08-10-2019, 10:06 AM
As others have already said setup is the most important and most influential part of obtaining good finishes. That said a 8X16 Chinese lathe is not a quality machine and will not give the service a good American, European, Japanese, or South Korean machine tool will impart. Some may consider this China bashing, but its based on experience. Even the "industrial grade" Jet machine tools are inferior.
Unless you have the skill set to do a complete tear down and hand scrape your lathe so it is assembled properly you'll never get good results. Even then you'll have a machine tool of inferior engineering and a inferior bed casting. Start saving so you can purchase a quality machine. There's nothing wrong with having small equipment, the steam modelers rely on small machines, but the good ones understand they will only face extreme frustration if they use Chinese machine tools.
Unless you have the skill set to do a complete tear down and hand scrape your lathe so it is assembled properly you'll never get good results. Even then you'll have a machine tool of inferior engineering and a inferior bed casting. Start saving so you can purchase a quality machine. There's nothing wrong with having small equipment, the steam modelers rely on small machines, but the good ones understand they will only face extreme frustration if they use Chinese machine tools.