Hi Steve,
I guess I'll start off with a few of my observations that may be able to help you out. I too am a newbie to maching, I've had a lathe for about 13 months so I am not as experienced as others on this forum.
I wanted a lathe for quite sometime and looked at many online but was always discouraged by the frieght costs and the possibilities of paying extra with customs, etc. I found out that a local store in town carries the Taig lathe. I looked at it a few times and my wife surprised me with it for a birthday
I think all together it was a little under $450 Cdn so I think it was a great deal for starting out.
My observations so far, I quickly found out that there are really only so many round things to make, brake rotors, mufflers, shocks and fire extinguisher. I think that really a lathe is meant to compliment a mill (or milling set-up) I have purchased some accessories for my lathe and made a few modifications. I have added digital readouts to help with accuracey. I have a milling vice but have found out that without a way to divide the chuck into equal parts it really is limited and I really haven't had the time to completely explore it. I feel that a decent mill (or milling set-up) would be a valuable addition to any serious machining set-up.
I also make some things to sell on Ebay in order to pay for my ever growing kit collection and have since learned that if you want to manufacture the same item with any kind of accuracey you will need to consider CNC. My best friend has a chinese lathe that he CNC'd and makes some stunning parts with it and it really does help speed things along, he has made a few parts for me and what takes me in an evening he can do in several minutes. Now CNC'ing is expensive and takes time to learn, also takes a lot of time to set-up your equipment right in order to function properly. There are some great CNC forums out there to learn some of this stuff.
Machining is a constant learning process and I'm still not sure if I am doing things the right way but it is fun and pretty cool when you put something on paper and then make it on the lathe. Take your time in selecting your equipment and keep asking questions I think this forum will be a great place to learn stuff (and I've learned a lot already) I have considered upgrading my lathe but after searching the net and seeing the stuff that people are making on the Taig I think it really has a lot of potential.
I have found over the last year of playing with my lathe that the accessories are just as important as the lathe itself. Things like top slides, quick change tollposts and digital readouts are invaluable items that you will need to add into your budget.
Hope that this all makes sense and helps you out.
Mike