarely machine steel on it though, usually 6061 or bronze plus stainless steel a few times. It's done a lot of things much too big for it
I recently purchased a can of 3-IN-ONE oil, just as you are using here. In my youth, I seem to recall, it was much thicker - less runny - than it is now. I see the 3-IN-ONE you are using here tends to run out just like mine, making a mess rather than staying where you want it. I feel it is tending more toward a "penetrating oil" than a lubricant. The name 3-IN-ONE has changed hands many times over the years, and it just isn't what it used to be. Sadly, I find this to be true of many other products as well.
At least your using the best allen keys money can buy. Best thing i ever done was junk one of them lathes. For a newbie they are more than enough to turn anyone away, for a few quid more could have a proper lathe secondhand.
Sir we have the same lathe and i am planning on adding a chuck with adapter on the opposite end of the spindle making it 2 chucks at both end. Dou you know what exactly the parts i need to buy and the rigit size?
If I waited until I'd fixed all the faults before making another video, it'd be a couple of years before it came out. It'll come apart and go back together many times before we're done.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Still, wouldn't this be the last part in a "chinese lathe fault fixing series"? If there is going to be a series, that is? :)
I wonder if all of the Seig lathes come with these defects or, as mentioned in the prior video, this was "special" case. I already know these things come covered with cosmoline and you have to disassemble and clean all of it.
I've been able to buy a follow rest for the Sieg C2, but it does not fit this lathe. Real Bull lathes have the hole positions on the saddle in different places.
It's too bad you didn't show your final adjustments on the cross slide lead screw nut. It's a very tedious process of getting the right vertical position of the nut so as to allow for smooth feeding and getting the right tilt of the nut to eliminate backlash. I just adjusted mine and the chatter I was experiencing has virtually disappeared.
Assembly and fitting of a chinese lathe kit. Even at chinese labor rates, that labor would make these pretty expensive. Mine still has a few random problems.
With just about everything being "Made In China" these days it is important to remember that everything is built to a price. If Harbour Freight ask Chinese suppliers to make lathes to a price point the manufacturer can only do so by cutting corners/quality if he is to stay in business. Even decent mini lathes like Warco are made in China I believe, they just have a different price-point and insist on consistent quality. I have one of these Chinese Mini lathes and yes in some areas it is sadly lacking in quality and yes I will need to do things to make it better, but that is part of the fun too.
These are lathes, they are kits. The only reason to own one is as a YT creator, many of your viewers own one. I'm wondering if one will fall into my lap at some point in the future. I must admit to curiosity and watching many videos on them. Liked.
I can totally fix this lathe. All I need is a mill, a surface grinder, a lathe...
Yes--just add 1000.00 hours of hard labor-- and it is still an Underpowered laughable POS That is best suited for an Anchor for your boat. Now if you look around, There is a Glut of old Machinists willing to be talked out of solid Iron that Repeats, Repeats, Repeats...Get it? Oh, did I say Good machinery REPEATS?
Do Not waste Good Money on this Chinese Crap-- The guy who made it with a Gun Barrel pressed to his temple did not care if it worked, Why Should You?
Spend your worthless Fiat Currency on quality machines. No shortage.!
@@anneinfurna8528 - Are you somehow of the opinion that the point of this project is to arrive at a hunk of "solid iron that Repeats, Repeats, Repeats"? It is not.
It is CLEARLY a light-hearted journey to see what adding 1000.00 of hard labor to an Underpowered laughable POS will actually produce, learn stuff along the way, and enjoy the process. It's a hobby. Lighten up, Francis. ruclips.net/video/iN-aXzpQUdw/видео.html
@@somebodyelse6673 Isn't the average cost of one of these chinese lathes about 500 dollars? All i am saying is that this money is better spent elsewhere. Light hearted is 20 - 35 dollars, not 500.You get out of something what you put into it--and this venture is not worth the results. Not to me.
I was thinking the exact same thing whilst watching this too. The V-Ways for the headstock, Saddle and Tailstock are shocking!!! The Saddle Gibbs need completely refab'ing. I bet the headstock bearings are just 'Off The Shelf' Roller bearings an not taper roller bearings and, how do you grease them? Those plastic gears!! No trust in them at all. Looking around, these Lathes start at about £500, I'd rather invest in a used Myford Super7 than one of these hunks of junk!
@@anneinfurna8528 these lathes can be purchased new for as low as $350 USD (Shipped!), and can usually do some decent work for less than 10 hours of fiddling, cleaning, and adjustment. From what I've read of other's experiences and my own, this lathe had a shocking number of issues right out of the box.
For most people just getting into the hobby, as I was, these machines are a good starting point. As well, even in my area where larger quality metal lathes are regularly for sale I haven't been able to find one that runs for less than $3k. Anything under $2k would require so much work that the restoration itself would need to be your hobby.
Yes, when compared to real machines these aren't much more than a toy that'll turn brass, aluminium, and plastic. They can still be a great learning tool for people new to machining, and the process of improving the machine is a valuable opportunity for learning how they work and machining useful parts.
Been waiting with baited breath for this, my mini lathe that I bought 10 years ago was still in the box until the last video ... its now disassembled, clean and deburred... Just waiting to get put back together :-) Thanks a LOT for this.
