I have a possible need for a turntable for painting a turned piece that is long off the lathe (restoration of a piece). I think it would be easier to touch up the painted accents if I could rotate the piece and not move the brush. The work is kind of delicate.

I'd think it would be best if the turntable had a low rpm motor.

Any ideas??

Why not check out thrift shops for a used record player? Seems like an obvious place to start, and if the slowest speed is still too fast you can play with the pulley ratios inside.

Thanks, magicwatcher2005. I've had a few suggestions by PM and email, but maybe I should have been more specific with my original post. I was kind of hoping I could find something that was plug and play, so I don't have to spend time on this, as if the tool were the project. I'd rather not have to design and build one, or retro-fit a non-motorized turntable.

I just found this and will investigate further. http://www.replicarz.com/turntable.asp

That display turntable is going to be way too slow for what you want to do. You need the work to pull the paint off your brush quirky enough to avoid laying it on too thick.

Good point.

Michael, many years ago my daughter had a little turntable for clay modeling. It ran on batteries and had a wired foot pedal for hands-free control. I cannot really remember if the speed would be sufficient for your needs or not. It might be too fast for painting, I don't know. It might have had variable speeds via the foot control, I'm not sure. I also don't know for sure how much weight it could handle. I do know it was nice and it worked well. I have wished I had kept it many times throughout the years.

Having said that, I recently saw it in Walmart. According to my memory it looks very similar to the one we had. I didn't really look at any details, or even pick up the box but just noticed it as I passed by. I'm not sure if it works the same but the pictures on the box sure look similar. Of course it was many years ago so they could look the same but still be different. Companies have a way of cutting corners to make a bigger profit margin.

Anyway, it might be worth a look. It is a child's toy, but was pretty cheap and my daughter's was very well-made. I'm sure you could get a real one of these that would be better but I have no idea how much they cost.

Thanks for the info Regan.

Three things

welders use a rotational table that works with a foot pedal which works well for welding but a but on the expensive side. It would also work well for painting and striping line work using one shot paints the type that pin stripers use.

For some years now I use an old turntable for finishing that a tv use to sit on. Works great! It is rectangular and you can easily add a clamping system. Its just a Lazy Susan. Whats nice about the rectangle is I can easily grab a corner and turn the piece resting on the turntable and swing the whole thing as needed.

I also seen a guy who took a old record player and added a wood top to this to make a flat surface it spins at 33 1/3 rpm which is not to bad for some things. Plus you can add a clamp system to the wood top. The only issue was that somethings you want to move slower is a problem but seems to be fine for some spray finishes. Not all but some.

I thought if you could re gear the record player so it moves slower it would be great, These players are cheap now and you may find one in your local thrift to play around with. Who knows it might just do the trick.

Cake decorators also use them. This one isn't super cheap but I'm sure you can find something for much less out there.

http://www.goldaskitchen.com/merchant.ihtml?pid=9239&step=4

"2 - 4 revolutions per minute" is WAY too slow for the what the OP needs.

Didn't some of the older turntables have also include a 16RPM speed?

Michael,
Are you trying to restore any spray painted pieces? I would be curious to know how successful you were. I have an old Mac Magic piece where some of the paint is beginning to flake off. Another problem is getting the correct shade. I have been working on a vintage chair. I found out that the varnish has to chemically removed first, meaning, a simple sanding is not sufficient. You make have known this already.

I have done restoration on many pieces. My least favorite part of the task is stripping old finishes. It is laborious, messy and potentially dangerous. MAK pieces are notorious for flaking paint (I'm assuming you are talking about metal pieces?). My best guess is that they did not use proper surface preparation techniques and/or primer. Matching paint color on such pieces is usually a waste of time because the old paint may continue to chip off. Best thing is to strip it all down to bare metal and do a proper finish on it. MAK and UF Grant pieces are somewhat collectible, but still at the lower end of that spectrum. Except for a few pieces, they are also not that difficult to find. If you are wanting to preserve something for its collectible value, you may just want to keep your ear to the tracks for a better condition example. Otherwise, it's hardly a cardinal sin to do a complete make-over.

Color matching in general is difficult for a number of reasons. I have had what should have been identical Milson Worth pieces, but each had a slightly different shade of that classic MW light blue. I suspect they had either faded or discolored in different ways because of the environments where they lived for many years. Because I had been charged with doing restoration on both those pieces, color matching called upon what I know about color blending from available colors. My mother did a lot of oil painting when I was a kid, so I learned quite a bit about this from her (Happy Mother's Day/Week, Mom!!). All I can suggest if you want to do that is to get a good color chart, lots of paint, and then experiment.

You could also take your piece to where they computer-match paint color, but there are limitations to that, as well. Fewer and fewer of those kinds of stores are custom mixing oil-based paints. If you do find one, you'll likely be buying a quart of more when a tiny bottle is all you need. Testors and Model Master have a wide range of colors. Check hobby stores for those. Sometimes close is good enough, plus you also have the option of mixing as I mentioned above.

Regarding your issues with varnish, you'll find that there are many combinations of finishes that don't play well together. I suspect the "varnish" that you mentioned is actually a polyurethane. You might as well be trying to paint a block of bee's wax.

Does Mac Magic still exist? I grew up on Mac Magic. I wonder if Mac would have an inventory of their colors? As for the varnish, I went to Ace hardware and picked up a recommended varnish remover. I hope this will resolve the streaking problem.

MAK does still exist, but I don't think they manufacture any more.

Hi Michael. Whatever you get, it might be easy enough to attach an attenuator, or some such gizmo, to provide variable speed for different applications, as, I think it would come in handy more than once.

Michael

I was hoping to not make the turntable the project, but may have to. Jim Riser already sent me some good info on that. I've had to sideline that project for some time so I can focus on completing some stuff for a convention in Iowa at the end of the week. I'll have a chance then to see the owner of this particular piece and discuss it with him. The item is a very large ball vase. It is natural wood with black accents.

If I am to use a turntable at all, priority would be one that spins with ZERO wobble.