Of you have pushed the limits of the G0733 lathe in terms of diameter & turning at the end of the ways & bigger than 18". From what I understand most items bigger than 12"-14" are hard to sell & also hard to find a place to store. Most big turnings end up as wall hangings, table center pieces, in museums etc The biggest item I've turned on my old delta double duty lathe has been 17" diameter a lazy Susan for the table. The way I see it having a bigger lathe just makes it so that your not limited if the big piece should ever come along. Thanks for your response.
Bart, my biggest diameter piece to date was a platter.........16.5 inches. That is big, but I just acquired a fairly large sycamore crotch and want to make a platter from it. I do not have an outboard tool rest set up as of yet, ........I don't have room at the end of my bed for one [ I am really cramped for space in my shop] but I would like to figure out a way to do it, because I could get a 20" platter out of this crotch piece. Not sure it will happen however.........I have thought about just using a pipe suspended between 2x4's.........it would work, but I will have to move a big tool chest out of the corner in order to do it........that means pushing my table saw and other tools to one end of my shop as well...........I am not sure if it is worth it or not.
I do not think there is any issue with the G0698 or the G0733 handling a large piece........providing it was a balanced blank.
Bart Leech wrote: [snip]The way I see it having a bigger lathe just makes it so that your not limited if the big piece should ever come along.[snip] That about sums it up for me, as well. The biggest I've turned on the G0733 is 17-1/2" with several Cherry and Black Walnut bowls, and that was over the ways. Last year I added the outboard extension that's available from Busy Bee in Canada for their Craftex CX802, their 18-47 version of the G0733. About US$100 with shipping: http://www.busybeetools.com/products...FOR-CX802.html
The Busy Bee extension is not a color match, but 10 minutes with some Grizzly touch-up paint fixed that. Still haven't used it for anything big, although I have some larger blanks waiting when the spirit moves me. It extends the swing to 30", but is not the beefiest add-on. Once I get to it, I'll stay with shallow platters and light cuts at the larger diameters. A couple years ago, one of our members reviewed the extension: http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthre...oard-Extension Here's a related thread on outboard turning: http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthre...l-Test-Options David
