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Gunsmithing What lathe for the home gunsmith?

TresMon

TresMon

Gunny Sergeant
Full Member
Minuteman
Dec 3, 2007
1,241
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NW USA
I know what lathes I love & prefer in the industry.($$$$$) But I'm going to try to come up with an affordable lathe to put in my garage. What is out there- the most bang for the buck?

I'm familiar with Grizzly's, the Birmingham's, etc. Whats the best value currently?

Thanks,
T
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

From the little I've looked into it, Grizly offers a gunsmith lathe with the tooling needed for such work. It looks to be very reasonable.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Are you wanting a new one? If not good used ones are to be had cheap. Ive checked out several on craigslist. But got there to late.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Got a little Logan 24" here for small jobs and it works great. Older lathes in good condition will usually do better and last longer than a lot of the newer import lathes. Lathes and other shop tools were usually made much stronger and heavier when they shipped by rail instead of boat
frown.gif
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?


Thanks guys. I'm a career machinist. I might just have to high of expectations.
I know a lathe is not a Jig bore or jig grinder, but some of the tolerance & test specs on the grizzly lathes(etc) are just a little too sloppy for my taste.

But I can't afford a new Harding either and most don't thread. I guess I need to get over it. What my wallet is is what my wallet is!

I'm looking into every suggestion, please keep them coming.
Big thanks!
Tres
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Monarch EE!! but then I'm spoiled. This topic was bashed about maybe a year ago. Most sided with the imports, a few old grey haired B'tards balked. With the disintegration of the U.S. economy older machine tools are being scrapped, SCRAPPED!
I would be looking for an old tool room lathe. Heavy,dependable,accurate, many of them didn't see the heavy day to day use of the production machines, and some had skilled operators not blacksmiths using them.
on a side note my double E weighs about #4000, make sure your garage floor is up to it. Good luck!
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

We too are looking at lathes. Mills as well, but I digress.

For us, it has come down to importing either a set of Grizzly's or Precision Mathews. The one and ONLY dealer that we have in this fair city is for Haas. Totally out of our league and budget.

Now with the adage of "one uses a handgun to fight towards a rifle,,,," then we are now thinking that "one uses an import to build their business towards Haas necessity". That work?

Overly simplistic I know, but that is the intent.

And seeing as I personally have NO experience with handling/viewing/operating either of these two brands, we are at a crossroads. All of the equipment that I have used, from '70's era Ta Shing (read CRAP) to totally rebuilding,then programming and operating a MOOG Hydrapoint (NC-tickertape) with quite the gamut in between, which way do we go?

There's a few things we'd like to do that just can't be done on a drill press, and 'farming it out' just isn't an option either, so... which one does one just "go buy"?

Not trying to hijack this thread, but actually trying to exemplify it, and take it further. In the hopes of having some ACTUAL KNOWLEDGEABLE INPUT as well, as opposed to here-say.

It's either these:
Grizzly Lathe G0709
Grizzly Mill G3617

Or these:
Precision Mathews lathe PM1340
Precision Mathews mill PM939

So, for those with some pertinent knowledge of either of these offerings, I know we (and others) would like to hear it. Would be different if there was one in the area for us to go see, but that is not the case.

Standing by,,,
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

I've been building customs on Smithy's and Precision Matthews now for years. Both are more than adaquate to preform all operations necessary to build extremely high accuracy weapons.

What ever you go with, make sure you budget for DRO's. Really makes for repeatabile accuracy. You won't regret it. I've built guns for years without DRO's and I really can't believe the difference the DRO makes.

Big thing is with less quality machines, make sure they are mounted solidly and level to the extreme.

Hope this helped.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

The #1 gun guru in my area runs a Jet lathe. They have a belt drive model for ~$1300.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

I just ordered a Grizzly G0709 yesterday, will update after it gets here. Looking forward to getting my hands on it.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: GardDog223</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The #1 gun guru in my area runs a Jet lathe. They have a belt drive model for ~$1300.</div></div>

the old dego up in Independance??
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

