During his revolutionary activities at Kim Il Sung University, Chairman Kim Jong Il worked at the then Pyongyang Textile Machine Manufacturer from April 21 to May 8, Juche 50 (1961). At that time he set a good example of taking care of equipment while personally operating Lathe No. 26 and thus started a model machine movement.

This movement developed into the movement to create model lathes following Lathe No. 26 in the early 1980s.

It was rapidly spread to industrial establishments, co-op farms and all other sectors and units including science, education and public health across the country, displaying its great vitality.

After all, more than 10,000 workshops and at least 11,800 factories and enterprises had become a "Lathe No.26" model machine unit or a twice "Lathe No.26" model machine unit until March 2011. And "Lathe No.26" Model Machine Prize was awarded to 890 workshops and over 1,600 factories and enterprises and twice "Lathe No.26" Model Machine Prize to at least 90 workshops and 10-odd factories and enterprises.

In the last 10 years, one thousand and hundreds of units and machines have won "Lathe No.26" Model Machine Prize (including twice and thrice) by over-fulfilling their national economic plans through the brisk works to put the equipment and production processes on a modern and IT basis and raise the working people's technical skills and level of scientific knowledge and establishing a cultured way of production and life to contribute to socialist construction.

The movement to create model lathes following the example of Lathe No. 26 serves as a mass movement of loyalty for defending and glorifying the undying feats the Chairman performed in managing equipment and as a mass equipment management movement for keeping machines in good state and making effective use of them by making the equipment management a task for the sake of the working masses and steadily improving the technical equipment level and production capacity.