What do you make with your lathe and mill that's not tooling, a jig or fixture, but something that is useful to the average person?

To some extent, having the means to make things is a comfort in itself, as is acquiring the skills involved. To the practical application, the tools are a means to an end, which varies with the interests and opportunities one encounters. For example, I joined the local railroad museum and offered my services as a machinist. I recently spent over a year with two others, restoring a narrow-gauge locomotive. I repaired or recreated a number of parts and in some cases made parts that had not existed before, but were improvements on the originals. Quite satisfying, to be able to learn new skills and see them successfully applied. And I think that satisfaction is the end result, whether one makes models or clocks or piles of chips and enjoys doing it.
 
This has been a great thread. I was once accused by a former spouse of only making tools but when I pointed out that the tools I've made have allowed me to do X, Y or Z task around the house, yard, vehicle the conversation was pretty much over.

Note that the above is in the past tense. My partner recently asked if I needed/wanted a TIG welder. She's the best. And she doesn't buy expensive clothes, jewellery or the like. :D
 
My very first lathe project was making a screw on gas cap for my tractor. Does that count?
I also made a brass doohickey to match one that came off wife’s shoe, getting warmer?
Repaired the handle on a glass pot lid...it was cute, with a thermal break to control heat flow.
And finally I made a dozen Delrin feet to replace ones that fell off our fancy Italian stovetop grates. That’s about it I guess.
The rest is stuff average people, even above average people, would have no interest in. A calorimeter, an automatic glass lapper, lots of fixtures, jigs and punches for various also uninteresting projects, millions of bushings, spacers, shafts, etc. Maybe I exaggerate the numbers a bit, but it feels like it. Every day there is something, it seems.
 
My first lathe project was using a wood lathe to trim some bushings I ordered of wrong size for fixing my truck saging doors. It was very hard, but I fixed it good. I think I used an angle grinder as cutting blade.

Later on, I made a pulley wheel for a home made crane.

I trimmed some car wheel adapters since I couldn't buy the correct size. Most of the work involved making holders for cutting those rings.

Another project was trimming down a weld of stainless to regular steel rod for my gate. The stainless goes underground where water is all the time. I could also buy longer stainless rod, but I didn't.

Most of the stuffs I made was to make or fix tools that are used to fix things like cars or around the house.

My wife often said why not buy a new/er truck or milling machine so I don't have to spend too much time fixing them.
 
Used the mill to resurfaced a clutch throw out lever for the Cub Cadet 126 I am working on after welding the worn areas.
A few minutes with an end mill and a file saved about $50, the price of a new one.
 

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You will get the question "What do you do with all those tools." Metalworking tools. I have made or modified may things over the years. Couldn't get my hobby machinist content to post some pics I uploaded here.

What I say about it sometimes is: "Most guys have the standard wood working tools. They think of something needed and how they can make it with the wood working tools they have. I have all that as well. But I also have METAL WORKING tools and when seeing something that needs to be fixed or made I can also think about how to do it with the metal working tools."
 
I’m sad to say that most of my projects for “average” people have been paper weights and door stops. Those weren’t their intended purposes when I made them, but if you drop in on folks unannounced, you find out all sorts of things.

Seriously, most of what I’ve made are tools and fittings for my mill or lathe... carriage stop, quill stop, DI holder, tramming tool, etc. Plus a few reloading gizmos. And my first project, a machinist’s bolt puzzle. Most recent project was a couple of 6160 spacers, just thick washers really, to level out a crooked office chair seat that listed to port. When people ask me why I have a lathe and a mill, I tell them I have a lathe to make things for the mill and a mill to make things for the lathe. What else would they be good for? ;)

Tom
 
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