Last Saturday, I went over to Albany, NY to the Harbor Freight Retail store. I wanted to look at their T34706 Variable speed lathe (it looked very similar to the Jet 1236 in their catalog and nearly 1/2 the price as well) to see if it was decent or just plain junk. Well, in my opinion it was decent and also was on sale for $188.95; so I bought it. Since I am an evening and weekend woodworker, it will fit my needs rather well. I bought the 2-year extended warranty as well, since the motors from China are always suspect.
Anyway, I assembled it on Sunday and with the day off Monday, I made 5 pens with it. I also tried out my new PSI scroll chuck and bottle stopper screw chuck and they run rather true on it, so I should have a good learning lathe to get started with. (A friend of mine has a vintage Delta lathe in storage that he said I can have for free [no motor] when we can get to the storage building later in hte spring)
Well, anyway, I know that HF gets a bad rap at times, but I think I did quite well to get a lathe that I can turn some bowls on for under $250.00 including the extended warranty and tax. I think I will enjoy this lathe (I know it isn't a Vega, Jet, Delta, Powermatic, Oneway or Stubby - but it didn't cost me an arm and a leg to figure out if I like to turn things other than pens or bottle stoppers either!) and if it turns out that I'd like to try bigger stuff it will give me an excuse to do more tool shopping! :D
Below are a couple of pictures of my new lathe!