I had a nice full day today to work on this monster. I have been spending some time on the bed. The sides and ports are roughly machined. Clausing had used some filler to smooth out the sides and the ports were left somewhat rough. I'm working on using body filler to smooth out the visible surfaces that will be painted. I figure a very smooth paint job will not only look nicer, but be easier to clean. I've little experience with body filler. I've been trying Bondo, a lightweight filler from Napa, and USC Body Icing. What appears to work is to fill with Bondo, then smooth the surface with the Body Icing. Body Icing says it is paintable, pourable, and self leveling. I don't get that at all. I can barely squeeze it from the tube and it is much thicker then regular Bondo. I wonder if I got a bad batch? It does make a very smooth finish, though and is very hard. In case you wanted to know, the bed completely stripped weights 185 pounds, actually much less than I expected for a 1000 pound machine.
I took time out to work on the pedestals. I have both of them painted on the inside and the tailstock pedestal smoothed and primed on the outside. In case you are wondering, the paint is Rust-Oleum Industrial. The color is Almond. I've never been a big fan of gray and see no reason the lathe has to be gray again, so I choose a color I like. I love green, but that would be way to Grizzly. The Almond does suggest Jet, but I can live with that. Their machine tools may be junk, but I have a Jet band saw I've been happy with. Besides, I can paint it whatever color I want.
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