I'm delighted & fascinated that my video motivated you to unpack it after so long. It makes it feel all the more worthwhile. :)
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Your level of detail and step by step format pushed me over the top. It was definitely worthwhile from my stand point :-)
I needed THIS video... I have watched and re-watched hundreds of them and read and printed out 3 or 4 guides in my various aborted attempts to get a level of comfort from a knowledge perspective to get it done.
I definitely needed the level of detail visually you presented apparently b/c after the 2nd time through it the box was back on the bench the lath was unpacked and after the 3rd or 4th time through the video it was disassembled and clean.
De-burring took some more watching and courage :-) But Im going out to the shop to put it back together shortly.
Again thank you sincerely.
@@grumpycat_1 I'm glad to hear that including plenty of detail is worth the effort. I'll keep doing my best to do that. Best of luck with your lathe, and I hope i brings you years of productive fun.
@@grumpycat_1 good job!
I hear ya, bro! I have been holding off purchasing one because of the cheapness...and I would only be utilizing the lathe as a hobby, not for a main income.
Nice video....lots of shots.....tons of cool shots...wow. ...take home message....glad I bought a Proxxon...phew.
I would still recommend these cheap lathes as a learning opportunity for people who want to learn about precision first hand.
I have a similar lathe. Nothing is right. I highly recommend treating everything like a raw casting. My bed was not flat nor parrallel, the headstock was not aligned, the tailstock is an abomination, the bottom of the bed is not parallel with the top, etc.
That being said, highly recommend as a project. I'm currently fabricating a flexture type tool post right now for it
I'm sure I heard Stephan Gotteswinter say once that Chinese machinery is fine as long as you treat it as a kit of parts that need finishing and assembly before you use them.
My similar lathe's worst part was probably the chuck that came with it. Seeing its interior, I thought it must have been cast in sand. I had to rework a good portion of the teeth so that it would not block when opening or closing.
Great video! This is exactly what I need to do to mine, I have cleaned and deburred it a while ago but there are no videos out there that go into enough detail to inspire enough confidence to actually make changes to it. You manage to do this with your attention to detail.
I will be waiting with bated breath for each episode in this fantastically informative series. Thank you
well it's a lathe ruclips.net/user/postUgkxN9zrzkkhnjUF5PQbuA_B1gYdsfCu9k6z but it wasn't what i would have anticipated. Headstock, tailstock, carriage apron are manufactured from aluminum now not cast iron. The spindle diameter for the bearings is too small allowing for a few play in the spindle so I am using some blue Loctite to take out the play.
Hi from Montreal Quebec. Thanks for nice video. I am by no mean at all a machinist but my sister is and she is working as a 3D software specialist for the avionics industry. I asked her to check on this lathe as I want to do some small parts for my other hobby, ham radio and automation. Getting to retire soon and need to setup my man cave with cool tools to play. After seing the video she told me to continu on listening to your stuff, you seem to know enough to help me going on.. So thanks again for the nice video and I am eager to see more coming!
Tell your sister that I'm very flattered. :) I hope you keep enjoying the videos.
You may encounter a motor no-start or spasmodic speed jumping which is not related to failure of the electronic controller. If there is no other apparent cause, check the brush holders on the motor. They seem to be a press fit in the motor case on my machine, an older Taiwanese version with slightly better apparent build quality and tidier castwork. It has with most of the problems you identified. The brush holders had crept out when the motor became hot and one brush had lost contact once the motor cooled down. I could not think of any other way to secure the brush holders so I glued them back in place. It has been fine since. Two MOSFETS blew out in the controller and a replacement I bought. With good help from RS Components, I replaced them with parts of a higher load rating or voltage tolerance I don't have a strong understanding of electronics. I was told they would work and they have. Failure of the controller seemed to be provoked by selecting a slower speed while the spindle was running faster. Since then my preferred practice when wanting a slower speed is to stop the motor, then roll back the speed controller, start the motor and ramp the power up to the desired speed. This bug may have been solved long ago as the lathe was bought in 1994.
Thanks for the info dump, lots of really useful info. I'll adopt your practice when wanting to a slower speed, as i'm not keen to have to fiddle around re-soldering MOSFETs. Do you recall the part numbers of the higher load rated MOSFETs RS sorted out for you?
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe It was quite a few years ago and I regret I no longer have the sales docket.
I have had the exact same lathe (right down to the paint scheme) for about three years and went through this playlist when I first got it. Your videos were a great help in getting it to be useable. I am now in the process of doing a very thorough cleaning and so have gone through your videos again to make sure I don't forget something. My biggest issue was the getting the tailstock to align with the headstock. It is still not as perfect as I would like, but at least useable. I have made so many improvements that it is almost not the same lathe (collet chuck, qctp, homemade milling attachment, etc). I want to thankyou for your videos, I would have likely have given up on this lathe without your very detailed videos to guide me.
Cool, glad to know you found the videos useful. I still have aligning my tailstock to look forward to, but you can be sure I'll make a video on it when I do.
Thanks for a very interesting and ib´nstructive 2-part video.
I bought basically the same type, from Warco in UK ca 1 year ago. They have obviously specified the lathe in some respects. They also unbox the lathe and check it up, maybe adjust things.
In the shipping box I found a manual "CJ0618" but my one is 14" long. Warco supplied an excellent, UK made, manual.
Most of the parts are the same as You show. The controll box is told to be American made so the controlls are differently situated. The geartrain for threading is all metall.
