New Lathe Falling Into Place

I am sitting here waiting for the new lathe.

I didn’t know if I should get a new lathe. Sometimes I feel like I spend stupidly. Other times I feel like I don’t spend enough. A month or two back, I felt like God was telling me to let GO already. When I wanted or needed something, I scoured Ebay and Craigslist. I bought used stuff. Sometimes I went without stuff that would have made life easier, or I bought tools that were one size too small. I felt like God told me, “You are praying for stuff I already gave you. Just SPEND THE MONEY.” I felt like I was serving my money, instead of it serving me.

I had that silly Clausing lathe. It wasn’t small by home shop standards, but it wasn’t big enough to be versatile and convenient to use. I couldn’t part long stock bigger than about 1 1/2″ in diameter. I couldn’t find rests for it. I couldn’t do a single metric thread. I thought I should give up and get a Grizzly in a comparable size or bigger, and I looked around and checked out models.

I found that you had to spend some dough to get a 2″ bore, which is a big convenience. And I learned that good used lathes were so expensive, it was hard to get anything bigger than a 25% discount over new. You can get stuff other people consider too old to use, and it’s cheap (like the Clausing), but it’s not the same as a new machine.

I got fed up with shopping. I prayed for God to send me a good deal on a new lathe, and the next day, I got a surprising email from a seller. I’ve written about this. New machine. Thousands off. Lots of good added equipment. Things I didn’t want to buy, removed. I had to jump on that. It took two days to get my nerve up, but I prayed about it and bought the machine.

Now it’s about to be delivered. I thought I would have to change some wiring to make it fit. I have an interrupt box and three 220 sockets in the area where the lathe will go. I thought I would have to move everything three feet to the right and remove one socket to allow for a phase converter. I took a few screws out, took down my air hose reel, and looked at the lathe measurements. It turned out the lathe is not tall enough to obstruct the wiring. In fact, the wiring, which was not really in the right place for my old setup, was exactly where it needed to be for the new arrangement. How about THAT?

I screwed everything back together and went in the house.

God prepares you for stuff, when you don’t even know it’s coming. He’s like Mr. Miyagi. One day you’re doing “wax on, wax off” ten thousand times. The next day, you’re using what you learned to wipe the smirk off some punk’s face at a karate tournament.

I have some work in front of me. I have to wire up the converter, and I have to move all the other tools in the garage (except for the mill) after the lathe is moved in. I have to put a cord on the lathe. I have to find a place to put the hose reel. But that’s about it. I probably won’t even sweat.

I have been praying for God to help me organize the garage. I came up with a surprising plan which is going to make life much easier.

Yesterday I opened up the garage floor and moved the Clausing out of the way, all by myself. All I needed were some pieces of conduit and a crowbar. I won’t have to pay the riggers to move it. They should be out of here in twenty minutes.

It will be a week before I can turn the lathe on. The converter people are VERY slow to ship. But I’ll be able to lean on it and turn the dials and go, “VROOM VROOM” all I want.

Don’t let anyone tell you prayer in tongues won’t order your life. It works, and it’s amazing. And it does other stuff for you. I sit out there in the evenings and pray, and not only does God give me faith, he gives me different flavors of faith. He gives me faith that rushes through me like water under pressure. He gives me a type of faith that feels like a mountain of lead falling on my doubts. It’s so strange. I never expected it.

Now if someone will just buy that Clausing. I’ll have my garage back, and I’ll be able to use my tools instead of working on them all the time.