Long Term Grizzly 4003G manual lathe review
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- Опубліковано 29 вер 2024
- This is my ~ 8 month grizzly 4003g lathe review. I have probably 400-420 (nice) hours on this machine. Overall it is a good entry level machine. it does have its quirks and weaknesses, but overall it has been a good addition to my business. hopefully in the near future I can upgrade and supplement it with a 16x60 or 20x80 in machine to tackle larger work. It is not a top notch machine, but it is accessible to a lot of people and manageable to move around. for most hobby work I would suggest a smaller 10x20 machine as those are much more manageable for an inexperienced person to move and quite a bit cheaper.
Good enough is always enough when good enough is all that is needed. Obviously a talented machinist like yourself will fill in whatever is missing 👍👍😎👍👍
Talented is a generous statement 🤣 when I try to use anything smaller than a 1/4 end mill in steel is snap city. I buy them in threes. One to snap, one to dull, and one to barely finish the job.
Well Said Joel👍
Get a decent microphone mate
Donate one
Picking up your voice from across the room is difficult to hear & understand, you need a Mic on you.
Never,never never have long sleeve on when running a lathe. Never …I witnessed a man have his arm ripped off at the elbow. Gives me the chills every time I think about it. Never
I’ve been curious since I followed you …how young were you when started in this Machinist field? You seem extremely knowledgeable . I like seeing younger people with an obvious dedication to the trade! All the best! ……👍K👍
I got started around 13-14 with fab work & blacksmithing and have been running machines on and off since 17 or 18. So 16-17 years to build on? I'm turning 30 in August. All the machines in my shop have been acquired or inherited in the last year and a half, excluding my baby drill press.
@@moosesmachinery Excellent. Thank You! Keep up the great work👍😎👍
@@Kevscancave thank you! I'm hoping to have a video on making a dovetail cutter in the next week. Which may or may not be interesting.
@@moosesmachinery It will be interesting! 👍
Thanks Moose. I appreciate your thoughts and reasoning. I'm looking forward to some smithing jobs! Keep up the good work.
For youtube content reasons, I am wary of posting videos of firearms work. They have really nebulous rules on gun work. I do have a job coming up where I need to make someone a new front sight. Reviewing the youtube rules that should be acceptable.
I do document some firearms jobs on my reddit account (u/moosesgunsmithing) and my Instagram ( Moose's Gunsmithing).
It looks like my Shenwai 900b made in Taiwan. Shell Telus is the best oil.
Wouldn't suprise me if it was the same pattern casting.
I have a similar machine. It is 14 x 20 inches with a 1.5 inch hole through the spindle. A 2 horsepower single phase motor rounds out the basic spec. I have a retirement job of machine-tool mechanic and turner-fitter. 80% of my work is produced on this machine and accuracy as a rule has never been a problem. Getting the tailstock dialed in at times can be a pain as is the 3 jaw chuck but at the price of the machine these are things you learn to live with. I do have a self aligning 4 jaw TOS chuck which gives better results than the 3 jaw re concentricity however. As for rigidity at just over 1/2 a ton it can be a problem as the lathes mass is not considerable, I find you can work around it most of the time. Looking at your threading box I think I prefer my own, that thing belongs on a 1950s Southbend. I did have to change out the spindle bearings which were P5s but not too good. It now has German FAG P5 replacements which seem much better. I have enjoyed your evaluation of your machine, many thanks.
This particular machine has a hump in the bed I am working to iron out. It's about the worst spot for turning tapers too, but I can't complain too much for what I paid.
Various edits and additional comments inserted.
Got my 4003g about 4 years ago, used a couple or 8 hours a week when projects are in the house.
First thing I did was drill and tap the cross slide to use an angle plate and mill vice and a “T” slot plate on it.
The cross slide travel was insufficient for most work and getting the tool in the right place to face an 8” disk was difficult.
The cross slide feed screw wore out in a short time so replaced it with ex stock 4140 5/8 10tpi from McMaster, nut was ok the, but I have to replace the feed screw again but it lasted 3 years. I’ll harden the next one, and make and replace the nut if required.
