Russianwolf
Member
Over the last couple months I've had several people talk to me about my duplicator (not really used for pen making, but a time saver in rounding things and for repairing furniture), so here is what I did.
Okay, so I bought the G0462 lathe which is a 16x42 lathe and later decided to get a duplicator to put on it. Problem, Grizzly only makes a duplicator for the G1495 which is a 14x40 lathe. I called them and no they didn't offer an adapter kit and the Vega unit runs $650-800. So after doing some searching on the web, I did find a guy that had put the Griz unit on his 16 inch lathe to make drum sticks so I knew it was possible and ordered the unit from Griz at $350.
When the package arrive, I knew it was a quality unit as it weighed about 100 pounds by itself. I decided that I didn't want to attach, detach this thing all the time to I would put it on the back side of the lathe (I knew this was possible on the Vega units, and after getting the Griz in show saw that it could be also).
In order to put it on the back side, I would have to boost the unit up to the center line of the 16 incher and flip the cutter tool so that the cutter faced down (remember on the back side of a lathe, the piece is rotating from the bottom up, unless you have a fancy lathe with a reverse switch)
Flipping the tool is easy, just a hex nut to loosen, flip the cutter and re-tighten.
In order to raise the cutter to the right height I needed to raise it by about 1 inch for the difference in height of the spindle, but also about 5/8ths for the flipped cutter (yep, you might have forgotten that bit of the equation). So I had a piece of Padauk laying around that is plenty dense enough, and I ran to the hardware store and got a couple more bolts since I knew the ones included wouldn't be long enough, and wouldn't you know that they didn't have any either. So I grabs some that I thought would work.
So back at the shop I cut my padauk into a two pieces about 1 and 5/8 inches thick, 2 inches wide and plenty long enough. I drilled a hole in each to mount it to the attachment brackets that go on the bed ways, and then figured out the placement of a second hole to attach the duplicator spaced about an inch or so from the other hole. It took some fiddling, but I got everything where I wanted it.
Here are a couple quick pics showing both the front and mounting risers. You;ll notice that with the tailstock in close for pens, the banjo has to be behind it, so the swing banjo is definitely needed. If I'm working on a longer piece, I have to move the tailstock and banjo around. no big deal as one you get the duplicator dialed in so that its parallel to the bed, you don't want to move it any more.
Okay, so I bought the G0462 lathe which is a 16x42 lathe and later decided to get a duplicator to put on it. Problem, Grizzly only makes a duplicator for the G1495 which is a 14x40 lathe. I called them and no they didn't offer an adapter kit and the Vega unit runs $650-800. So after doing some searching on the web, I did find a guy that had put the Griz unit on his 16 inch lathe to make drum sticks so I knew it was possible and ordered the unit from Griz at $350.
When the package arrive, I knew it was a quality unit as it weighed about 100 pounds by itself. I decided that I didn't want to attach, detach this thing all the time to I would put it on the back side of the lathe (I knew this was possible on the Vega units, and after getting the Griz in show saw that it could be also).
In order to put it on the back side, I would have to boost the unit up to the center line of the 16 incher and flip the cutter tool so that the cutter faced down (remember on the back side of a lathe, the piece is rotating from the bottom up, unless you have a fancy lathe with a reverse switch)
Flipping the tool is easy, just a hex nut to loosen, flip the cutter and re-tighten.
In order to raise the cutter to the right height I needed to raise it by about 1 inch for the difference in height of the spindle, but also about 5/8ths for the flipped cutter (yep, you might have forgotten that bit of the equation). So I had a piece of Padauk laying around that is plenty dense enough, and I ran to the hardware store and got a couple more bolts since I knew the ones included wouldn't be long enough, and wouldn't you know that they didn't have any either. So I grabs some that I thought would work.
So back at the shop I cut my padauk into a two pieces about 1 and 5/8 inches thick, 2 inches wide and plenty long enough. I drilled a hole in each to mount it to the attachment brackets that go on the bed ways, and then figured out the placement of a second hole to attach the duplicator spaced about an inch or so from the other hole. It took some fiddling, but I got everything where I wanted it.
Here are a couple quick pics showing both the front and mounting risers. You;ll notice that with the tailstock in close for pens, the banjo has to be behind it, so the swing banjo is definitely needed. If I'm working on a longer piece, I have to move the tailstock and banjo around. no big deal as one you get the duplicator dialed in so that its parallel to the bed, you don't want to move it any more.
