Daniel Andy

I don't. My metalworking options are limited to rough casting, filing, hacksawing, drill press, and cold forging.

So far I haven't found a use for an anvil if you don't also pick up a torch and/or a forge...which is a much larger investment.

I too would be a customer of this company.

While I admire Hamish's dedication to DIY appliances, I don't think it's realistic that people fabricate their own machine parts on a wide scale, regular basis. Repairing our own things, yes.  But if we all had to do metal fabrication for every appliance we owned and to build bracketing and such for every motor replacement it would be too much for people with a job to handle.

I think this kind of company would be best suited to a small community not looking to make money but looking for any kind of income.

You would have to keep the manufacturing simple, because you would be selling low volume, so complex stuff like injection moulding wouldnt be worth doing if you did one a year and then forgot how you did it.

To be even more concrete: a block and tackle is basically what we used for winching before we had winches. Think of anything you might use a winch for...dragging stuff, picking up heavy stuff, bending things that are hard to bend...you can use a block and tackle for that.  

Well that explains it all perfectly, thank you!

Would be interested in talking with you if nothing else. Sounds similar to what we intended to do.

Swindler is an interesting forum name choice...

Thanks, John. Sorry, but I guess I'm not enough of a woodworker to understand your reply. I don't understand what centres and dogs mean in this context. I'm used to dogs being pegs in a work table concept but I have no idea how to apply that to a lathe in my head. Centres is totally new to me.

The perfect homestead vehicle is the Slate EV truck. Thats my honest opinion. Its simple, its repairable, it charges off your solar array, it can be reconfigured for changing needs, its only $27000 brand new.

Honest opinion, its perfect, and i wasnt paid by them in any way to say this. I have my cars settled just about for life so i shouldn't be able to buy one.

So im building a treadle lathe, which will also function as a disk sander by sticking a 9inch sanding disk on it.

Only thing i cant figure out is work holding. I can buy a machined chuck for a lathe of course but then it costs $100 which i figure is almost half what i could buy a used lathe for.

Is there a DIY alternative or should i look for a parts lathe to grab the chuck from?

Here is a related digital offgrid archive project like the one I had in mind that might be good to mix with a permies snapshot in digital archive form.

offthegridvault.com/blog