Barnes 4 1/2 metal lathe as a foot powered wood lathe?

[Brian Kopp]

Hi folks,
I’ve been intrigued by foot treadle powered lathes since I saw one displayed and used at a “Mountain Craft Days” festival back in the 1990s in western Pennsylvania. I’ve been looking for one for a while and located a big stout wooden one in upstate New York. A professional wood turner talked me out of it because my left leg is weak after several strokes and they require both balance and coordination as well as stamina.

So I gave up on the treadle wood lathes. Upon further research it seems the only foot powered lathe I could manage is a Barnes velocipede that the user sits on and pedals. They’re rare and not cheap so I pretty much gave up on the whole idea of a foot powered lathe.

However a Barnes 4 1/2 velocipede metal lathe popped up on my Marketplace feed yesterday morning and it had only been posted two hours previously. I contacted the seller immediately. He had bought his house 14 years prior and this was left behind by the prior owner. He’s getting ready to sell the house now and didn’t want to leave the lathe in the basement. He knew nothing whatsoever about it otherwise and just wants it out of his garage asap. We agreed on a price of $400.

Everything appears to be intact, including the pedals, flywheel and many of the accessories. Apparently it is rare to find one in this condition.

I searched the archives and found several references to antique foot treadle powered wood lathes, but none about the Barnes velocipede.

However, I’ve read a number of comments on various Facebook groups and forums that the Barnes velocipede metal lathes were sold with an optional wood lathe rest and have been used effectively for wood turning many times in the past.

I’m picking it up tomorrow.

Has anyone here used a Barnes velocipede lathe for wood turning? Any pointers?

 

[Brian Kopp]

More images of this lathe. It has a motor which was attached at some point in its past, but the pedal mechanism is still intact and it looks simple to return it to its original state.

 

[Brian Kopp]

I’m pretty sure I can use the current Barnes tool carrier mount to accept a slightly modified modern wood lathe banjo with tool rest on top of it:


And I could use a larger flywheel to increase the spindle speed. Barnes metal lathes were considerably slower than their velocipede wood lathes.

 

[Richard Coers]

I doubt if there is a morse taper in the head shaft. The chuck on it is not a scroll chuck. Way oil, lead screws, and oil fed bearings don't mix real well with sawdust. I'd be worried about the head bearings if it was driven fast with that motor. I have a little treadle lathe and I made a new head shaft so it will have a 1"-8 thread. You definitely won't want to use the back gear, that would be way to slow for turning wood. Beautiful machine!

 

[Brian Kopp]

From my research, the spindle shaft and tail are indeed MT1, but I don’t yet know the spindle thread size or tpi.

Barnes #3 is a wood lathe and uses similar bearings etc., and they seem to be well regarded.

I agree about the head bearings and I’ll check that specifically. The spindles on various Barnes lathes of this era have seized up when turned too fast with an electric motor.

I doubt if there is a morse taper in the head shaft. The chuck on it is not a scroll chuck. Way oil, lead screws, and oil fed bearings don't mix real well with sawdust. I'd be worried about the head bearings if it was driven fast with that motor. I have a little treadle lathe and I made a new head shaft so it will have a 1"-8 thread. You definitely won't want to use the back gear, that would be way to slow for turning wood. Beautiful machine!

 

[Brian Kopp]

There are two 4 jaw metal lathe chucks. I can use a thread adapter on my modern Nova wood lathe chuck and hold the spindle end of the adapter in one of the four jaw Metal chucks to use the Nova chuck to turn wood on the Barnes lathe:

 

[Brian Kopp]

I am curious if this might be an MT1 to 3/4" x 10tpi spindle adapter. If so I can pick up a 3/4” x 10tpi to 1” x 8tpi spindle adapter and use my Nova g3 chuck.

The spindle is 7/8” x 10tpi:

 

[Brian Kopp]

I did figure out how to mount a wood lathe tool rest banjo on it:

 

[Brian Kopp]

Progress:

 

[Sarah S Elkind]

Super cool! What a find. I hope it works for you because, well, it's super cool.

