Most lathe owners assume that the cross-travel of their lathe's cross-slide will be sufficient to face across the full diameter of the lathe's swing. In practice, this is rarely the case, and in all honesty, it is something we rarely need to do. There are exceptions, of course, such as truing up a faceplate, but more importantly the more travel we have the greater flexibility we have in tool placement, making it easier to turn large diameters and bores or other awkward tasks. Mini-lathe owners might imagine that the limiting factors on the cross-slide travel of their machine are adequate engagement of the leadscrew in the feednut and overlap of the dovetails. This is true when feeding the slide 'away from the operator', but winding the saddle 'out' it will stop somewhat sooner than one might expect. It is, however, possible to increase the 'towards the operator' travel significantly.
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