I think for someone at home wanting to learn how to use a lathe a Grizzly is fine. Someone trying to make some money should choose a bit wiser. Most will find the headstock huge if you are chambering thru the headstock. They fill a gap in the market so someone can afford a lathe, but there are better choices. Most of the Chinese imports are all the same, just a different name, paint and stickers. My father in law has a older grizzly precision model and i believe it was made in Taiwan. It is night and day different than the Chinese lathes. It was also about 7k. Their "gunsmith" lathe is nothing more than a standard lathe with a spider built into the spindle liner out back. The threads are silly thin and we had ours almost stripped out within a barrel or two. 26" was the shortest barrel we could make with the larger gunsmith lathe (again about 7k but not near as nice as the older Taiwan lathe). The smaller gunsmith lathe is right up there with something from harbor freight. I wouldn't take one if you gave it to me. Im not saying you cant make a accurate gun with one, just saying there are better choices for about the same money or maybe just a bit more.

I posted a link to a Hardinge above. You can find them all the time for around 5k. There is a reason they sell newer for allot of money. They are a very nice lathe, but only if you chamber thru the headstock.

With the two lathes mentioned above you are either choosing a Mac truck or a Ferrari and you have a long curvy road ahead of you.

A Haas is a cnc lathe and if you have enough barrel work to do or want a prototyping lathe is a great thing. We just got a TL1 a few months ago. It builds titanium barrel nuts for me and will be transitioned to a barrel lathe if/when we start producing complete rifles. For now it is ok. You can do much better if you are looking for a production part making machine. Haas is the very bottom of the barrel if you are talking real cnc's. The purpose this lathe serves is a good one. Don't plan on using it like a manual lathe though. In the life of a machine tool Haas is the most expensive to own because the don't last as long, generally have more down time per year (time is money) and are worth nothing when just a few years old.

If its a toy then it doesn't mater, get whatever you want and learn the tool. If you need it to make a living then you need to be looking at ROI (return on investment) instead of trying to decide if 3k more for a way better machine is going to make or break you.

I would not buy a Chinese mill. Very much different than a lathe. I got a used Bridgeport off of ebay for 1500 with a DRO and power feed.
This would be light years better than the grizzly and i only looked on ebay for 2 seconds.
http://cgi.ebay.com/Bridgeport-1j-9x42-M...a#ht_500wt_1156

 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

We sure have had better luck with used mills for gunsmithing and bad luck with used lathes for gunsmithing.

We have finally wound up with Jet and Precision Matthews lathes... straight from China. Like driving to work in a new compact Hyundai, no status, but it is getting the job done.

I am willing to rebuild an old American mill, put in new spindle bearings and adjust the pre load.

I do not want to take apart any more old American lathe gear boxes.

Just give me a new lathe from China that is not worn out yet.

I have a 1938 Atlas 12x36 lathe that has almost no wear. But that is the exception. Most of the old lathes in that size range are already at some gunsmith's house, or rightfully headed to the scrap yard.

God grant me the serenity
to <span style="text-decoration: line-through">accept</span><span style="color: #FF6666">avoid</span> the <span style="text-decoration: line-through">things</span><span style="color: #FF6666">lathes</span> I cannot <span style="text-decoration: line-through">change</span> <span style="color: #FF6666">fix</span>;
courage to <span style="text-decoration: line-through">change</span><span style="color: #FF6666">buy</span> the <span style="text-decoration: line-through">things</span><span style="color: #FF6666">new lathes </span>I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

I do all my rifle-building in my gunsmith shop on a G4016 lathe. It's easy to take up and take down (I had to move my shop once) and has done long range target rifles and hunting rifles (as well as several AR barrel configurations). The army AMU test fired one of my rifles and it fired 1/2 MOA at 800 yards. There are ways to indicate and cut/chamber barrels and true actions on the basic lathe that does a greta job.

Consider one of these. You don't NEED the gunsmith lathe from Grizzly (it just has alot of bells and whistles that the CEO of grizzly deemed "needed" for his benchrest hobby).

Let me know if you want some input on moving from general machining into rifle-building. Would be glad to provide input.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

ACER lathes are what Colorado School of Trades is using to teach gunsmithing machine shop on. They're pretty good for the cash.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: mountaineerjdm</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I do all my rifle-building in my gunsmith shop on a G4016 lathe. It's easy to take up and take down (I had to move my shop once) and has done long range target rifles and hunting rifles (as well as several AR barrel configurations). The army AMU test fired one of my rifles and it fired 1/2 MOA at 800 yards. There are ways to indicate and cut/chamber barrels and true actions on the basic lathe that does a greta job.

