Treadle Lathe

[Russell Neyman]

One of our club members says he'd like to make a foot-powered treadle lathe. Anyone know of plans or articles on the subject? Or where to purchase the hardware?

[John K Jordan]

One of our club members says he'd like to make a foot-powered treadle lathe. Anyone know of plans or articles on the subject? Or where to purchase the hardware?


He might want to do a Google search. I searched for "treadle lathe plans" and got pages of articles, videos, and books.

JKJ

[Ralph Boumenot]

Bob Easton made a treadle lathe. You can find the blog posts at BobEaston dot com. He also was selling a PDF of all the lathe blog posts as one all inclusive package.

[Brice Rogers]

I was at the Goodwill store a month ago and I saw the bottom of an old singer sewing machine. All cast iron and made to last a couple hundred years (or more). Nearly indestructable. I pushed on the treadle with my foot and the wheel started rotating. I recall that it had a ratchet mechanism so that the wheel only went in one direction as the treadle went back and forth. Of course, that is what you'd want on a working lathe. I recall that the price was pretty cheap - - something under either $50 or $75.

If the OP could find an old singer treadle mechanism, it would appear to be very easy to rig it up to drive a smaller lathe. I kind of recall that there was a big pulley for a vee belt. So there is pretty minor complexity to make this work.

I looked on Craig's list and saw eight local treadles ranging from about $85 to about 300. A few still had the sewing machine on the top but about half were only the lower portion (which is what you'd want). So I suspect that it would be pretty easy to pick up that assembly quite reasonably.

[Jim Underwood]

Fine Woodworking has a pretty nice looking Treadle Lathe in their book Making and Modifying Machines.
I made the flywheel for it, but never got any further...

[Allan Ferguson]

Check Roy Underhill, Plans for spring pole and treadle lathes. See Aug 2016 Popular Woodworking mag, 2 articles on the spring pole. Roy hosted "The Woodwright's Shop". I have his spring pole lathe stacked in a corner of my shop.

[Marvin Hasenak]

I would do like Brice suggested, find an old treadle sewing machine base that is intact. Then look for an old iron, cast iron mini lathe that is in working order. A 6" by 18" is more than big enough for a treadle lathe. Anything bigger and you will probably need a bigger heavier flywheel to keep the momentum up.
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Another option is to find an old Beaver lathe like this one. Small enough that the sewing machine wheel will have enough weight to keep up the momentum.
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[Ralph Lindberg]

Have him get in touch with me, I own one.

[Glenn C Roberts]

Here's one in central New York for $600

http://ithaca.craigslist.org/tls/5634242477.html

[Reed Gray]

A friend made one with an old sewing machine. You need a fly wheel. He ended up using a brake drum since it is round and balanced. The type of treadle on the sewing machine, for me left a lot to be desired in efficiency. The rocking back and forth with your ankle is not as good as the up and down type, or my preference would be a bicycle type. There was one of those set up at the AAW Symposium, but I don't have pictures.

robo hippy

[Mark AJ Allen]

I was at the Goodwill store a month ago and I saw the bottom of an old singer sewing machine. All cast iron and made to last a couple hundred years (or more). Nearly indestructable. I pushed on the treadle with my foot and the wheel started rotating. I recall that it had a ratchet mechanism so that the wheel only went in one direction as the treadle went back and forth. Of course, that is what you'd want on a working lathe. I recall that the price was pretty cheap - - something under either $50 or $75.

If the OP could find an old singer treadle mechanism, it would appear to be very easy to rig it up to drive a smaller lathe. I kind of recall that there was a big pulley for a vee belt. So there is pretty minor complexity to make this work.

I looked on Craig's list and saw eight local treadles ranging from about $85 to about 300. A few still had the sewing machine on the top but about half were only the lower portion (which is what you'd want). So I suspect that it would be pretty easy to pick up that assembly quite reasonably.

Turning anything but pens on a lathe with a sewing machine treadle will be difficult; the flywheel doesn't have enough mass to keep the inertia through the cutting. I know, I've tried it. I suppose someone clever and skilled enough could add weight to the flywheel, or replace it with something else much heavier if they want to turn larger pieces.

[Ralph Lindberg]

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