At the time 17:00 You adjust the cross slide nut. I wish You had told how You did it, how You thought. Using the lathe for some times adjustments are likely needed. Adjusting gib screws feels okey.
Time 35:45. Note the difference, between QCTP and the edge of the compund. When needed to lower tool holders extra they have to be milled off.
I've heard really good things about Warco, and they're definitely high up the list of places I'll go when I'm looking to upgrade to a bigger lathe for real work. (This Chinese lathe is for practice projects).
At 17:00 I'm not really doing anything too clever, or accurate. The centre screw pushes the nut down, the two on either side pull it up, so I was trying to get it straight along the lead screw, at the right height that the screw is parallel to the movement so it doesn't get stuck. All I did was fiddle with these screws until the cross-slide seemed to be able to run smoothly from end to end.
For the QCTP I haven't yet had a need to set the tool holder below the level, so haven't had to worry about that. I can see a need for it though. What tools in particular have you been using when you needed to do that?
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe So You're not giving the leadscrew a slight angle, in the axial respect, to lower play/backlash from the nut?
The toolholder I think of is a 250-007 part off holder. The blade is directed upwards. Parting of thick material the blade is sticking out more and more. Then the height of the cutting edge becomes higher and the holder had to be milled off by some 4 - 5 mm.
@@Stefan_Boerjesson No, I didn't think of setting the nut at an angle. Most of the backlash comes from the way the leadscrew flange is held by a pocket that is too large, so my first priority will be to fix that.
I see what you mean about the 250-007. I've never tried using it, but I've heard from others that it is very limited by the way the tool slopes up.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Thanks for the tip to check the play at the flange. The backlash has increased a bit.....
@@Stefan_Boerjesson I was planning to pack the flange with a couple of bronze washers, to make sure it can still move freely with way less slop.
Go to 2:32 and hit pause.......the two inner bolts are for leveling the blue assembly. Screwing them up through the bed will hold it level. When you tighten the
outer Allen screws it will pull downward locking the blue assemble level and tight against the inner bolts. I don't think those bolts are for the motor. .
The 2 screws that you thought were for the motor adjustment i believe they are meant for adjusting the headstock not the motor. They make up for the gap on the flat surfaces and perhaps some angular adjustment....
I'm absolutely certain that's not the case, because they line up with voids in the headstock casting. No matter how much they protrude above the bed, they can't affect the position of the headstock. On the other wise, if the motor is not supported from above, the belt tension causes it to flap around and vibrate, because the main mounting studs provide almost no vertical rigidity.
I read a few comments on chinese laithes, like the belt broke only after 2 weeks, the on and off swich blew off ecc. So I decided to build my own. After waching this video I know I made the right decision. My hat goes up to you for your effort and the time you took to do all this. Great job.
At 26:50, what did you do to unlock the apron from being stuck on the adjustment knob? That's the part I'm stuck on! Thanks!
At that point the lead screw was loosely in place, and free to move around. After I opened the half nuts, I had to nudge the lead screw until it was at the right height to pass through the half nuts without snagging.
Watching this makes me glad that I bought a Proxxon. That said I wish there was something inbetween price, size and power wise.
This project has certainly made me appreciate that I bought the Proxxon first. I would like the Proxxon to have a bit more power and torque though.
Me too, but I found a emco compact 8 copy at the right time
Yes!! I would also like to have a full cast iron lathe, instead of the aluminium slider
It makes me happy that I bought a Sherline... None of the issues that the Proxxon or the Sieg C2 have (In my opinion) :D
7:11 Maybe those bolts are for fine tuning the head stock instead of the motor ? Just thinking out loud. Thanks for sharing your adventures.
Check out my most recent video on the motor mount for exactly this question. The short answer is "no", but watch the video for more specifics.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I've seen it, so I blame my inadequate attention span for missing that lol. Thanks for the nice video's
What about phosphor bronze washers to take up the slack in the adjusters? They would hold oil and you could change the thickness to get all the backlash out and not be too tight.
Sounds worth a shot, if I can get hold of some bronze for a reasonable price. I'll put that on the quick project list.
I just ordered some 5/8" phosphor bronze from a model engineering supplies shop. On it soon.
Very detailed video. I have a similar lathe and will use your info to dial mine in.
One thing I already did was to replace the cap screws that hold the handles on the saddle and compound with stainless button head socket screws. The rounded head of these helps to keep from scrapping your knuckles in the cap screw head.
I recently received my chinese mini lathe, and it has the exact same feature where the headstock does not ride flat on the ways opposite the v-groove. However, after taking everything apart, cleaning things up, and reassembly, using a 0.002mm test indicator I've found that the headstock is within 0.01mm of being true to the ways in both axis and this is using the 3-jaw chuck and it's the chuck that has the small amount of runout, not the alignment. Yes, the head has a small tilt as a result of this, but not on an axis that matters in the least. The important thing, the v-grove runs almost perfectly parallel to the shaft in the headstock. Of course each person's mileage will vary with these lathes.. Someone commented that they must have gotten one of the laths that was built with all the reject parts.