 

[Brian Kopp]

Mounting a modern wood lathe banjo and tool rest on the Barnes 4 1/2 velocipede metal lathe so it can be quickly removed and restored to original:

 

[Bob Sheppard]

Brian-
nice machine. I'm jealous.
I've turned on a wooden treadle lathe a few times. It's not that easy to balance on one leg and pump with the other. You do get a good cardio workout while turning. lol

 

[Brian Kopp]

Good news - everything works!

 

[Brian Kopp]

And I couldn’t go to bed tonight without trying it out on an actual piece of wood:

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wqf_QVAeNjA

 

[Brian Kopp]

Brian-
nice machine. I'm jealous.
I've turned on a wooden treadle lathe a few times. It's not that easy to balance on one leg and pump with the other. You do get a good cardio workout while turning. lol

I had originally planned to buy a treadle wood lathe, but I was talked out of it by a professional wood turner. My left leg is weak following multiple strokes and my stamina ain’t great as a result either, so he said I’d have trouble balancing on that left leg and recommended I forget about a treadle lathe.

It was good advice. However after the strokes I took up riding an e bike for exercise and to help in my recovery, so a pedal lathe seems like a good fit.

I was aware of the Barnes velocipede lathes and knew they were the only foot powered lathe I could successfully operate.

I also knew they were quite rare and if I did find one, I’d never be able to afford it.

But this guy didn’t know what he had, didn’t care, and just wanted it gone.

It did have me winded after the four or five minutes I turned wood on it this evening for the last video above, but I haven’t ridden my e bike since last summer so that will improve.

 

[JeffSmith]

Nice lathe - I think I’d be tempted to find a way to power it though, my old knees and ankles would let me know real quick that I should look at options…impressed with your banjo solution.

 

[Brian Kopp]

Nice lathe - I think I’d be tempted to find a way to power it though, my old knees and ankles would let me know real quick that I should look at options…impressed with your banjo solution.

I did have to cut 1/4” of the bolt that holds the Rikon banjo to the wood tool lathe bed to make it fit the shallow bed of the Barnes lathe and function properly, That didn’t affect its functionality when I remounted it on my Rikon.

This lathe had a motor mounted long ago judging by the age of the motor, the wiring and the switch. Fortunately they didn’t molest the rest of the lathe when they motorized it and this motor was the first thing I took off.

it effectively forces the user to exercise! That was always in the back of my head as a secondary reason to find a pedal powered lathe. I had multiple strokes in 2016 that left my left arm and leg paralyzed. They put two heart stents in my brain and I’ve had a miraculous recovery but have residual left leg weakness, so I can’t stand on that leg and pump a treadle with my right foot. The only option for a foot powered lathe for me then was a pedal powered lathe like the Barnes.

 

[Brian Kopp]

A friend’s 18 and 14 year old sons trying out the antique pedal lathe:

The 18yo in the first half of the video is using a tool I made from scratch last night from one of the metal lathe tool bits I got with this pedal lathe.


The 14 yo in the second half of the video is using a manufactured carbide lathe chisel as well as a lathe chisel I reground on my slow speed grinder into a different style of lathe chisel.

It’s pretty cool being able to make your own tools from scratch or convert one type of tool to another on the grinder. I never tried it before the first one I did recently.

 

[Brian Kopp]

I was able to mount my Nova G3 chuck on this Barnes lathe by using the four jaw metal chuck it came with to hold a “Chuck Reversing Adapter” that’s used while centering a bowl on a vacuum chuck. It has the proper 1” x 8tpi thread.

Fortunately this adapter was a lot beefier than it looked in the photos online, and I was able to mount it in one of the original metal lathe chucks


This is not a self centering metal lathe chuck so it took a lot of adjusting of the four individual jaws but I was able to get it well centered. Then it was just a matter of screwing on the Nova G3 chuck.

This combination looks long and bulky but that actually helped because it moved the wood blank farther to the right on the bed of the Barnes lathe, so I’m not working with my left hand all the time.

I just spent some time playing with it late this evening once I got everything centered and a piece of wood on the chuck.

I looked at my watch and realized I have been pedaling this lathe for at least 40 minutes, but I didn’t even realize that because I was trying to turn a captive ring in several pieces of wood.

I got close several times working with a bedan type chisel but couldn’t quite make it work yet.