# Gingery Lathe



## Radneck (Jun 23, 2018)

My fist post 

This is a Gingery lathe I built about 20 years ago




I pretty much built the whole thing with minimum departures from the book.  I used the furnace setup as described in the "Charcoal Foundry" book (1st in the "Build Your Own Metalworking Shop From Scrap" series).  I think there are 20 or so castings here.  You can see by the tailstock that I didnt quite finish it.  Note the belt wheels on the headstock, the were cast then machined on the lathe





this shows the line boring operation on the headstock




This shows the line boring operation on the tailstock...  lesson learned of referencing the head and tail to the same ways




This shows the cross slide assembly.  When I started out I tried Gingery's blue ink and scraper method to flatten the mating surfaces.  This method made a colossal mess !  I chickened out and used a friend's Rong Fu mill to flatten everthing out






Does the Gingery lathe work ?  Absolutely !  Above shows some test cuts on a mild steel bar...




This is an assortment of mandrels, arbors, and boring bars I made in the course of the project.

I learned a LOT in the course of this project.  
Being from Texas I wasnt exposed to a lot of heavy industry growing up, so the concept of the foundry were very cool to learn (and suprisingly easy to implement)
Ill never forget how even on a 100 degree day I could definitely feel the heat from a pot of molten aluminum 5 feet away

I probably would have gone further with the project but the issues of putting a MT1 taper on the tailstock were not very straightforward.  Plus, around that time I bought a Birmingham 14 x 40 lathe and all the goodies

It sits in my office now...  a great conversational prop with the other engineers


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## easttex (Jun 23, 2018)

That's outstanding. Thank you for sharing.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk


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## savarin (Jun 23, 2018)

Very nice job. I finished one for a friend and almost finished mine but got tired of waiting and purchased a 9x20.
All my castings are finished and scraped in just need the apron and fittings to finish.
i cant even find anyone to give it away to.


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## markba633csi (Jun 23, 2018)

I think you did quite nicely- especially those step pulleys- outstanding!


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## Radneck (Jun 23, 2018)

markba633csi said:


> I think you did quite nicely- especially those step pulleys- outstanding!


Thanks for the complement... I bought the step pulley as per Mr. Gingery's instruction


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## Smithdoor (Jun 23, 2018)

Radneck said:


> My fist post
> 
> This is a Gingery lathe I built about 20 years ago
> 
> ...


Looks great
Looks like fun to build

Dave

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J320A using Tapatalk


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## Aaron_W (Jun 24, 2018)

That is neat, and interesting timing. I just ordered the 7 book set from Gingery yesterday and have been curious if anybody really builds on of these things.

I didn't buy the books so much to build a 7x12 lathe as I did just for the ideas. I am thinking about building the charcoal foundry though.


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## savarin (Jun 24, 2018)

The charcoal foundry is dead simple, a hair dryer is powerful enough to drive it and can be altered to use propane in a couple of mins.
BUT
dont do what I did and have the air inlet tube lower than the floor of the foundry in case you spill molten aluminium and it runs down the tube and explodes the hair dryer.
(Explosion is a bit of an exaggeration)


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## hman (Jun 24, 2018)

Sounds like ALL KINDS of fun!


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## silverhawk (Jun 24, 2018)

Aaron_W said:


> That is neat, and interesting timing. I just ordered the 7 book set from Gingery yesterday and have been curious if anybody really builds on of these things.
> 
> I didn't buy the books so much to build a 7x12 lathe as I did just for the ideas. I am thinking about building the charcoal foundry though.



Yes, they do. See makercise on YouTube for the lathe, or PGS for the mill. Makercise is currently doing a shaper.


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## brino (Jun 24, 2018)

@Radneck,

Welcome to the Hobby-Machinist!

Nice job on the Gingery lathe. No doubt that you learned much from that exercise.

-brino


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## Aaron_W (Jun 27, 2018)

silverhawk said:


> Yes, they do. See makercise on YouTube for the lathe, or PGS for the mill. Makercise is currently doing a shaper.



I finally got a chance to follow up those links, very interesting to follow along, Thanks.


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