Interesting. Good to hear that despite the issues the headstock is straight where it counts. Did you also find that the saddle has the same issues? One of my concerns is that the poor fit to the bed reduces the overall rigidity of the machine significantly, and tightening all four bolts holding the headstock would add a twist force to the bed.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe In my case I didn't find any issues where the bed warped when tightening the headstock. I put the most tension on the front and back bolts on the side where the v-grove is, and then just snugged up the opposite side which does not really sit flat on the bed just as your video shows. Once adjusting the lateral (x) adjustment on the tailstock I get a good alignment on the tail stock with the chuck. I suppose I got lucky on the Y axis (elevation) of the tailstock I think one way of fixing that if it doesn't align (hopefully it would fall too low) would be to run a shim to compensate along the back side of the head stock to get the proper Y alignment with the tail stock. The saddle (cross slide) seems to run true to the bed. It seems that the dimension between the top of the bed and the machined underside where the adjustment plates rub seem to be ok. I did find them a bit tricky to adjust properly.. I've seen a number of mods to the way they're configured on youtube. For now I've left mine stock. I noticed that both the plates had a slight curvature to them so they tended to come in contact with the underside of the ways on the ends. I found that adjusting the grub screws first and then tightening the center bolt first tended to flatten out the curve and then drawing up the two outside screws seems to work the best to get a good even tension on those places and increase the contact area. I get a nice smooth even drag on the cross slide all the way up and down the ways. In all of this I'm assuming that I just happened to get extremely lucky compared to what some others have received with this particular versions of the mini lathe.
Really like these type of videos. I was a mechanical fitter in my former years. I think I understand why you are doing this. I think there are several reasons. Firstly because you can, you want a better lathe. you need a project. So is this a cost-effective way to do it. That is not counting your time.
It's all those things, but it's also having some space to learn without worrying too much about the consequences.
Yes enjoyed the video very much, thank you for all your creative filming, editing, narrating, greatly appreciated :)
Thanks Ray, and thanks for watching!
The usefulness of this video can't be overstated! ;-)
It really exposes many of the down sides of these inexpensive lathes.
On the other hand it also open the doors for a lot of fine tunning and adjustments who can easily and cheaply turn it (no pun intended) into very capable machines.
Over the years I encounter these issues many times. Making an inexpensive machine a perfectly functional piece of equipment is mostly on the end user hands. ;-)
Cheers
dont know about you but $1000 doesnt seem inexpensive
How does someone assemble a lathe with so many parts that just doesn't fit together in the first place? I kind of want to believe it was manufactured on a production line in some kind of factory, and that it wasn't a one off design. So how did they end up with for instance all these pieces where the holes for the grub screws doesn't line up? What was that, four of these pieces for the different slides? And not one of them really fitting...
And that's just one of the problems with this lathe. Boggles my mind...
Question about the added grub screws added to align the flanges holding the slide to the bed. Won't these work their way out when the lathe is being used, or will they be secured with locking nuts or/and locktite when the fitting has been completed?
The bad fit is very frustrating. The gibs are the most obvious, and the most mysterious. I can only assume the design was changed at some point, but there were surplus parts, or the production specs weren't correctly updated.
I think you're right to be concerned about the grub screws in the hold-down plates, but those aren't a good long term solution anyway. There are a few ideas out there to improve this, from shimming the plates, to completely replacing them with tapered gibs.
Great video! I've had one of these for 10 years, they're great. I've done quite a bit to mine but still have more to do. if you ever take the saddle off again, open the half nuts then slide it off the end of the leadscrew and vice versa.
edit, I've just seen that you might not be able to take the leadscrew off the tailstock end, however you should be able to take off the 80t gear at the feed end and pull the leadscrew out through the control box and through the saddle.
Thanks for the edit, I was just about to ask about that. I've tried a few ways to take the overall leadscrew assembly apart, and I've not found an approach I'm happy with yet. I haven't removed the large plastic gears yet because they've been forced and tightened onto the shafts so hard they're cracked, and they may not survive the disassembly.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I think its a very common issue with these unfortunately, I cracked one of the 20t gears because the part which joins gears "B" and "C" together was too large, I made a new part from phosphor bronze to remedy the issue.
Arceurotrade sell a set of metal gears (part no 090-020-01800) which really are quite good, I bought mine in 2012 for £38, they have gone up in price but they are worth it in my opinion. The plastic gears which came with the lathe didn't give me any issues though to be fair.
On my lathe, the bearing blocks and leadscrew are three separate components, does yours not come apart? maybe try to clamp the leadscrew between two bits of wood, and see if that hex bit will unscrew.
If the right hand bearing block doesn't come off over the end of the leadscrew then your only option will be to bite the bullet and remove the gears if you need to remove the saddle again. Not that the saddle needs to come off regularly.
I would have liked to see how you re-mounted the chuck because after doing this myself on this type of lathe there is a bad loss of concentricity ever since🙁
That's not good, how bad is the runout? I didn't do anything special at all. I just placed the chuck onto the register, and threaded on the three nuts. Can your chuck shift slightly against the face plate if the nuts aren't quite tight? The inner diameter of the back of the chuck should be sitting snuggly on the spindle plate register, ensuring that it can't really move.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe the register has 0.1mm runout, the chuck 0.23 mm. Before removing the chuck it was much less I remember. However I guess the runout of the register was there before. I conclude that the manufacturer has a procedure to somehow set the combination register-chuck in a way that the flaws of the register can be egalized when fixing the chuck.
Glad I found this video again, I watched it way back when thinking of buying a mini lathe. I have now bought one that has had the control PCB blown, a common fault I understand, but that's no problem to me when I can buy it very cheap with little use. Whilst waiting for parts I will now strip it and follow you video, thanks.
