Craftsman tube-lathemobile

[Rob Miller]

So, I've been working on an old 1980-ish vintage Craftsman tube lathe my dad had in his woodshop. It's mounted to a Craftsman lathe bench with drawers, etc. Since I'm pretty much a noob I have just been running it on the slowest speed. I had rough-turned a bowl enough to get the wobble out so I decided to try it a little faster and put the belt in the third position, i.e. the one next to the fastest. Turned on the lathe, and holy crap, man! The whole darned bench started walking across the shop floor! Now I know why the Powermatic weighs in at something like 660 lbs. What does it take to stabilize this thing!?

[Dennis Nagle]

That was my first lathe. I put a shelf on it and put 6 bags of sand on it. My current lather weighs 4008 lbs.

[Dennis Ford]

Some weight can help stabilize a lathe, I am guessing that your bench with drawers is fairly heavy (if not put a few bags of sand in it). There is a point of diminishing returns here; putting 600 lbs of weight on a 60 lb lathe does NOT make it equal to a Powermatic (or even 1/3 of equal). When the lathe starts shaking, you are turning too fast for that lathe. Stopping the shaking by adding weight is a recipe for destroying the lathe and/or injury.

[John Brown]

Dennis Nagle,
What kind of a lathe do you have that weighs 4008 lbs.?
Post a picture please.

[Dennis Nagle]

Here you go. It is an 1956 Oliver 20D. 30" swing inboard, 84" swing outboard, 78" between centers.


http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a60/djnagle/010_zpse9058a7c.jpg (http://s9.photobucket.com/user/djnagle/media/010_zpse9058a7c.jpg.html)

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a60/djnagle/008_zps0880af20.jpg (http://s9.photobucket.com/user/djnagle/media/008_zps0880af20.jpg.html)

[Dennis Nagle]

The sand really helped my lathe Dennis. Before I added it, any little vibration would set it walking. I agree that it is going two fast in this case.


Some weight can help stabilize a lathe, I am guessing that your bench with drawers is fairly heavy (if not put a few bags of sand in it). There is a point of diminishing returns here; putting 600 lbs of weight on a 60 lb lathe does NOT make it equal to a Powermatic (or even 1/3 of equal). When the lathe starts shaking, you are turning too fast for that lathe. Stopping the shaking by adding weight is a recipe for destroying the lathe and/or injury.