I started turning around 11yrs ago but I wouldn't say "I've been turning for 11yrs", two young children and a list of other hobbies have meant that I seem to spend time at the lathe in pockets here and there. I'm hoping that my current "pocket" stretches into more of a regular thing; I have a bit of nice source material stacked out in the yard and my youngest has shown interest in spending some time in the shop and learning to do projects with me. So I finally pulled the trigger on a couple of items that have already made my time at the lathe more enjoyable. The first is something that I've been wanting for a long time but could never justify - a vacuum chuck. Seeing info here on the Frugal Vacuum system pushed me to put in an order and I'm glad I did. I had a couple of bowls that I needed to finish the bottom on including a natural edge that wouldn't have fit in my old donut chuck. Fire up the vac and peel away the tenon...so nice. The other is something I didn't know I needed until you guys enlightened me - a set of CBN wheels for the grinder. I ordered a 180/350 pair from Ken and all I can say is "wow". I used to drag out my cuts until they became terrible because I didn't want to deal with the wear on the friable wheels. Now whenever I'm not getting a nice shaving I go spend 10sec on the 350 and I'm back at it; no checking for flatness or dressing the wheel. Plus I haven't burned myself a single time checking for a burr . I've noticed significantly less dust mixed in with the shavings I'm cleaning off the shop floor and realizing just how bad I was letting the gouge edge get before....the surface that 350 puts on helps too. I was sheer scraping the outside of a maple bowl last weekend and the shavings were so fine they were like high quality wool!
This isn't really a gloat or anything like that since I paid full price for everything, but more of a nudge to anyone that might be on the fence about products like these. Take the plunge on some accessories that free you up from the maintenance/setup tasks and spend that time on the wood instead!
Peter