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Nova lathe question

John Snow

John Snow

Joined
Jan 29, 2022
Messages
65
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46
Location
Woodinville, WA
I am considering a Nova lathe (one of a couple models), but I haven't been able to determine if they have a bore through the headstock spindle. If not, how do you get a stuck drive spur out of the spindle, since a knockout bar won't be useful?
 
As far as I’m aware, they all have bored through headstock spindles. Can’t imagine a modern lathe without this.
I have an aging nova 2024 lathe, that other than being severely underweight, has been quite enjoyable to own and use.
 
Thanks all. I was sure I read that the headstock of one model didn't have a throughhole, or at least, I thought that because the description said it could not be hooked up to a vacuum chuck. Every vacuum chuck I've seen sucks through that hole.
 
FWIW, Vicmarc makes vacuum adapters that go between the inboard spindle and the vacuum chuck. They can also be mounted in a 4 jaw chuck and then the vacuum chuck attaches to the adapter.

Rotating Unions | Branches to Bowls

Rotating Unions, V01216 and V01217 can be mounted directly to a self-centering four jaw chuck by clamping onto the provided dovetail or they can be mounted directly to the lathe spindle. To mount directly to your lathe spindle you will need to select a VM120/150 Chuck Insert to suit your lathes...
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I have one of the Galaxy DVR 16/44 and that is all you have to do with it is change the plug and plug it in to 220 rather than 110. At startup the software identifies the current it's connected too.
 
Denny Nebgen said:
I have one of the Galaxy DVR 16/44 and that is all you have to do with it is change the plug and plug it in to 220 rather than 110. At startup the software identifies the current it's connected too.
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That's darned smart. I ordered a Rikon 70-1824 in 110v. In Rikon's case, it's two different configurations.
 
It's important to make sure the plug and outlet design you choose are rated for the amperage you're going to draw. NEMA actually has multiple configurations for 240V plugs depending on amps.
 
Bryan Field said:
I have the comet II, and my new Nebula will be delivered next week. I love Teknatool, great customer service.
Click to expand...
Bryan Field said:
I'm totally blown away by the Nebula, an amazing tool. Very quiet, very hi-tech, very heavy, and best of all no belts to change.
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Hey Bryan,it’s been a minute since this post,but I ordered my Nebula over a month ago and am waiting patiently for it to ship.
I was wondering how you were liking your Nebula after some time to use it.
Thanks,Alan
 
Thanks again,,I am now torn between canceling my order or sitting tight and see what transpires.
Although I really don’t want to own a machine from a bankrupt company,not knowing what this means for customer support issues in the future.
I am already hearing stories about people having issues with support from them,including trouble getting parts needed.
Although this lathe has all the bells and whistles I want in a lathe,I really don’t know what I should do.
 
I’d have no trouble canceling. The combination of wondering re replacement parts and customer service availability would convince me.
 
I suppose one challenge is whether a warranty changes the utility of a tool. My table saw is 40 years old, was improperly wired when I purchased it (as well as missing most of the screws, switches and knobs). I never wondered what warranty would be possible. I just fixed. The reason I like more open build designs is the standardization of interfaces (modbus for the VFD, 485, canbus et al). No product can break that creates a wheel chock out of my tools.

I really like the principal behind restoring old tools. The casting is the most important part, but can be corrected.... the electronics can be rebuilt/rewired/restored/reconfigured. Would a NOVA lathe be repairable by accessing the manufacturers of the PCBs that are sourced? Bearings replaced with TIMKENs et al? Company out of business make very little impact on a purchasing decision personally... unless the primary reason for chapter11/7 is directly resulting from bad quality.
 
Strange isn't it...a company that couldn't deliver it's products fast enough is suddenly looking for financial protection. I wonder if the new tariff issues is what pushed them over the edge?
 
John Grace said:
Strange isn't it...a company that couldn't deliver it's products fast enough is suddenly looking for financial protection. I wonder if the new tariff issues is what pushed them over the edge?
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I have no inside info, but they've clearly had problems shipping their lathes for years. Maybe the threat of tariffs indeed created a last-straw situation, but at most I suspect it just moved the timing of all this forward a little. (Similar to how the pandemic "ripped off all the band-aids", pushing a lot of ongoing trends forward very fast.)

In principle, I don't see the change in business at this point as putting Teknatool International in a fundamentally different situation than say Vicmarc, as regards the US market. We'll see how well they're able to turn the business around and rebuild customer confidence through all this.
 