Consider one of these. You don't NEED the gunsmith lathe from Grizzly (it just has alot of bells and whistles that the CEO of grizzly deemed "needed" for his benchrest hobby).

Let me know if you want some input on moving from general machining into rifle-building. Would be glad to provide input. </div></div>

You are correct. Most of the time its the user that makes the difference and not some elitist who can only work on a name brand machine to create good shooting rifles.

The gunsmith series of lathes came about as a result of discussions with my gunsmith, Gordy Gritters, who chambers all my match guns and has also built some World Record setting rifles. He gave me a laundry list of what would make it nice to have on a lathe from the factory so that guys could just start chambering rifles. We have sold hundreds and hundreds of these lathes, both the beginner model as well as the heavy G0509G. All of our "gunsmith" lathes have Japanese spindle bearings that do make a difference in spindle runout. They also feature outboard spindle "spider" bolts. These bolts are not meant to be reefed upon. They are for support and fine adjustment. In fact, they are particularly handy in making the final runout adjustment from the back, rather than at the chuck.

By the way - I do not shoot Benchrest - never have. I shoot F-Class and shot at the last F-Class world championship in England in 2009 for the US Team using two barrels that were chambered by Gordy at the SHOT show on a Grizzly lathe. Came back with five medals, including one Gold, so the chamberings must have been good!

 
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Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

The relationship between lathe radial run out and rifle accuracy is even smaller than the relationship between glass bedding and accuracy. It is even smaller than the $million per moa I calculate below. It is bounded by that line.

Here is my shpeal from 3 days ago on another forum on this Ford vs Chevy topic of Chinese vs expensive gunsmithing lathes:

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The relationship between a lathe's accuracy and a long range hunting rifle's accuracy is tenuous at best.

If my 7mmRemMag chamber that is 0.0050" off center of the lathe when done, shoots 0.75" groups at 100 yards, then the difference between a $3K Chinese lathe that has 0.0005" runout and a $75k Monarch that has 0.00003" run out, is ...


$75K - $3K = $72K cost change
[.0005"] [.75"]/[.005"] = .075" Chinese group size
[.00003][.75]/[.005"] = .0045" Monarch group size
.075" Chinese group - .0045" Monarch group = .0705" group improvement with Monarch
[$72K Monarch upgrade]/ [.0705" Monarch group improvement] = $1,021,276.60 per moa improvement.

What does it all mean?
Ammo concentricity is important, as the ammo is inserted with random rotational orientation, but chamber concentricity has constant rotational orientation, and so is less important. <span style="color: #FF0000">This often confuses gunsmiths</span>, and they dial in both ends of a barrel to get the bore concentric and parallel with the lathe spindle to within .0001".

I have done it.
Don't fall for that accuracy ritual.
You can get beat at the range in a match with someone who chambered on a drill press. </div></div>

What does it all mean?
Not only is there no place for me to invoice for this engineering, old gunsmiths do not want to hear that they have been wasting their time and their customer's money, selling superfluous jewelry like machining with no significant effect on accuracy.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Its obvious that you can make about any kind of lathe cut a barrel good enough to be competitive. Especially with floating reamer holders and good tooling. Its also obvious that most have not been around higher end equipment that will save you time <span style="color: #FF0000">(your labor = money) and last longer.</span>. Sometimes for lower cost than Chinese..
If the above group sizes were even remotely accurate data i can guarantee you 100% that the .070 group size difference is the difference between 1st and 10th (or worse) place at a 100yd BR shoot. The same argument can be made about a BSA scope vs a Leupold. Why doesn't everyone shoot BSA and save the money?
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

How much faster? Last how much longer?

If BSA scopes cost $3k and Leupold scopes cost $75k, I would own fewer Leupold scopes.

What does it all mean?
Numbers matter in reality, not in the world of aesthetics, where many people make decisions.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: TresMon</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
I know what lathes I love & prefer in the industry.($$$$$) But I'm going to try to come up with an affordable lathe to put in my garage. What is out there- the most bang for the buck?

I'm familiar with Grizzly's, the Birmingham's, etc. Whats the best value currently?

Thanks,
T </div></div>


I'm out in left field a bit in my choice of equipment. If a guy were to scour, dig, and be very shrewd I think he'd find a CNC in decent enough shape that would work.