Nice content, can't wait to see you start building new parts for it. thank you for your time to do these, Chuck
I really appreciate the video. My own mini lathe shares nearly all of the same issues, and I will be cleaning and aligning it just like you show. Thanks again.
Good luck! I'm sure it'll be worth the effort.
I see you had a problem with the gear shifter, it won't disconnect from the gears below. I had that same problem during my assembly.
I resolved it by pushing down the belt cover before tightening the cover screws.
I just got my mini lathe yesterday, and i disassemble it to clean and removed those factory applies lubricants.
Thank you for your 3 videos regarding this mini lathe. Your videos is a great help.
Your video is helping me a lot with my Mini Lathe. I like the improvements you are doing to the lathe!!!
I have a new mini lather and appreciate the video - thanks - Just one niggly point - by the time I got to 1:30 seconds I had already sat through two sets of 2 ads each by RUclips PLUS the sponsorship ad for skillshare - is getting to be too much. Keep the good content coming 🙂
Wow, that's annoying, thanks for the heads up. It looks like RUclips has automatically added a lot more mid-roll ad breaks than I realised. I've deleted most of them from this video, and gone through a bunch of others too. I do really appreciate the bit of ad revenue I get and it helps me fund more projects on this channel than I could otherwise do, but I don't want it to be annoying or pestering. Thanks for helping me improve this.
Can you do a video explaining how mount the gearbox and exchange to diferent threads?
I haven't gotten to grips with the gearbox on this lathe yet, but once I do I'll make a video about it.
Those Gib adjusting screws seem awfully long.
Wouldn't some short grub screws be better?
Well spotted, yes; I replaced them with shorter grub screws in my more recent video "Five Quick Mods to the CJ0618 7x12 Mini Lathe that Anyone Can Make"
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Just checked out the video.
It looks much better, but I still think the screws are a bit too long.
Another success. I can’t wait to see the videos on making the fixes. I may actually be able to clean mine now.
Great video.I would say that the best thing one can do to the mini lathe is to harden the bed because my lathe has some years using, and it needs repaired.
Tapered headstock bearings a must , as I have the same lathe. I had to shim my tail stock and spend sometime getting it on center along with indicating the barrel so it runs out straight. I recommend a halfway decent Quick change tool post not the eBay $40 aluminum Jobbie. OXA Wedge type tool post will do the job.
A steel OXA wedge type is the one I have. You should be able to see in this video at 35:42, but if not I did a review video which went through the installation.
I'm simply amazed at how many things that are wrong with this lathe. It will be super exciting to see you try and fix most of them. And very satisfying :D
I'll do my best to satisfy. :)
It seems to me that two screws with nuts should level headstock in proper position. Motor has threaded hole (for missing screw) on upper side for belt tensioning (10:16 in previous video).
The tone and cadence of your voice reminds me of my grade school shop teacher, Mr. Day. Thanks for the great video and keep up the great work. My son and I look forward to watching all your videos. Cheers.
Amazing job with the editing and filming, love your content!
I have a warco wm180. Its technically a mini lathe I guess. Im blown away about how capable these little lathes are. It also blows me away about how creative people can be making the most out of their tools.
Nicely done! Clear concise and well filmed.
Wow just Wow! It's like a representation of a lathe and it's anatomy but the parts that are there aren't really made to be used under any kind of working pressure.
This video just saved me hours. I just rebuilt/lapped the saddle and compound. These tips are invaluable. Thanks man!
wonderfull mate, u thought me a lot am an age pensioner,and i did maintained my lathe too, also i had to change my motor into 2 hp, BUT i use belt and 5 ways pullyies, easy for me, many thanks
are you sure the "spacer bolts" weren't meant to be used to jack the headstock into alignment? I have seen that kind of thing before. I agree that there are better solutions but that is quick and cheap so may have been the case here.
When I took the lathe apart, these bolts were resting against the top of the motor, and if the bolts aren't there, there is nothing to hold the motor steady against the tension in the drive belt. I also don't think they're in the right place to effectively support the headstock. If you go to 1:37 you can see that there are voids in the headstock, and I'm pretty sure they line up with where those bolts are.
I suspect a more effective way to quickly and easily fix the headstock height would be to use washers with the main fixing screws.
I absolutely thought the same thing and probably a ton of other ppl too. However. Without those two screws being the motor 'mount and align,' there's nothing else to do the *mount* thing. This is a brilliant design trick. The motor can overall diameter must be within a range. Important: there's no motor- or mfr-specific end bell geometry/holes/tabs/slots/whatever to adapt to! That yields a much wider range of possible motors. CON: the max motor power is limited, because the motor can itself becomes part of the structural chain of forces.
@@jimbarchuk I imagine they've been iterating the design of this lathe for many years, making small changes so they can manufacture them more cheaply, and expand compatibility with a greater range of parts for even more cost efficiency. I think you're absolutely right that this is a neat way of allowing almost any motor around the right size to be installed.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Another pro, align the motor shaft in parallel with the rest of the machine, so the belt doesn't lean to one side. I know you know this alignment stuff just wanted to point it out. A rigid, built in badly designed motor bracket could easily cause other alignments to be weird and hard to adjust, or force a certain motor style to be required. Less is often better.
Have you considered simply adding a washer of the right size within the saddle to reduce the backlash?
Yeah, already on it. Got some phosphor bronze to keep things moving smoothly.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Cool, what thickness ended up working for you? probably going to do the same to mine.
