Has anyone here tried any of Dave Gingery's books and actually built something?
http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/djgbk/index.html
I've got some of his books I bought years ago but have never gotten around to seriously building a lathe, mill, band saw, etc.
I know a bunch of people (online) who have built his, or a variant of, his lathe. Its typically regarded as a slightly less than perfect lathe, but for the bucks (if youre a hobby metal caster like me), you cant beat the price. I have a bunch of ideas for one myself.
Ive also met (online) a guy who built a Gingery dividing head that worked perfectly.
Theres a yahoo group for gingery machinists.
In reply to 4cylndrfury:
What kinds of metals can you cast?
Technically, i have the capacity to reach stainless temps, but Im really only comfortable with my current handling equipment to go up to brass/bronze, and of course aluminum
With the price and availability of offshore built machinery, the gingery stuff really isn't worth the time and effort.
If you're building it for the experience, that's a different story.
Shawn
I hoped this thread was about a book about red-headed chicks 
Trans_Maro wrote:With the price and availability of offshore built machinery, the gingery stuff really isn't worth the time and effort.
If you're building it for the experience, that's a different story.
Shawn
Oh yeah, even if you have a pretty great selection of machining tools, youre likely to build a slightly less than mediocre tool at best. But , youre very likely to learn a metric crap-ton of tips and processes that you never new about, or at least figure out a better way to do something than you knew how to do before you started.
Plus its friggin cool to shift a gear selector topped with a shift knob you milled out of a blank of aluminum you cast, on a machine you built from scratch, from parts you cast...at least thats what Im hoping 
