What height to prevent crouching over

[Dueane Hicks]

Like most older folk; I get a lot of back pain if I hunch over to see inside of a bowl while turning. How high is it safe to raise up a lathe so your not hunching over?

[John K Jordan]

Like most older folk; I get a lot of back pain if I hunch over to see inside of a bowl while turning. How high is it safe to raise up a lathe so your not hunching over?

Good question. Most advice for general use is to have the centerline of the headstock spindle a the height of your elbow, with the arm bent. This may be too high or too low for a specific person, what they turn (spindles, lidded boxes, bowls, hollow forms, platters?), and the way they like to work. You can test different heights by putting the lathe legs up on wooden blocks. (I used to cut blocks and use a forstner bit to make a recess to hold the pad on the adjuster. (I used to be 6'1" but with age I'm now 5'11" so a slightly lower lathe is fine now.

Another thing I often do to see the inside of a bowl is turn with the lathe in reverse. This keeps me from bending over the lathe to peer at the tool in action.

Another thing some people do for bowls and hollow forms is to turn outboard, on most lathes now that means sliding the headstock down to the end of the bed and standing directly at the end. This also puts you out of the line of fire in case of a mess up.

JKJ

[Roger Chandler]

I heard a professional turner in Hawaii say he has his center line about nipple line on his chest. That keeps him from bending over too much. For me, elbow height or maybe 2 inches above is a great place to be at.

[Brice Rogers]

I located my lathe so that I could access both sides. So when I'm going a bowl and can't easily see the inside edge (for example), I just walk around the lathe and cut from the other side.

[bob pfohler]

I located my lathe so that I could access both sides. So when I'm going a bowl and can't easily see the inside edge (for example), I just walk around the lathe and cut from the other side.
Who needs a lathe with reverse.

[John K Jordan]

Who needs a lathe with reverse.

I certainly appreciate reverse. For one thing, I put my lathes close to walls for some very good reasons, at least good reasons for me, how I like to work, and the things I lilke to make.

427655

I use reverse for sanding spindles by hand and some scraping with hand scrapers too. With reverse, the sanding dust is directed directly to the dust collector pickup.

427657

JKJ

[Pat Scott]

I heard a professional turner in Hawaii say he has his center line about nipple line on his chest. That keeps him from bending over too much. For me, elbow height or maybe 2 inches above is a great place to be at.

Was that Kelly Dunn? He has back problems and has to have his lathe that high. He has to turn pretty much standing straight up.

[Dueane Hicks]

My wife says "crouching turner, hidden back pain!"