I've sometimes wondered which would be the easiest route to a small hobby lathe... either taking the Chinese route and needing to repair, restore and/or rebuild it.... or going Gingery and building the entire thing from scratch.......
I've watched some of those Gingery build project videos, and they seem to be pretty major commitments, and require quite a bit of expertise. I feel like the improvement work I'm doing is quite a bit easier.
Good job very informative. Did you think about repainting the lath body before you reassembled everything? Where did you get the multicolored Allen wrenches they were your go to wrenches for the lath Assembly and takedown, seemed like great tools for this type of work. Thanks again for the video!
Thanks! I'll definitely be repainting the lathe at some point, but it'll be much later in the overall improvement process, so the paint doesn't get damaged by the frequent disassembly and reassembly.
The allen wrenches are Wera, and many people call them the finest money can buy. You can get them from Amazon, or many other tool sellers. Beware of cheap imitations coloured to look the same.
I realize this video is 2 years old, but how is the 3-in-1 treating you? I'm using ISO68 hydraulic oil as recommended by the manual on my old Clausing.
I don't use 3in1 for day to day oiling. For the ways I use specially formulated slideway oil, which I also use for the other parts if they need oil. If I had more space I would get hydraulic or gearbox oil for the moving parts.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe my machine is a bit of a dinosaur compared to the current crop of import machines, circa 1950s 🤣
@@208Concepts BTW, the slideway oil I use is mobil vactra no. 1, in case that's useful information.
ON many of these gibs the design seems to be just to allow the centre one of the grub screws to engage in its detent for location, whilst the other screws just contact the gib itself.. The other detents may as well not be there, perhaps the gibs are used in other slides. Very common in Far east imports.
You will want to make a sheet metal shield for the apron gears to keep chips out of the gear teeth.
That sounds like a good plan, as they're totally exposed right now.
Onr of the first mods to the carriage is to replace the screws for the hold down plates with studs and shim packs. The shim packs keep the bars parrallel to the bed ways.
Thanks
Little Machine Shop in the US carries an extensive array of parts for the mini lathe.
Thanks
I've heard of them and they look great, but the shipping is sadly a bit prohibitive to where I am.
Adventures with a Very Small Lathe have you tried arc euro trade I get all my parts from them and it’s fast delivery hope it helps all the best stay safe
My 80+ year old lathe has shims that hold the cartridge slides off the bed so it doesn’t act like a clamp.
There are multiple shims of different sizes to you can add and remove them as the slides wear.
The apron is assembled first then the lead screw is inserted last. Not sure if that would help in your case
Interesting video. I’m surprised by the way the head stock fits on the bed.
Looking forward to seeing how you solve these problems.
So which one is better CJ0618 or Proxxon?
The Proxxon is way better built, but the CJ0618 is bigger, more powerful, and can be more fun if you want to be able to tinker with your machine.
Thank you!
Minute 18:42 : the spacing screws are used to get the saddle on slides without any gap. To be adjusted until saddle can freely run on guides without any gap, and not any friction due to the underside guides ( that is an antithesis ! ). I went on this work many years ago, when i bought my minilathe ( Einhell MTB 3000, very similar to the lathe been descripted ).
Believing guides were ok, i had to file just a bit ( only with thin sand paper ! ) on the underside, till i got no gap and no friction ( or . . . very little gap and costant friction ! ).
Untill today, it works ok, though i met in time other problems ( gear in the box broken, they were plastics ! and so on . . . ), . . . but i solved all . . . and i'm happy lathing . . .
There should be a dog point grub screw with a locking nut underneath the quill end of the tailstock casting. That stops rotation and over travel of the quill
thanks for the informative videos on the CJ 0618, i have recently bought one of these and have found many defects that need addressing. i have a question on the feed direction selector lever, does it have 2 indents or 3, mine has 2 and cannot select neutral, is your the same or do i need to drill an indent for neutral.
It has 3 indents, but neutral isn't in quite the right place.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe thanks for the reply, i guess i will have to try and drill an indent for neutral.
i have to say i am disappointed in the standard of machining on the lathe. when i unpacked it i went over it to check all nuts and bolts, i found a number of them quite loose but on tightening the spindle locked up due to misaligned drill holes, the missing indent that i mentioned and saddle, cross slide and compound faces that had to be deburred. still i enjoy a challenge and am working my way through it with the help of your videos. thank you.
Looks like the lead screw nut holes are also drilled off center on the cross slide!
Those two bolts above the motor are to align your head Chuck!!!!
Not stedy your motor!!!
I don't think that can be true, because they are lined up with voids in the headstock casting. No amount of adjusting to those bolts makes any difference to the headstock or chuck.
However without them there is nothing to keep the motor in place, or the belt tensioned.
On the previous video you asked for projet to do with that lathe, Can I propose a milling adaptor?
Hi. That motor wiring laying on the motor is unsafe. The insulation is going to chafe through - motors vibrate - and if you should have a protective conductor fault (earth) on the motor or in your house wiring you are at serious risk of a possibly fatal electric shock. Don’t use it like this. A sheath alone does not really help, that too will wear through, it will just take longer. Re-route the wires so they are in a sheath and crucially do not lay on the motor. Where cables pass through the casting there should be a rubber grommet for much the same reason. Stay safe. BobUK.
He has already said that the first upgrade project will be the motor mount and wiring .
