AlanS
Active Member
One of the sections which drew me to this site was the section on Machine Modifications. That’s a particular interest of mine (in addition to building working models), making and modifying tools.
This picture might be of interest to those who can't leave machines stock..
This is my main lathe, I’ve another smaller lathe which doesn’t get a lot of use. This one is a 1950s era Atlas QC54 which I’ve owned for almost 40 years. I’ve been replacing parts and upgrading pieces over the years, mainly die cast Zamac parts with steel, very few Zamac pieces survive.
This isn’t a posed picture, no clean up beforehand, just snapped this morning while I was making a batch of brass pipe connections for the cooling system for my Seal Major engine.
Obvious changes are the reworked tailstock with rack feed and lever bed lock, the T slotted cross slide and billet steel compound slide with a geared leadscrew to get the handle away from the tailstock. Larger index dials including one on the tailstock.
Not so obvious are the presence of a clutch on the countershaft, a lever operated cross feed and a lever operated spindle lock (the bull gear has been modified to change the drillings from indexing to locking).
What doesn’t show are the change gears and apron cross-feed gears which are now steel. Probably the most major and time-consuming upgrade of all - the bed has been re-scraped three times over the time I’ve owned the lathe. Each time I scraped the bed to remove .0015” hollow at the chuck end.
Oh yeah, ball handles everywhere.
This picture might be of interest to those who can't leave machines stock..
This is my main lathe, I’ve another smaller lathe which doesn’t get a lot of use. This one is a 1950s era Atlas QC54 which I’ve owned for almost 40 years. I’ve been replacing parts and upgrading pieces over the years, mainly die cast Zamac parts with steel, very few Zamac pieces survive.
This isn’t a posed picture, no clean up beforehand, just snapped this morning while I was making a batch of brass pipe connections for the cooling system for my Seal Major engine.
Obvious changes are the reworked tailstock with rack feed and lever bed lock, the T slotted cross slide and billet steel compound slide with a geared leadscrew to get the handle away from the tailstock. Larger index dials including one on the tailstock.
Not so obvious are the presence of a clutch on the countershaft, a lever operated cross feed and a lever operated spindle lock (the bull gear has been modified to change the drillings from indexing to locking).
What doesn’t show are the change gears and apron cross-feed gears which are now steel. Probably the most major and time-consuming upgrade of all - the bed has been re-scraped three times over the time I’ve owned the lathe. Each time I scraped the bed to remove .0015” hollow at the chuck end.
Oh yeah, ball handles everywhere.
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