World's largest lathes - photos

[Tonyg]

I have a client in Johannesburg that manufactures winch drums for some of the gold mines using a vertical lathe. The faceplate/chuck is level with the floor and is 8m in diameter. I watched for a while as they surfaced a 7,2m diameter, 3m wide drum which was quite fascinating. I do not remember what the RPM was but it was quite slow as at that diameter the m/minute move by very quickly.