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1984 Jet 12X36 bel;t driven

challenger

Stainless
Joined
Mar 6, 2003
Location
Hampstead, NC-S.E. Coast
I went to look at an ad in the paper this weekend. It is a 1984 Jet lathe. I was expecting a real POS Chinese bomb but I found it to be a hardly used unit and I am wondering what else to look at. It has a VFD on a 3 phase 220 motor and you almost don't need to change pulleys becaus ethe VFD runs form about 1 rpm up. It also looked real high quality-w-screws for the gib adjustments (compared to my crap 9X20)and a ton of thread selection and of course reverse etc. Is there any reasin to avoid the older Jet stuff? For 1K I can get it and I understand that the VFD is expensive? Not much in the way of tools other than the steady + follower rest. It doesn;t at all stink of that low quality like my current lathe does. Advice please!
 
Jet is one of the better inports, I have a mill by them and it has done fine so far, had to replace the collet guide pin is all. Can't say about there lathe's never ran one.
 
My impression is the older Jet stuff is better...mostly made in Tawain..some even made in Japan. The newer Jet machines are the same Chinese models Grizzly sells, cept at higher prices due to those pesky Jet middlemen.
 
Is the one you looked at a model 1236-P ?
I just bought a nice, older JET this past weekend, and it seems to be VERY solid.
Your description sounds very familiar.
 
The model is 1236-PY. I wish I knew what the PY meant. It has a 220VAC 3 phase motor but has a VFD that makes it 110VAC compatible. I went today to see it cut and it does real nice. It has a factory stand. It was made in Taiwan. The seller bragged about the value of the VFD but I see tham for sale for a few hundred or less. Anyway I think I will get it cause for the price and the condition it is in I have not seen anything close. I was looking for opinion about how/why these older ones are so different from the new Chinese stuff. I consider this a real lathe as opposed to my 9X20 which is great for small stuff but won't realy make those large dangerous flying bits of shrapnel we all love to see fly.
 
I had one of these of 1978 vintage. It was not great but OK. The bearings tended to heat on the highest speed, which wasn't very high (< 1100 RPM), so it wasn't much fun for carbide or little diameters. The spindle nose is bastard 65 mm x 8 threads per inch. At least the machine can cut its own spindle nose thread. The way wipers didn't touch the ways at the peaks. I got it with a hardly used Royal 5C lever collet closer setup, but that wasn't useful because you couldn't get the carriage close enough to the spindle nose. The gears were rather noisy because they were steel instead of cast iron.
 
Wow Challenger,
An older jet. Allways makes me look twice. I still remember our first lathe and somtimes wish it was still here. Good luck and here is a story I told a while back.

Dear Ranman,
I have been reading this board for about a week, and have really enjoyed all of the topics and replies. However when I read of your interest in a JET lathe it made me smile on this Easter Sunday,
I have slept at a few Holiday inns, and maybe that is why I ended up with a Jet one day. I bought the thing for 500 bucks. It was a Jet 10/24. It was fitted with an Armstrong Rocker style tool post, and had a home made R8 hand wheel type collet closer. It came with the standard stuff like 3 and 4 jaw chucks centers and a cool little vise for milling with the cross slide.
It became like a family member, and I liked it. I realized it had some limitations, and they were constantly pointed out to me by well meaning machinists. I got an Aloris tool post for it and that helped, although I used the Armstrong for a few years.
One day a man came to my shop looking for work. He was a little down on his luck. He was Alcoholic and nobody would hire the guy. (Can’t blame them) I had a lathe job to do and felt sorry for him. Since much of my experience came from sleeping at the Holiday inn I decided to give him a try. He was a very qualified man. 20 years of nothing but lathe work, from VTL to watch maker type parts, and every thing in between. He helped me in ways I am still discovering. He hated that Jet Lathe, but could get some fine parts off of it.
My wife and I paid for him to go to Rehabilitation but it did not take, and we had a love hate relationship for a few years, when he needed money for his habit he would come by and ask for work, and I would give it to him and he would teach me a thing or two.
My shop makes some Optical parts and often they require strange sizes and pitches of threads. That Jet Lathe would cut inch and over 32 pitch microscope threads in aluminum all day long. I had to fight the thing allot but when that is all you have, that is what you must do. I wore the thing out, and wanted to restore it, but another man offered it a good home for 500 dollars less tool post. I hated to see it loaded up and taken away, it had been a loyal piece of equipment, and it used to make the machinery dealer angry that I made money with it, but it has a good home and is well taken care of. It made about 45 thousand dollars wile at my shop, and is now making some gun parts on a hobby basis for its new owner.
My advice (free) is to consider a cheep lathe of a good cheep brand. Jet is one of the better cheepies, and get on with making some parts. Bigger and better will come to those that are patcient.
Good Luck, and Happy Easter
PS: My Alcoholic friend died from a brain aneurysm. They could have saved him but there was too much alcohol in his system to do the required surgery. I miss him, but I often feel his presence as I run my new lathe.
 
