@Beantown
Congratulations! Enjoy adventure!
I don't think you will regret getting the PM1440GT. I like mine! Of course, there is always some other feature or knob that one lusts for! I also have an old South Bend 10" Heavy, which needs some TLC, but I still use it a lot. The one thing about it, compared to the 1440, that I prever is the Norton gear box with its 10x7=70 TPI/feed positions. I think the PM1340 also has a Norton box, but I don't think it has this many positions. Also from what I have heard the 1340 has kind of a splash oil system and it tends to leak. I do not find that my PM1440GT leaks at all.
By the way, PM service has been fantastic. These guys have been very helpful and responsive to me. So I buy from them knowing that if there is something wrong they will figure it out, and probably fix it, or try to help you do so.
As far as speeds are concerned. I don't know who it is that runs an 8 inch chuck at >2000 rpm. On the other hand my VFD set up lets me run my 1440GT right down to a few(<5) rpm. I am not for sure there is a lot of power down at these speeds, but sometimes these low speeds are handy. Also, if I recall correctly the Hitachi VFD Jog feature runs at 6Hz so this is already 1/10 that of 60Hz. Combining this with the low speed gearing and the spindle is hardly turning. This is unimportant for most folks, but handy if you are winding things like electrical wire coils, springs, .... or even fishing reels!
On most of the lathes (independent of supplier), the manuals are a bit sketchy or even non-existent. Only a few of the possible TPI, Feed, and X-Feed settings are provided in the manual or on the lathe plates. The X-feed rates are seldom accurate. After you get your 1440GT you may find you would like to know what other TPI etc values you can obtain with all of those knobs and external gears. I wondered and so wrote an excel spread sheet / workbook to generate them ALL. I designed it for my PM1440GT, but then extended to to several of other lathes. Anyway it is all set up for the PM1440GT and can be used manually to find a single value or by using the built in macros to automatically generate a table of select or all of the possibilities. Other macros allows you to search the large table for exact or approximate values. I posted it on HM and so it is available to everyone here:
Grab the first zipped file if you want the version with the macros already installed. There is also a tab with a Readme file to help explain the workbook and macro operations.
Dave L.
