benchmaster rotary table pricelist

The South Bend rotary table, in addition to being a worthy machine accessory, commands a fairly high collector premium. South Bend stuff is hot these days, and the rotary table is one of several that head the list of most desirable accessories.

As you can see, quite a range! One little exercise that might help is to convert the original selling price for the turntable to current dollars. For example, the RTB101 sold new in 1963 for $61.75. Converting this price to 2009 dollars gives you $453.82(!) This is what the same item might sell for today, if it was still being sold. From this point, one needs to factor in all manner of subjective criteria, such as collector premium (how many people want one?), condition, how badly you want it, how badly the seller wants to sell it, your relationship with the seller, etc.

I"d also suggest that you allow the work you do to help make the decision on rotab size. If you do nothing but small work a 6" table may be fine, but if you intend to pursue a wide variety of work, you"ll come to cuss that small table. They"re geared faster, so using them for large work isn"t very convenient, even if you can mount the work. No problem if you"re just drilling, but if you have to do any milling, it"s harder with a fast table.

The real issue is that a small table can be far more difficult to use for larger work, often eliminating the chance to make the required setup because there"s no surface left after placing the work piece on the table.

Just my 2 cents. Buy a larger rotary table, you"ll appreciate the extra real estate for clamping. If you can, steer clear of the combo horizontal/vertical ones, it"s just extra weight. When you finally have the need, buy a dividing head and foot-stock for horizontal work on the mill.

The Benchmaster Mill table measures 6 by 18 inches. The mill has limited space of about 8 inches from table top to bit bottom. I"ll keep looking for a 6 inch that has more than 3 slots and a low price. At this time i am not interested in the tailstock.

You can put a vise on a rotary table but consider the vise is a chuck. Consider the ability to turn a piece and remove it from the lathe and sit it upon that table and it perfectly centered. That is because you"ve made a center plug to fit the center of your table. The center can end to a thread matching the chuck, threaded or taper. Then again many Many chucks use 3 bolts to attach to the backplate anyway, so there could with centering plug, a chuck affixt quickly which when tightened aligns to center. Then only snug up the pass-thru studs to T nuts.

I have a small aluminum cylinder, 1.00" dia. and 1.00" height. I"d like to drill three holes in the base, equally spaced from the center and from each other (a minimalist bolt hole pattern), and so I believe that a rotary table might simplify the job.

My question is, what is the best or easiest way to hold the workpiece on the table? I"d like to be able to drill a bunch of these, so I need something that is easily repeatable. Is there some way to hold a collet in place in the center of the table, so that the collet can hold the workpiece? Or perhaps a 3-jaw chuck from a mini-lathe centered on the rotary table would do the trick? Or maybe I just need to clamp a vee block to the table?

Sounds like you have only one part. Mounting a rotary table for a one off is a lot of work, and dialing in a 1" diam part on the table, and holding it there is a PITA for one item.