@@steved8038 know-it-all! ;-)
My Mini lathe is almost exactly like this one in design. The tailstock is different, you have a much better locking to ways arrangement. I have a threading engagement wheel dial on my saddle My drive screw is 16T.
If ever you haven't already seen it, This Old Tony found that cone bearings in the headstock thing reduces chatter and noise by a lot.
Welcome back, I’ve been looking forward to this video.
The Aussie Shed channel has a playlist on improving a Chinese mini lathe, there may be some things of interest.
Keep up the good work.
Thanks! I've already included all of The Aussie Shed videos into my playlist. Unfortunately RUclips doesn't provide an easy way for me to share a link to the playlist, but you can find it on my channel page, on the playlists tab, "7" Lathe Improvements from all over RUclips".
@"Adventures with a Very Small Lathe"
at the end of the day, do you find this machine to be a better performer than the Proxxon?
It's definitely bigger, heavier, and more powerful, and if I was doing larger work, I'd prefer a machine this size, but it didn't arrive in nearly usable condition, and it's still a long way from being ready to do really good work. It's hard to predict how good it's going to be once I've improved it to my satisfaction.
Ahhh this brought back memories... the banjo bolt...
DId you find a way to get it straight? I can't work out a way to straighten this out well given the equipment I have available.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I shimmed it at the top of the bolt with a piece of copper.
thank you for those two excellent vid's of this type of (Chinese) 'cheap' lathe's. I'm curious if you had already a solution for the plastic wheels where on was broken/cracked while it was still new !
This Old Tony makes good video on how to change the head stock bearings to get less chatter
Thanks for the tip! I'm actually considering something he mentions in this video, but doesn't do: trying out anglular contact bearings instead of taper roller bearings.
Keep these videos coming. My crappy lathe arrives on Tuesday, and I'd like to get quite familiar with its shortcomings so I can use it to build a bigger/better one.
That's one interesting shot for me with the Leggo(tm) men, the traverse half-nuts on mine were only a single half-nut and bent bit of metal retaining. There was a plate chip-cover over the leadscrew which got in the way of having both nuts on. We had to get a new set because they snapped turning a thickish bit of mild steel so we ditched the cover and just use a paintbrush-sweeper and a lot of care..
I've ordered the bronze for the bush, yeah will be nice. Considering putting a couple of steppers on for a bit of computer-numerical-control and this should help. Or even turning it with just a battery-drill.
That's the only limitation for me of mine, the traverse just flies along too quick!
Great lockdown video, good work.
NEAL
I've never thought before but I suppose it can be a hobby in itself to get a broken old or badly made new machine and spend our free time trying to get it to run properly.... I've always considered these machines to be an inconvenience.... but it's a matter of perspective..... they can also be seen as many weeks of entertaining tinkering.
Another word for "hobby" is "pastime" :-)
you must be getting a bit wiser to recognize this. Ditto crappy musical instruments made to sound wonderful in the hands of a competent player... and yes, watching and commenting on youtube videos... and of course commenting on the comments.... whew!
Aren't those two hex bolts ruclips.net/video/z2_WWE000SY/видео.html for actually pushing up and positioning the headstock right and not just for resting against the motor?
Definitely not. They are lined up with voids in the headstock casting, so pushing the screws up has no effect at all on the headstock position.
Was worth the wait!
Thanks Ashley, that's good to hear.
Listen up everybody.......the guy who says that this lathe cannot cut steel doesn't know a toss about lathes or any machine for that matter......many years ago in 1966 I built a small lathe, 50mm centre height and 200mm between centres......that is a micro lathe without doubt but it cuts steel like cheese.........those that dispute it have never used a lathe......I still have and use this lathe and it still cuts steel........probably mainly due to the headstock bearings being taper roller......I use HSS all of the time, hand ground and a bit of carbide occasionally.
The biggest job it did was Morris Minor brake drums with the headstock raised up on a block to clear the bed.
主轴箱后方中间两颗螺丝（电机上方）不是用来限制电机位置的，那是用来调节主轴箱后方高度的😂
I recently bought a 7x14 mini lathe that looks a lot like yours (same design, paint colours &c) but Vevor branded and while I won't say it is perfect a lot of the things that made you think yours was from a batch that failed QC appear to have been done right so maybe they aren't all so bad. I just subscribed and I'm looking forward to seeing the improvements you make to yours and deciding which ones I should do too.
BTW, I see yours has the same red stripe down the bed that mine does. Any idea why that is the only red on the lathe?
Vevor seems to be the emerging big brand for low costs machine tools imported direct from China. I haven't had a chance to try their stuff yet, as every time I look at their site the tool I am interested in is out of stock.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Maybe I got lucky. When I ordered they had several models in stock; I picked the one I wanted and it shipped in a day or 2. Or maybe their Canadian warehouse is better at monitoring inventory than the UK branch.
@@SidecarBob The Canadian branch is probably better at _having_ inventory than the UK branch. It's not that easy to get imported stuff here any more. EU companies find the extra paperwork more trouble than it's worth, and the UK is a small market on its own.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe True, but there are almost twice as many people in the UK than there are in Canada so one would expect the market to be substantially larger too. If they are on top of things the UK warehouse should be bigger and better stocked.
Or perhaps the machines you wanted to try were just popular enough the weeks you tried to get them that stock was depleeted and not many lathes sold in Canada the week I ordered mine.