EDIT-In the process of doing this repair I increased the crosslide travel about 3 inches and spaced the dial out an 1 1/2 to centralize the increased movement, I can now do a larger range of cuts with out resetting the tool post and top slide, and using the BXA tool holders mill longer runs without shifting the work.
While I was there I modded the cross slide dial for a threading stop, works well.
I added a hard stop setup for the cross slide as well for milling and repeat lathe operations.
Added capacitive scales and a “Touch DRO” setup, works well also.
Replaced front panel switches with better Square D style switches and added reverse inching to the exercise just needs an extra wire to the micro switch box to energize the switch remotely.
The steady and follower rests did not work so made new bearing arms and adjusters and will make a set with rubbing blocks the next time I need to use them.
It would not allow turning of 4” steam pipe with the as supplied fittings, fixed now.
Everything that can be has been stripped, cleaned, deburred, adjusted and lubed regularly, a little scraping done to slides, I have stoned various locations except the bed to remove burrs and dags.
The reason I bought the g is it had the larger head stock spindle, a lot more tooling and the stands were included and it was cheaper than the 4003.
Holds accuracy well and repeatably cuts to tolerances.
Adding a tool post grinder to the mix at the moment as I am in the boonies and machining services are scarce or ridiculously priced.
Would I buy it again, tough question but I think I would.
Nice review, take care.
I had one of those and it was pretty much pure junk.
The issues are common to modern lathes. My least favorite being the gap bed.
Even from the factory the carriage bumps across the rack and always puts a divot in your work 2” from the chuck where you do 99% of your eork.
I've found this to be a pretty serviceable machine with most of my issues coming from the poor fitting of the cross slide and compound. A gap bed would come in handy for some work, but I've yet to find a job I couldn't stuff on the mill when I am in thos situations.
I got mine in canada
Sold as a king 12x36
Its not, check yours
Mine was like 12 x 28
They are sold by the distance between the face of the retracted tailstock barrel and the face of the spindle with no chuck. It's quite misleading, but makes me glad to have gotten this over a 12x30
I'm a South Texas gunsmith and have been using the ShopFox version of this lathe for about 12 years. I have never had an issue and it has always worked great. My 3-jaw chuck also has about .003 TIR, but I rarely ever use it. I use the 4-jaw for almost everything as barrel chambering and muzzle threading require greater precision. I also had a used Bridgeport, but recently bought a new Grizzly clone. The fit and finish are not there, but it is entirely accurate enough for my work and less than half the Bridgeport price. I am very happy with my Grizzly machines. BTW: a FEATURE is a BUG with a SUIT on! Good luck with your shop and well done on the video
They are certainly adequate machines and good for the price. My 3 jaw has worn to about 0.005 in of runout. Scraping the cross slide and compound helped surface finish a lot. It did nothing to effect accuracy or repeatability though.
Did you ever look at the gunsmiths back plate? It made muzzle threading and chambering through the headstock possible on much shorter barrels. My 4 jaw doesn't hold parts quite straight enough for my taste.
Ps. Thank you for your kind words! The channel has been growing steadily and its awesome to see feedback from other guys in industry.
Snowmobiles and motorcycles are super fun
All a matter of perspective!
Nice review, thanks.
Thank you. Vetting a straight answer on these machines can be tough. People really seem to love them or hate them. I'm looking forward to upgrading to a 20x80 or 16x60 regardless.
@@moosesmachinery I just picked up an Enco 1340. It’s very similar to certain Grizzly models including yours. It was manufactured in 2005. I think I paid more for it then it cost new back then, lol. It’s in excellent shape, came with the stand, tool kit (including all the change gears) and some other niceties.
@@unclebuck5051 Enco is usually a decent machine. Not ideal, but they will pay the bills. You can usually find parts for them too.
@@moosesmachinery Yes, parts and additional tooling were key in the decision to get it. I've been using a WWII vintage South Bend Heavy 10 and a 11" Delta Rockwell. Neither one has a steady rest or Follow rest for example and forget about metric threads. I'm just a hobby machinist and amateur fabricator.
@unclebuck5051 you can diy both family easily, but metric threading is a pain. I do it only as a last resort.