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12 – Housing the moving bits and making it look nice

Because wood turning creates a decent amount of dust and wood debris, the motor will need encasing and protecting. Same applies to main bearings and drive belt. It is important to cover away the drive belt anyway – exposed it presents an intolerable safety risk. I still wanted to keep an eye on what was going on inside while the lathe was running though, so the plan was to find some thickish perspex to cover the top. See the pics.
I have a stainless panel, taken form a microwave, which I will cut down to size. Here I am using some cardboard to consider possible layouts for the control panel.
The microwave panel was easy enough to cut to size with tin snips.
Not so easy to make the internal hole though. A dremel or similar would have been useful.
Here we are just testing the control panel – it looks ok.  It has the speed control, no volt release switch and brake switch.
There has been a rubbished stainless steel kitchen sink in the woods now for about 6 months, which I walk past on my way to university most days. Not to let an opportunity to tidy up pass me by, this found its way onto the lathe (well part of it anyway – the rest went to the correct recycle facility).
This is the section I want, it should fit well.
“I must watch out for that sharp edge – I must watch out for it – manoeuvre the hand this way to avoid… oh dear there is my blood. ” Please wear thick gloves when cutting the sink, it is so easy to nick yourself on one of the freshly cut edges.
This was the original stainless back panel, it needed cutting and bending to accommodate the motor. Despite the photo the tin snips were never getting through this – it was much thicker than the sink – so I used a hacksaw. To cut sheet material, angle the hacksaw closer to parallel, that way the teeth don’t catch. The cork sheet is simply there to absorb vibration and reduce noise.
Fitting the ‘sink motor housing’
It needs a good clean, but is starting to take shape, and covers the motor nice.
Here we are drilling and filing square a space for the forwards and reverse switch. I didn’t want this on the main control panel for two reasons. 1. It would be very bad to accidentally switch it from forwards to reverse while the motor is spinning at 6000 rpm. 2. It made the wire routing much simpler.
Switch in place – panel ready for final fitting.
This should protect from the wood.
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Responses to 12 – Housing the moving bits and making it look nice

  1. brian
    December 14th, 2014 at 7:00 pm

    If you are using a hacksaw and you are not used to it -when you cut sheet material the turn the saw around or better still mount the blade in backwards .It cuts much easier and doesn’t jam as much

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