@@SidecarBob I think I was assuming they coordinate warehousing across North America, but I don't really know enough about NAFTA to know if that's practical.
Thank you for your videos, I have just bought the same lathe and with your videos I feel I know so much more about my new toy! Regards
@9.20. Theres a small crack in the housing just below the RH attaching screw. A stop drill now will probably prevent this from propagating until you have time to fix it properly.
Edit: just spotted this is a year old!😁
I've hunted through the video, and I can't find what you mean. Can you give me a timecode, or a more complete description of which housing the crack is in, and which attaching screw?
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe
Ok, if you stop the video at 9.46.
Right where you are installing the attaching screw with the Philip's screwdriver.directly below the screwdriver head theres a small crack in the housing.
@@manin10 Ah, got it. Nice catch, thanks!
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe
No probs. I bought a little Crenex and did the same as you, probably not as good as you did as I just fixed things as they effected what I was doing. One thing that did help was when I removed an item I used low strength loctite when I reassembled.and I fitted a vacuum attachment which helps remove a lot of the swarf. I'm an aoro engineer and know very little about machining. Uploads like this help!
I would have thought that those "Spacer bolts" are actually supposed to be used in a push pull arrangement to level the headstock.
Personally, I would say the 'motor adjusting bolts' are really to compensate for the incorrect head to slideway assembly and should be used to adjust head-stock level and parallel to bed? Not a very good solution but better than having things clamped at an angle
They could be used for that, but then there would be nothing to keep the motor stable, and tension the drive belt. Without them the motor is very unstable, and the belt tension would likely eventually rip the mounting screws out of their heads.
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe I've got an EMCO 7x12 and it doesn't have the 'motor adjuster bolts' which is why I speculated they are to adjust head-stock.
The bolts haven't torn out of motor in the 17 years or so I've had it (which actually surprises me as they are only inserted 2~3 threads) I very rarely machine steel on it though, usually 6061 or bronze plus stainless steel a few times. It's done a lot of things much too big for it
I recently purchased a can of 3-IN-ONE oil, just as you are using here. In my youth, I seem to recall, it was much thicker - less runny - than it is now. I see the 3-IN-ONE you are using here tends to run out just like mine, making a mess rather than staying where you want it. I feel it is tending more toward a "penetrating oil" than a lubricant. The name 3-IN-ONE has changed hands many times over the years, and it just isn't what it used to be. Sadly, I find this to be true of many other products as well.
Hi/Lo gears. Witch position do you us most?
Sadly my model doesn't have that feature. Single ratio, and the gear train is just used to drive the feed screw.
At least your using the best allen keys money can buy.
Best thing i ever done was junk one of them lathes. For a newbie they are more than enough to turn anyone away, for a few quid more could have a proper lathe secondhand.
Sir we have the same lathe and i am planning on adding a chuck with adapter on the opposite end of the spindle making it 2 chucks at both end. Dou you know what exactly the parts i need to buy and the rigit size?
Sorry, I've never looked into making a modification like that.
What brand of hex wrenches are you using?
Wera
Kind of painful watching you put it back together without fixing any of those faults, but I understand 🙂
If I waited until I'd fixed all the faults before making another video, it'd be a couple of years before it came out. It'll come apart and go back together many times before we're done.
Adventures with a Very Small Lathe and no locktite.
@@gordon6029 I'm guessing because "It'll come apart and go back together many times before we're done.".
@@AdventureswithaVerySmallLathe Still, wouldn't this be the last part in a "chinese lathe fault fixing series"? If there is going to be a series, that is? :)
@@ScinnerNo1 yes, Days of Our Lathe
very helpful video. I'm waiting for new china lathe.... Needs a similar adjust.
I wonder if all of the Seig lathes come with these defects or, as mentioned in the prior video, this was "special" case. I already know these things come covered with cosmoline and you have to disassemble and clean all of it.
I have this lathe in a 7 x 14. do you know where I can get a Follow Rest for it?
I've been able to buy a follow rest for the Sieg C2, but it does not fit this lathe. Real Bull lathes have the hole positions on the saddle in different places.
How much this cost the mini Lathe Machine I am interested?
I paid £330.
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Excellent work :D both on the lath and on the video
Coal to diamond? Maybe, but the process is where the fun lies. Thanks for sharing the journey!
It's too bad you didn't show your final adjustments on the cross slide lead screw nut. It's a very tedious process of getting the right vertical position of the nut so as to allow for smooth feeding and getting the right tilt of the nut to eliminate backlash. I just adjusted mine and the chatter I was experiencing has virtually disappeared.
Assembly and fitting of a chinese lathe kit. Even at chinese labor rates, that labor would make these pretty expensive. Mine still has a few random problems.
With just about everything being "Made In China" these days it is important to remember that everything is built to a price. If Harbour Freight ask Chinese suppliers to make lathes to a price point the manufacturer can only do so by cutting corners/quality if he is to stay in business. Even decent mini lathes like Warco are made in China I believe, they just have a different price-point and insist on consistent quality. I have one of these Chinese Mini lathes and yes in some areas it is sadly lacking in quality and yes I will need to do things to make it better, but that is part of the fun too.
These are lathes, they are kits. The only reason to own one is as a YT creator, many of your viewers own one. I'm wondering if one will fall into my lap at some point in the future. I must admit to curiosity and watching many videos on them. Liked.
Useful information for any one with a small lathe, although the one I have is similar but not identical