Bless you for being Human - looking at getting a similar JET

Wow Challenger,
An older jet. Allways makes me look twice. I still remember our first lathe and somtimes wish it was still here. Good luck and here is a story I told a while back.

Dear Ranman,
I have been reading this board for about a week, and have really enjoyed all of the topics and replies. However when I read of your interest in a JET lathe it made me smile on this Easter Sunday,
I have slept at a few Holiday inns, and maybe that is why I ended up with a Jet one day. I bought the thing for 500 bucks. It was a Jet 10/24. It was fitted with an Armstrong Rocker style tool post, and had a home made R8 hand wheel type collet closer. It came with the standard stuff like 3 and 4 jaw chucks centers and a cool little vise for milling with the cross slide.
It became like a family member, and I liked it. I realized it had some limitations, and they were constantly pointed out to me by well meaning machinists. I got an Aloris tool post for it and that helped, although I used the Armstrong for a few years.
One day a man came to my shop looking for work. He was a little down on his luck. He was Alcoholic and nobody would hire the guy. (Can’t blame them) I had a lathe job to do and felt sorry for him. Since much of my experience came from sleeping at the Holiday inn I decided to give him a try. He was a very qualified man. 20 years of nothing but lathe work, from VTL to watch maker type parts, and every thing in between. He helped me in ways I am still discovering. He hated that Jet Lathe, but could get some fine parts off of it.
My wife and I paid for him to go to Rehabilitation but it did not take, and we had a love hate relationship for a few years, when he needed money for his habit he would come by and ask for work, and I would give it to him and he would teach me a thing or two.
My shop makes some Optical parts and often they require strange sizes and pitches of threads. That Jet Lathe would cut inch and over 32 pitch microscope threads in aluminum all day long. I had to fight the thing allot but when that is all you have, that is what you must do. I wore the thing out, and wanted to restore it, but another man offered it a good home for 500 dollars less tool post. I hated to see it loaded up and taken away, it had been a loyal piece of equipment, and it used to make the machinery dealer angry that I made money with it, but it has a good home and is well taken care of. It made about 45 thousand dollars wile at my shop, and is now making some gun parts on a hobby basis for its new owner.
My advice (free) is to consider a cheep lathe of a good cheep brand. Jet is one of the better cheepies, and get on with making some parts. Bigger and better will come to those that are patcient.
Good Luck, and Happy Easter
PS: My Alcoholic friend died from a brain aneurysm. They could have saved him but there was too much alcohol in his system to do the required surgery. I miss him, but I often feel his presence as I run my new lathe.

Some of the best folk I've ever worked with have similar demons, can say the same thing about some incarcerated tradespeople. Somebody pointed out a welding shop at a prison I was doing some work at and said the best TIG guy in the USA is in there practicing every day. Shame a few ways around
 
Some of the best folk I've ever worked with have similar demons, can say the same thing about some incarcerated tradespeople. Somebody pointed out a welding shop at a prison I was doing some work at and said the best TIG guy in the USA is in there practicing every day. Shame a few ways around
17 years letter much? [emoji16]
 








 
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