After a gazillion revisions I finally got to mount my 3D printed handwheels on my mini lathe (MJ-189, Emco Unimat 4 clone) and try them out.
It’s great to have resettable dials which the originals lacked and the larger size really improve the surface finish. I am using carbide tools on aluminum so mirror like finish isn’t to be expected but with the new handwheels in place it is much easier to maintain a constant feed and surface finish is actually beyond my expectations.
I’m not sure about Emco. I got my lathe used recently and the model was sold new around 2001 here in Sweden.
Lathes named Unimat do exist new from a company called thecooltool (duh…)
But they look more like toys or very low end entry models even compared to my little lathe which can handle quite a bit if handled accordingly.
The thing about the real/clone Unimats from the time is that unless you get lucky accessories are pretty expensive and can be hard to find compared to other machines in the segment on the current market. If I’d start over from scratch I’d probably look at a Taig/Peatol (with larger spindle bore upgrade and brushless motor), Proxxon or Sherline. Proxxon seem most capable out of the box but Taig/Peatol sure is the most hackable/extendable and most value for money of the three.
@Anders_Larsson I’ve started tinkering a bit with Fusion 360 and I like it but I keep coming back to OpenSCAD for most of my projects since I know it moderately well while I am quite lost in Fusion 360. It all boils down to having the time to play with it of course.
Right now I am cleaning up my OpenSCAD source. I’m not going to be a perfectionist about it because then it would never be ready but I need it to be in a state where I can at least understand it in a few months time
I’ll probably publish the files within a few days.
