A Cool Garage Sale Find...

[TruckJunkie]

Saw this at a garage sale/estate sale a couple weeks back, wish I had the disposable income and room for it. It is a homemade wood lathe with all hand turned handles and many homemade accessories. The man who made it used to restore old wood boats for a hobby. His heirs were asking $300 for it, but were not sure they wanted to sell it, just did not have room to set it up at their place.

 

[automobiliben]

That is sweet! I wonder why it has so much swing as I wouldn't want to get something all that out of round on it. Was there weight added anywhere or concrete?

 

[Jarhead0408]

I know it's alot of block wood. but I just got to say "Cool, they lathed their own lathe"
Couldn't help myself.

Here's another "What came first? the lathe? or the lathe lathe?"

Annnnnd I'm done. My apologies for anyone who wasted time reading my post.

 

[TruckJunkie]

Something interesting about the guy who built this...

Jarhead - you should appreciate this, the guy who built this was a Marine who fought in the Pacific during WWII, I have his uniform. I knew him growing up and remember many of his stories.

 

[David W]

That's a cool truck in your avatar. Do you have any pics posted here or elsewhere?

 

[RivennHewn]

Looks very cool, but I'd put a dial indicator on it and check for run out.

 

[TruckJunkie]

David - That is my '66 Dodge W500 which I bought from the Michigan DNR several years ago. They used it for fighting forest fires and the body is armored for dragging a large V-plow throught the woods to create fire breaks and it was also equipped with a 400 gallon water tank with a high pressure John Bean pump powered by a Wisconsin motor. It is one of about 350 W500s built with a 318 V8 in '66. It was used as an example of the W500 in the book 'Dodge Power Wagon Photo History' by Monty Montgomery.

Rivennhewn - It would not be difficult to fix any runout situation, if any exists, but I just love the looks of it and would consider it more of a decoration. With the wide base it has, the lam-beam bed and glued up head and tailstocks, it is very heavy and should be quite stable for a wood machine.

 

[RivennHewn]

I would consider it a treasure, and a great find.

 

[TruckJunkie]

Automobiliben - It is very heavy as it is, have never seen it run, but have no doubt it is quite stable, the man who built and used it turned out awesome work restoring old boats and furniture.