Thread: My new lathe
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  #69  
Old 21-06-2020, 05:45 PM
dikman (Richard)
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Join Date: May 2019
Location: Adelaide
Posts: 292
I just found this thread, very interesting bojan. There are two versions of what is commonly referred to as the Chinese mini-lathe. Yours is the slightly bigger, and supposedly better, version. A chap on another forum I'm on bought the same one you did and had no problems with it. I bought the smaller, more common version. My controller lasted two weeks! The seller couldn't supply a replacement board, which I asked for. I won't go into the details but I fought long and hard with them (and ebay and Paypal) and got nowhere! In the end I bought a stand-alone controller off ebay ($30) and fitted it to the lathe. It's been fine since then.



I spent time on mine taking out high spots on the ways, smoothing and adjusting the slides, modified the compound slide so I don't have to remove it to change the angle and fitted a tacho. There's lots of info on the 'net about these lathes and the controllers. The best option for these lathes is to replace the motor and controller with a 3-phase motor and VFD as this is their weak point.


I was extremely annoyed with the dealer I bought this off so bought another one! My intention was to replace the controller and then send the faulty lathe back for a refund. Long story short after three months fighting with ebay and paypal and after involving the Australian finance authorities Paypal grudgingly gave me a refund (and I kept the lathe).


A bit of advice to anyone buying off ebay, if you have problems only use ebay to fight any claims, paypal policies are NOT consumer friendly and once you seek help from paypal ebay will no longer help you.


My little lathe is very useful for working with small items, much better than trying to work with small stuff on the bigger lathe.
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