Rockler Excelsior mini

[tonydem]

Got one on eBay and it came in very damaged. The guy refunded me and said just keep it so now I have a non working excelsior. Anyone know where to get parts?

The on/off switch is shattered and the motor lift and tightening lever is broken

[jwatson]

id say rockler first but those lathes are pretty highly cloned and you can probably find parts that fit it from jet etc.

[jHop]

On/Off switch... You could cut and splice pretty much any switch in for that. I'd check with appliance parts stores for something that can handle the voltage/ wattage necessary. While it's possible to go with a regular wall switch from the BORG/BlueBox, you could end up with something that isn't quite right. The benefit, however, is you can now build in an on/off circuit for your lathe station that can include overhead lights, dedicated station dust collection, the lathe, and the grinder/sharpening area. (dedicated buffing is up to you.) All that would require is bypassing the switch so the lathe is "always on," pretty much an ideal situation from my perspective. (OK, maybe metaphorically speaking... )

When you say the lever is broken, are you referring to the entire metal plate, or the hinge portion, or the tightening bolt? The metal bar that the motor is mounted on can be acquired from a variety of places, as long as it is solid (laminated works too, just check the connections between layers). As for the hinge location, that's typically a bolt with a bushing attached to the cast iron/ heavy metal base. If that section is broken on the base, you may have success rebuilding it with something like JB Weld (my uncle's mechanic rebuilt a section of the engine block with this stuff, but it was not permanent), but you will need to look for probably another bed/base. Sure, options exist like creating a sub frame box under the lathe that the lathe gets bolted to, and this is where the motor will be mounted, but that's 1) complicated, and 2) not efficient. If the problem with the lever is the tightening bolt, as long as the hole is fine, and the slot on the base is intact, you can find pretty much any bolt to use for this.

As for locations of specific parts, I'd start checking with suppliers for industrial parts, like maybe McMaster Carr, or some of the smaller metal shop suppliers in your area.

[rmac]

Find another one that's trashed (in different ways) and combine the two to make a working one?????????

-- Russ