Parcel reception:
The lathe arrived well packed and protected. A surprise though: I expected a lathe made in the UK but the country of origin is:….China. Well! lets see how things are.
Unpacking:
No surprise there, all non painted surfaces are well protected with a no rust oil.
As a supplement to the original spur and live centres (black) I was well surprised to find very good quality ones nicely machined.
At first sight the machine looks sturdy and well designed.
Getting acquainted:
As I am unpacking all parts within the box, I find that the pulleys plastic cover is broken on the right hinge. Soon contacted, Axminster ordered a replacement right away that arrived a few days later.
Reading the instruction book I came through the belt replacement process and failed to understand it. I contacted Axminter who helped me on that: the description in the book is not really appropriate and, though it is not something you do every day, I suggested a correction in the hand book.
Testing the motor, I am agreeably surprised with the high torque provided by the motor and the variable drive.
Getting prepared for turning:
First I made a stand bolted against a wall to use as little space as possible in my little workshop. Here I regretted that no indication for the correct height is given in the hand book.
Now here is the list of my findings and/or suggestions.
• Spindle indexing: I noticed the absence of a mark on the frame to indicate the position. This is easily overcome with a marker mark but It would be nicer if it was part of the deal (photo).
• Pulley misalignment: running the motor I noticed the belt jumped to the left producing a whistling noise. I realised that the top and bottom pulleys were misaligned. Correcting the problem was not a big deal but I had to move the lower pulley about 2 mm to the right.
• The writing "axminter professional" shows the bottom part of the first S detached from the body (photo).
• The pulley lid hinge screws are not at all secured and could come loose with vibration. A little threadlocker would avoid that.
• Tailstock guide: the tailstock had too much lateral play on the bed. I could solve that by gluing with epoxy, either side of the guides, 0,08 mm shims.
• Tailstock quill: rotation of the quill is blocked by mean of a tiny key (not shown on the parts list) held in place with a hexagonal screw which, as for the pulley lid hinges, is not secured and could come loose.
General impression:
The general design and manufacturing are quite satisfactory but, unfortunately, quality control is not the best part of this lathe.
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