Connected the camera to the computer last night, so here's an update on the world's slowest lathe rehab.
Tailstock was badly worn, but two separate e-bay purchases has it working nicely. I replaced the broken hand wheel, and found a used barrel with good threads at a good price. The tailstock will require shimming to height, but it's nice and tight now.
I also found a really nice 4 jaw chuck from a fellow up in Jersey.
I had to jack up the pedestal base, and thought I'd use something nicer than a paver block and a chunk of wood. Just happened to have a small plastic tub that matched the base OD perfectly. I had a bunch of old mortar mix, so....
The motor and VFD have been bench tested, and the 3/4 HP motor squeezed into it's new home. It's a 3 phase D56 frame. The motor J box interfered with the adjustment hardware, so it had to be padded up a bit.
I'm still working the electric box. I decided to make it up out of small hot rolled shapes on hand. Not sure if I just wanted the cutting, fitting and welding practice, or if I'm just too darn cheep. Trying to keep the enclosure small, but the layout is turning into somewhat of a Rubic's Cube. Still some welding to finish up the frame. I hope it works out to be sort of a clamshell design, with the face of the VFD exposed when the door is opened (the vertical frame in the pic will be the back of the box). I did buy the remote keypad with the VFD, so maybe I'm just getting silly. Hopefully it works out and doesn't end up in the scrap bin.
Another year or two and this thing will be done!