Woodturning Steady Rest for 12 inch Swing Medium Size Lathe (12'')

Put it on my Laguna 12/16 lathe. Fits great. I've used it on 3 different turnings and it did not disappoint. Well worth the money

As purchased, the largest bowl I could turn on my 12-inch lathe was 8.25 inches. The wheel bolts were limiting outward travel where they bump ujp against the frame. So I drilled out the frame another 1/2" at each bolt location as shown below. This allowed the bolts to travel farther and gave me 9.5 inch overall carrying diameter. This unit is sturdy enough to handle the cuts without any compromise in stability. Overall a great tool. I also thought about replacing the wheels with 45 mm diameter, and I might do that to get to 10", cost would be about $40 for new wheels.

I recently started wood turning and just bought a Delta lathe. I needed the steady Rest so I could turn an Urn for our dog. It was the biggest thing I had ever turned and I wanted it to look nice. I had no problem mounting it on the lathe and it held everything together nicely.

I was looking for a cost-effective steady for my JET 1642 wood lathe. Most of them are either flimsy, expensive, or not versatile. This one seemed to have what I was looking for as being made of all steel parts except the guide wheels which are made of tough&nonmarring PU roller skate wheels. The first one I ordered came in within a couple of days and was well packed but had a problem with the frame being not at a right angle. Thanks to Amazon, they sent me a replacement with a free return. The second one was fine with all parts in good condition. It is made in China but seems well machined with all plasma cut steel and powder coated paint.One downside is it is made for a lathe with a 12inch swing which I have to adapt to my 16inch lathe. I had to make a proper raiser block along with adapting the clamping mechanism suited to my lathe bed. It took careful measurements to make all the parts fit my lathe but in the end, it is able to support any stock up to about 6-inch diameter anywhere between centers. The lockdown clamps are a bit awkward to use due to tight spacing but it is not a show stopper. I tried it on a 12"x1/2" spindle and it held it steady to shape the tip which is a good test to see how well the steady rest will hold up in real use where the stock is usually larger.Overall I am quite satisfied with the quality and functionality of this steady rest if you are able to customize the fit specific to your lathe. I am a pretty handy person and can figure things out but it would be helpful if basic instructions were included about how to clamp and support the stock specific to their accessory although there are many good videos on YouTube on this subject

It's not fancy, but it does everything I need it to do. You should spend some time beefing up the bottom part that seats on the ways to prevent twisting.

It works well. Keeps the turned piece in place as our lathe is not high end and we need more support than the tenon alone. It is not a super heavy duty tool and it is not huge, but it works very well for a light to medium weight tool and fits everything we need it to turn.

The media could not be loaded.  The overall structure of this stabilizer is of good quality however the wheels are horrible . Upgrade the wheels to a set that comes with a bearing spacer and it a night and day difference .The wheels it comes with have no spacer between bearings so when you tighten them you get a lot of resistance . Instead of trying to find a spacer that will work just buy a set of new wheels and then this thing works great!

Very clever, on 3rd use 1 lock-lever interfered with my tool rest; I discovered 3 levers are held geared to bolt by a spring and Allen screw on the top. If you loosen the screw you can lift lever against its spring and rotate it then reengage gear teeth. Correction, next day I discovered you do NOT have to loosen the top screw of the lever, nor the lever itself from clamping your work... just pull outward on lever and it's free to rotate to a different geared position on its bolt. Very smart & useful. I also found I can remove the lever, bolt & all and change the approach path of its contact wheel on the project to allow my tool rest to cross through the Steady-rest axis inside the main/outer rim, securing it with only the 2nd locking bolt & knob that each wheel strut has. This thing is quite versatile. Hefty steel, six bolts all have washers to lock position better, and have lever and knob so no tools needed for ongoing adjustments during work. I was able to make a mounting yoke out of 2x4 to bolt it to Shopsmith Mark V's slide-tubes and buy one long through-bolt & wing-nut at hardware store. You can see a bit of the yoke's wood in photo around the steel tube.