Michael Brown said:
Would a NOVA lathe be repairable by accessing the manufacturers of the PCBs that are sourced?
Click to expand...
Technically, absolutely not, coming from an IP perspective – those PCB designs are at minimum copyrighted. In reality, many parts of the world play much faster and looser with all that than the US does (fun fact: so did we before our superpower days). Also, there's unprecedented ability to simply reverse engineer a board with one in hand now. Assuming parts are available, it may just be some time in Fusion and "click click" on the right website to get a replacement shipped to you. Practically, it would take just one person with a decent EE background to sort things out and sell replacement parts.
 
John Whitley said:
Technically, absolutely not, coming from an IP perspective – those PCB designs are at minimum copyrighted. In reality, many parts of the world play much faster and looser with all that than the US does (fun fact: so did we before our superpower days). Also, there's unprecedented ability to simply reverse engineer a board with one in hand now. Assuming parts are available, it may just be some time in Fusion and "click click" on the right website to get a replacement shipped to you. Practically, it would take just one person with a decent EE background to sort things out and sell replacement parts.
Click to expand...
Ah, to clarify.... https://striatech.us/ makes the servo motors and controllers for Nova, so I would expect to be able to order replacement parts from them...
 
Kent Reisdorph said:
That's darned smart. I ordered a Rikon 70-1824 in 110v. In Rikon's case, it's two different configurations.
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Kent- 2 different spec motors, or the same motor that can be rewired for 220v?

Machines I've owned with motors that are dual voltage, I rewired to 220. But I know you went 110 for house wiring reasons, if I recall.
 
Steve Tiedman said:
Kent- 2 different spec motors, or the same motor that can be rewired for 220v?

Machines I've owned with motors that are dual voltage, I rewired to 220. But I know you went 110 for house wiring reasons, if I recall.
Click to expand...

I don't know the details on the motor(s). Yes, I got the 110v because I didn't have 220v in the garage.
 
I think a part of the difference between 110V and 220V specs at least with modern VFD drives (3 phase motors) is simply how the VFD controller is set up and programmed (and a couple or three of wire terminal changes) When I got a generic no-name 1 HP 3 phase it came as 110/220v , and I could wire it either way to the VFD controller (I opted for 110V, didn't want to bother wiring up another 220 outlet) and only real differences were where to hook up the input wires (obviously) and then some of the VFD programming settings. With a bit of know-how it'd probably be easy enough to rewire your 110v to 220, or vice versa (assuming motor and controller supported both voltages)
 
With the Nebula its easy to switch from 110 to 220 you just have to change the plug. I'm not worried about Nova and their reorganization. Number one I've owned my DVR3000 for over 22 or 23 years and it is still running like it did when it was brand new. I don't see the Nebula doing anything other than that.
 
Michael Brown said:
Ah, to clarify.... https://striatech.us/ makes the servo motors and controllers for Nova, so I would expect to be able to order replacement parts from them...
Click to expand...
Good point. I’m aware of Striatech’s relationship at a high level (my Galaxi was even a unit refurbished by Striatech), but it’s never been clear to me, at the low level of parts like the PCBs, “who makes what” – or in the thought experiment here, who holds things like the IP and the CAD models. That can go a few different ways.

For example, a company I worked for some time back produced an ARM-based SoC (System on a Chip) and the associated base firmware. We had a reference PCB design tailored to early product development, but it was always the expectation that customers would produce a “form-factor board”, a PCB tailored to the specific needs of their final product. That included purely physical considerations like how the PCB fit within and mounted to the product housing. In our case, we never had access to customer PCB designs at any level. And yet, other companies run a more full-service model which includes things like PCB design services in partnership with the customer product design team.

All in all, I do think that talk of reverse engineering PCBs is “in the last resort” line of thinking re: Teknatool, and I agree that doesn’t appear warranted now.
 
@John Whitley I can relate to the firmware dev package developer perspective... Allegedly...

I suspect that nova completely outsourcing their circuit dev is the most likely scenario. I suspect that is why you have the privilege of downloading firmware updates for your brand new drill press ... Because the inventory on hand was assembled before the update was ready and they opted to ship the unit and tell Nova to tell their customers to update it themselves...

I do my own pcb repair on my AC unit on my roof, so sweating off some caps in the DVR controller doesn't seem too much worse. Regardless, as others have indicated Nova seems to have found a good motor/controller supplier. Since Harvey has introduced their own servo based lathe, I think the dramatic advantage Nova had in lathe technology has ebbed significantly.
 
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