A buddy of mine called me yesterday, from the home of some folks having a garage sale in a nearby town.
"Ken, I'm thinking of buying this lathe, they want $375 for it."
Oh, yeah?" says I.
"You think that's a good price? It comes with a set of tools."
"I dunno--maybe. What kind of lathe is it?"
My friend asks the lathe owner. I hear in the background:
"Jet"
"It's a---"
"Yup, I heard. How about a model number?"
"OK, yeah--here it is...uh, Jay, double-yoo, el, dash one, two, uh, three, six."
"Oh," I say. "A 1236. $375 is a little high for that model used.What kind of shape is it in?"
"He says he bought it new, never even used it. Paid six-hundred-something for it. I think it's a dang good price for a like-new lathe, don't you?"
"Well, I suppose...it's OK. But, hey--where you gonna put this thing? You don't have any shop space--not even a basement in your house!"
Well, it took a bit of arm-twisting on my friend's part (my arm, that is) but he finally convinced me to ride with him this morning to get the lathe, help load it into his van, and unload it into my shop--parking it in a convenient place out of the way, but near an outlet just in case I wanted to plug the lathe in and try it out.
I did give it a good look-over before we lugged it out of the guy's garage, the belt and pulleys had very little, if any, wear. The bed was still covered with shipping grease which after about 3 yrs was dry and wax-like.
The set of tools thrown into the deal were the typical no-name cheapies, carbon steel, but probably halfway useable for a novice (or not).
So, now, I have a like-new, quite decent quality lathe taking up valuable space in my shop for an indefinite period of time, but I can't call it mine. I can use it to my heart's content, but my friend isn't interested in selling it to me at this point. I'm hoping to change his mind, it would be easier to sell my existing lathe if I owned the Jet. But noooo, my buddy wants to keep strings attached so I'll feel obliged to give him turning lessons! Isn't that what friends are for? 

Rev, my lathe is a Karle Spinshop (Spinmaster) metalspinning lathe, converted for woodturning.
The exact model is pictured on the following site, scroll down a ways toward the bottom--it's the green one on the right.

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A super-heavy duty lathe, the cast iron is about 3/4" section thickness all over. Biggest shortcoming is the length, only 13" between centers.

I had the spindle nose rethreaded from an odd 1 3/8" x ?tpi (can't remember) down to 1" x 8 tpi, and machined a new tailstock barrel with a handwheel and morse taper socket.

Some older pics (c 2000) of my actual lathe are here:
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