WEN Mini Benchtop Wood Lathe, 8-Inch by 13-Inch with Variable Speed (LA3421)

Great little lathe! I didn't want to spend 700-1000 dollars on a midi lathe for my first go at this.It is solidly built, and the motor has good power for small projects.I've already reached some of the size limitations on this thing and am looking to buy a larger lathe in the near future. But that being said, I highly recommend this lathe for beginners.For the price, this little lathe is hard to beat a great way to learn and get you started in wood turning.

UPDATE: 20 days in with minimal use and one of the headstock bearings has started going bad, clicking when tail stock puts minimal pressure on workpiece. Removed bearings and cleaned bad one and repacked with grease so I could try using again. It is better but still going bad. Ordered a 10 pack of better grade bearings and not going to deal with Wen. Aside from low grade bearings I am still ok with purchase from the stuff I have made and how well it turned out.Nice entry level lathe.For me as a cnc machinist this lathe is super basic which I like. No G&M codes/programs, just a wonderful tactile hobby.Within 20 minutes of box hitting my front step I had wood chips flying.Unit is solid and works as expected with only one disappointment and that is the motor being more underpowered than I expected. Not a huge issue as this is a smaller inexpensive lathe.Overall I am pleased.

a great starter item. The bar upon which you rest the tool snapped clean off when the tool caught a knot (I have a review about said tools though, too). It snapped the bar clean in two. I wished it came with bolts to fasten it, I had to find others for that.

I started turning pens a few years ago, but using my large lathe seemed to be a waste of electricity and unnecessary wear and tear on an expensive piece of equipment! I saw the WEN LA3421 lathe was on sale for $135 during Prime Day, so I ordered one. It was shipped via USPS and arrived a little later than the "Order now to arrive by..." date, but that was Amazon's fault. Seems like that is happening more and more :-( Anyway, the package was only a little scuffed, which surprised me since the lathe weighs about 50 pounds! After opening the box I was relieved that there was zero damage to the contents. I cleaned off the oily protective coating and then applied a coat of paste wax to the bare metal bed. Other reviewers pointed out how "rough" the tool rests are, so right away I took a flat mill file to the top edges and removed the thick layer of paint. The tool shanks now glide smoothly over the rests. My wood turning club is getting ready for a show, so I rough-turned over 100 wood pen blanks on the WEN, and was impressed how quiet and smooth running it is. I don't expect to turn anything larger than pens and bottle stoppers, so I'm happy with the power and speed range. If you plan on turning larger bowls, chair legs, etc., this is NOT the lathe for you! I wouldn't even try putting a scroll chuck on it unless it was very lightweight. At $135, I have no problem relegating this to just small items. If you're not sure you want to get into woodturning, this would be an inexpensive first lathe. One caution, though, it takes #1 Morse taper tooling (Google Morse taper #1 verses #2), so if you plan to upgrade to a larger lathe in the future, you'll probably need to buy more tooling since it will take MT2. This WEN is light enough I might take it to my son's house and teach my grandchildren how to turn! And yes, I would buy it again, even at the regular price of $170 it's at now.

It’s a really solid first lathe for entry into the craft. One of the pins did fall out of the tightening handle but it was a very easy fix. I’ve already turned dozens of things and it runs great. The variable power knob makes it super easy to adjust speed. Some people will tell you a display for rpms is a must have. It’s not. Speed is a feel thing, finding the max speed for minimal wobble for odd shaped pieces. I love it and so far Wen hasn’t let me down.

Great for the price. It’s a good starter lathe for small projects.

Don't waste your Money! I wanted to start learning how to use a lathe, saw this and thought it was a steal...didn't realize i was the one being stole from. I'm a novice so i have only used this lathe a grand total of 3.5 times. the ".5" is from the last project i was working on and halfway through the motor gave up the ghost.This is advertised to be able to turn a project up to 8" wide and 12" long, which geometrically it can, but they fail to mention that the total weight of that can only be about 1.5 lbs, anything over that weight will bog the motor down and then its over. So adding the 4-inch-4 jaw chuck will only make matters worse. This thing is really only good for very light-weight projects, probably things like pens and small pill boxes or honey dippers. Even then you have to be very gentle and shave off a tiny bit at a time, if not it will most likely burn the motor out.Another note besides the carp motor is the locking mechanisms, they will not hold very well. As you try to tighten down the piece of wood they give way making it almost impossible to get your project secured safelyTake advice from someone already fooled, if you want to start turning wood, invest in something a little more durable. This definitely seems affordable, but when you consider you will end up having to buy replacement parts that will probably give out soon as well, then you will end up buying another lathe (if you haven't given up on the lathe dream by then), you end up burning through a few hundred bucks with nothing to show but a couple crappy looking first time projects.Dear WEN, please be honest when advertising this thing