I'm looking for my first lathe for turning fairly small parts. Thread-cutting is essential. It won't be production work so doesn't need to be super-fast either - light cuts are acceptable. I don't have a lot of space so I've been looking at some of the 300mm benchtop "mini-lathes" that I understand are all descended from a single Chinese design. It seems these have been improved significantly in the 10 years or more since they first arrived on the scene.
Out of all the ones I've looked at - Clarke, Axminster/Sieg, Sealey, Warco - the Warco stands out due to:
Slightly lower price
400W motor instead of the 250-300W the others offer
Digital RPM display
Reported better quality than many of the other mini-lathes and they make a big thing of using US drive electronics instead of the Chinese stuff that got a bad reputation for reliability on the early mini-lathes.
It is also available in two versions - with either metric or imperial thread-cutting as standard. All the others I can find are imperial as standard. I will be using metric, primarily, so this would initially save a (very) few quid on buying an optional metric gearset and the hassle of changing over.
Bearing in mind my requirements, any comments on this lathe? Any alternatives to look at?
Out of all the ones I've looked at - Clarke, Axminster/Sieg, Sealey, Warco - the Warco stands out due to:
Slightly lower price
400W motor instead of the 250-300W the others offer
Digital RPM display
Reported better quality than many of the other mini-lathes and they make a big thing of using US drive electronics instead of the Chinese stuff that got a bad reputation for reliability on the early mini-lathes.
It is also available in two versions - with either metric or imperial thread-cutting as standard. All the others I can find are imperial as standard. I will be using metric, primarily, so this would initially save a (very) few quid on buying an optional metric gearset and the hassle of changing over.
Bearing in mind my requirements, any comments on this lathe? Any alternatives to look at?