Once you have one, you'll wonder how you lived without it.

lathe programming is pretty simple as your generally dealing in only two axis. Tell the machine the tool, the offset, what direction/rpm on the spindle and then connect the dots so to speak.

Good luck.

C
 
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Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Value is relevant to what a consumer is willing to pay for said item and how that item fills your needs.

I have one of Grizzly's combo mill/lathe machines,G9729. Does everything I need to do for my home smithing work and then some. Not one problem yet. Good equipment. Solid as it's namesake. You can't go wrong with a Grizz. Plus.... it's home grown.



Cheers, Cheech
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

@ papGrizzly

Just relaized i wrote down Benchrest from your commnets. I meant F-class and had benchrest on the mind from another posting when I was writing that. Completely apologize.

I actually kept track of those F-class events and was very impressed with your awards. I have to say that probably 1/2 of my equipment is Grizzly brand and it has done incredibly well by me.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

I just picked up a Jet 14 x 40 off of CraigsList for $750 and it was in pretty good shape, I had to get some tooling and should be making chips late this week. I had a machinist friend of mine check the lathe out and he was impressed with the lathe and price.

wade
 
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Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

You cant compare a Hardinge Tool room lathe to a Grizzly. Thats like a porsche compared to a toyota.

Buy the largest, best condition rigid bed lathe you can afford. Thankfully larger manual lathes come cheaper than small precision lathes.

Speak to a specialist reseller who will be able to guide you.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

My PM1236 has served me well. The DRO and coolant system was definitely worth getting.
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

For small work; bolt handles and the like, I would recommend nothing smaller than one of these -

reallybiglathe.jpg
 
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

Well, we started to make chips with the Jet that I mentioned above and life could be better. At $750 the lathe may not have been a good buy, as any cutting while turning or facing caused quite a bit of bucking. It was able to bore withoyt the heavy vibration that turning and facing caused but the finish was not great.

Something must not be tight to cause those vibrations. The spindle seems tight when we mounted a 1.25" round steel bar in the 3 jaw and used to check how much play was caused when we applied force to the end.

Anyway, I am looking for suggestions on what path a noobie like myself should try to fix mhis problem.

Thanks

wade
 
Interesting reading. I've been eyeing the Grizzlies, myself. I have one of their mini lathes that I bought several years ago to play with and get familiar with machining. I was planning on just hobby stuff for myself and family, not for business.

I keep hearing "Go find yourself an old American lathe and rebuild it". To me, that sounds like a ton of work. As someone without years of experience with old lathes, I have no clue what to look for, but even if I did, it seems like a lot of work driving around finding one that checks out, then even more work trying to find parts or whatever you might need to get it running. That's where the attraction to new lathes comes from. It's been a while since I've read up on new vs. old, but 2 years ago when I was looking, I was pretty sold on one of the Grizz models.
 
kombayotch said:
Re: What lathe for the home gunsmith?

My PM1236 has served me well. The DRO and coolant system was definitely worth getting.
Click to expand...
Does PM1236 has limitation on how long the barrel is? Can it chamber and threading on 7 inch to 35 inch barrel? Thanks
 
Last edited:
acg said:
Does PM1236 has limitation on how long the barrel is? Can it chamber and threading on 7 inch to 35 inch barrel? Thanks
Click to expand...
You just need to make extension bars for the short barrels, then you can put them through the headstock. Internally thread one side for the chamber side and the other side for the barrel muzzle thread. For and AR, just machine internally for the barrel extension and thread the outside for a barrel nut. No lathe is going to be able to let you work on a 7" barrel through the headstock without some kind of extension or jig. Some people will do these with the steady rest outside of the headstock though. I prefer inside with a simple extension jig.
 
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I have a G0709 and the bore is over 1.5". Good if you also plan on building silencers for yourself. It is a purpose built gunsmith lathe.
 
You need at least a 12x36 with a 1.5 spindle bore or larger. You want a quick change gear box. I highly recommend getting a DRO, it makes life easier.
I use a Precision Mathews 1340GT, it's robust enough for everyday use. I get great results with it on muzzle threads rebarrels, prefit barrels and bolt handle threads. I taper and contour barrels on it. I'm very pleased with it.
 
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Grizzly, Jet, & Shop Fox all make good stuff for personal use. Grizzly and Jet are commercial companies, so their stuff ranges from residential to mass-production commercial equipment.
 
