How Do You Build A Wood Turning Lathe?
A wood turning lathe rotates a piece of wood mounted between two fixed points. The wood is shaped by tools held against the rotating wood and finished with sand paper. While commercial wood turning lathes are available, a homemade version can be constructed by do-it-yourselfers with some advanced skills. Build a base for the turning lathe from two pieces of iron channels. Channels, basically U-shaped pieces of iron, are bolted together with the open tops of the channels facing each other. Spacers on the bolts hold the two channels apart to form an opening along the top of the base. Mount the head of the turning lathe at the left end of the metal base. Mount three or four pulleys on the shaft of the head unit of the lathe. Mounted to the spindle of the shaft of the head unit is the chuck or face plate. The center of the shaft of the head unit should be 6 inches above the base. Assemble the tail unit of the lathe. This unit sits on the other end of the base and is adjusted along the slot