A REVIEW: THE RPML 300

A MINI-LATHE WITH MUSCLE

by Fred Holder

I had been thinking about a small lathe since the AAW Symposium in Provo, Utah. At that symposium, I had looked at both the Carbitec and Klein lathes. They are nice little lathes. They are very good for pens, tops, small bowls, etc. I wanted a small lathe, but with enough heft to turn bowls up to eight or ten inches. When the July/August 1993 issue of, the British Publication Woodturning, arrived in the mail I found my lathe. Technical Editor John Haywood had reviewed a new lathe from Record Power: the RPML 300 a compact swivel head lathe.

This was just what I had been looking for, but I didn't feel I could afford to buy the lathe and pay shipping from England. So, I forgot about it. Forgot about it that is until my April 1994 copy of Woodcraft Catalog arrived in the mail. There on the cover was my lathe. A phone call to Seattle assured me that my lathe was indeed here! In fact, they were offering it with a live center and two video tapes on turning. My wife said the magic words, "If you want it why don't you buy it!" And now I have a mini-lathe with 12 inches between centers, eight and one-half inch swing over the bed, and a 14 inch swing when the head is swivelled outboard.

Originally, only Woodcraft offered these lathes. I've since seen them in several other catalogs, plus one at Eagle Hardware during the Christmas shopping season. For some reason, Record Power lathes have disappeared out of the January 1995 issue of Woodcraft's Catalog. I did find them in both Trend-lines catalog No. 513F and the most recent catalog from Harbor Freight Tools. At $399.00 this is a good little bowl lathe with minimum spindle turning capability. It will turn small objects like lace bobbins, baby rattles, goblets, etc. in the spindle turning mode. Once you add a chuck, your length is greatly reduced unless you remove the tailstock, which only takes a minute. It isn't very satisfactory to put a Jacobs chuck in the tailstock to drill a hole in an workpiece held on the faceplate or in a four jaw chuck. There just isn't any room.

Incidentally, all other lathes offered by Record Power use two round rods for the lathe bed, the RPML 300 was the first deviation from this design. It uses a solid box section cast iron bed, very rigid and very heavy. The lathe bed is accurately machined so that the tailstock and tool rest assembly slide easily along the length of the bed. I've had the lathe for nine months now and have turned a great many bowls, baby rattles, bottle stoppers, tops, goblets, etc. on it, and I'm still happy with it.

The lathe has three speeds: 540, 1140, and 2400 RPM. On small items like bottle stoppers, tops, baby rattles, and goblets, I just use one speed_2400 RPM. For bowls, the other speeds are needed, especially when roughing in from a chunk.

Ok, so I like it. Why?

1) My old lathe had a 3/4-16 TPI spindle with a No. 1 Morse Taper. All of the face plates, screw chucks, and four jaw chucks (Nova Chucks) from the old lathe would fit on the RPML 300. It has a 3/4-16 TPI with a No. 1 Morse Taper headstock and a No. 1 Morse Taper tailstock. All of my old fixtures would work with the new lathe.

2) The lathe is small, compact and hefty. It measures just 26 inches in length without the motor (space with motor is about 39 inches), but weighs 90 pounds. Its powered by a 1/3 HP electric motor using 115 vac power. The switch is prewired and ready to plug into any 110 volt three-prong grounded outlet.

3) The spindle runs in two sealed-for-life ball race bearings. The larger of the two bearings is housed on the thrust side of the headstock. Record claims that the bearing recesses are machined to plus or minus 3/10,000 of an inch and the spindle is ground to the same tolerance.

4) Finally, the swivel head feature impressed me considerably. Hollowing bowls on a regular lathe is sometimes difficult to say the least. With the RPML 300, loosen the headstock locking bolt and rotate it about 30 degrees outboard. Now, you can stand comfortably in front of the bowl while hollowing it. At this angle, you can still use the tool rest on the lathe for bowls up to about nine to ten inches in diameter. Of course, you can't easily rough out the outside of a nine or ten inch bowl on this lathe. I did some of the roughing work on my old lathe, then moved to the RPML 300 for finishing the outside and hollowing the bowl. Of course, if you don't have a larger lathe, this is a problem.

There are some negatives to the little lathe. I suppose to cut costs, there are no locking handles. You either have to use Allen wrenches or open end wrenches to make adjustments. A 3/4 inch open end wrench will fit the tailstock, headstock swivel, and the tool rest lock bolts. A different wrench is required for the motor tension lock. Three Allen wrenches are needed, these are supplied, but I bought a set of metric T-handles after a few days of fighting with the regular Allen wrenches. In a later catalog, Woodcraft offered a Handle Upgrade Kit for $12.95. By the time it was available, I had it well in hand with the wrenches and T-handles, so I didn't bother with buying the kit.

There was one major problem. Changing to the slowest speed or from it was nearly impossible. The clearance between the pulley on the headstock spindle and the housing is so small that changing the belt from one step to another is a problem, especially at the 540 RPM speed step. You can loosen the set screw in the pulley and slide it to the right to get more clearance, but you then have to slide it back and lock it up again once the belt is in the correct position. This is a bit of a pain, but then, I normally run it full out for many of the things that I turn. There is no problem in converting between the 1140 RPM and 2400 RPM steps. I think they could have left a little more room, or designed the pulley to be positioned a little further to the right. This is mostly aggravating, not debilitating.

With the few problems I've described, this is still an excellent little lathe and I believe a good buy the money. You've got some real heft, plus turning capacity up to 14 inches. Not really a portable lathe like some of the other small lathes available, mostly because of the weight. For someone with limited space, the RPML 300 gives big lathe performance in a small package and it does little lathe work well too!