A couple of things to keep in mind. 1) the tooling is going to cost more than the machine. Start slow. 2) To all the folks saying old American iron. Where are you going to get parts? I have a 14" Logan, 1963. Owned by two hobbyists. absolutely perfect. And you can still get parts from Logan. Try that with Southbend. But for the money today, the Taiwan made Precision Mathews. Watch Youtube, a lot.
 
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I have had the Grizzly 12x36" G4003 (I think it's probably their most popular and common metal lathe) since 2000. In all that time, the only problem I ever had with it was a motor overload protection module went out recently. Grizzly support was good at helping resolve the issue. For the money, I don't think you can beat it. There's also a "gunsmith" G4003G version, which is $1000 more, has a 0.010" larger bore, spider mount (I made my own with a drill and a tap), claimed better bearings, and claimed shipping weight is about 300 pounds more. I don't know what the additional weight is from, as all the other specs seem to be the same as the G4003.

I have seen the PM, mainly heavily promoted in YouTube videos by a guy called gavintoobe and his Ultimate Reloader channel. To me, the PM looked about like the G4003 and seemed to me to be essentially the same lathe as the G4003/G4003G for about the same money. I think he got the PM either free or discounted in exchange for promoting it.

Another nice thing about the G4003 is that, in a world of frequently discontinued models, the G4003 has stood the test of time and has been available for many years, and probably will remain so for many more. I have many Grizzly machines, and never any problems with any of them. Excellent USA customer service, too. Back when I bought my G4003, the manual for it was poor, B&W, and very skimpy. They say their new manuals are all full color and written by Americans.

And yes, you will end up with more (perhaps considerably more) in tooling than in your machine

I also recently put a DRO on both my G4003 and a few years ago on my Grizzly mill. I HIGHLY recommend them. Source is
https://www.dropros.com/
Easy installation, with outstanding directions, both written and videos, all done by Americans in real American English. Excellent customer service. It greatly improved my accuracy and ease of use on both machines.

And finally, here's an excellent video about the founder of Grizzly. A true American success story and a fascinating and talented person:
 
cvuxton said:
A couple of things to keep in mind. 1) the tooling is going to cost more than the machine. Start slow. 2) To all the folks saying old American iron. Where are you going to get parts? I have a 14" Logan, 1963. Owned by two hobbyists. absolutely perfect. And you can still get parts from Logan. Try that with Southbend. But for the money today, the Taiwan made Precision Mathews. Watch Youtube, a lot.
Click to expand...
I agree with half of what you say here. For someone just wanting a hobby lathe that works. I agree, go with Taiwan lathes to get the best bang for the buck. Just do the research on which ones are good. PM and Jet come to mind here.

For anyone interested in old American iron - AFAIK South Bend is still in business. Grizzly Industrial is their distributor and handles replacement parts for Southbend. Monarch is still in business and they were (may still be, one would have to call and ask) making replacement parts for Lodge and Shipley lathes. Leblonde and Cincinnati are still in business. Clausing Colchester is still in Business and servicing their old machinery. Warner Swasey is out of business, but a quick google search found a few companies making replacement parts for those as well. Hardinge is still going strong, and as a side note, they bought Bridgeport. Hendey, Standard Modern, American Pacemaker all have their own aftermarket niche support. Companies that can grind Lathe beds, manufacture lead screws, make necessary spindles and gears, etc... are out there and not hard to find.
 
About six years ago I was struggling to find a decent lathe for barrel work . Most I looked at were badly worn in terrible shape or priced out of my price range . If anything was reasonably price it sold immediately with backup buyers waiting.

A good friend that taught me how to run a lathe sold me his second machine a Sheldon model . Great lathe lots of thread options and a 1.400 thru hole in the spindle . This machine was a school lathe missing parts when he bought it and had lots of marks from being crashed . It was good enough to build rifles but the half nuts had ton of slop and the ways were worn right in front of the chuck . I really didn't have the time to restore it and after looking at options I bought a Precision Mathews PM1440GT .
Very happy with it all the issues I was having threads and chambering disappeared . Last week I barreled a Howa with metric threads something I couldn't do with he Sheldon . Having a DRO is a must have I fine myself looking around on the Sheldon for a readout .
 
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