Show Us Your Lathe

[SHARPSHOOTER90]

Not sure what your reference to political overtones is all about, but I agree the Monarch was in production before the war, but only affordable to professional machine shops- the price was way out of reach for any home shop. After the war, their production dropped back to prior levels and even less, as they had a lot of unused wartime parts sitting on shelves.
The title of this forum is the HOME MODEL ENGINE MACHINIST, so you shouldn't compare professional production machines to low cost machines designed for the home machinist.

 

[catproc]

Hey guys, I'm new in here ,My lathe is Emco Maximat Super 11 with mill

 

[abby]

Getting older and feeling the cold , I thought it would be nice to be able to work in the comfort of our kitchen.
I make stuff for a living so having a day off because it's too cold in the workshop is not an option.
some small machines light enough to carry , or fitted with wheels would be ideal , wheel 'em in and out as needed but what machines !
I have an ML7 but a clockmakers lathe could do the very small and accurate turning.
Keeping an eye on the net I eventually bought this ......cheap !

I took a risk but reckoned worst way I could sell the collets for more than the asking price.

The rust came off with wire wool and paraffin and after some preparation she got some paint.

It is fitted onto a plywood cabinet with a 3 phase motor fitted inside and inverter speed control.

these machines had many fittings and I have collected a form and cut-off slide and a 6 station capstan turret too.
The turret tooling is just like the big machines.........but small.
I have also gathered two boxes of 3/16" square HSS , genuine Mushet and Mo-max
It is a dream to use with silky smooth hand scraped slides and capable of working to 1/2 a thou consistently.
Still in the workshop though ! need some production work for it.

 

[SilverSanJuan]

Wow, that was quite a find. Nice rebuild too.

Todd

 

[lathe nut]

Guess I should post this in the proper place, yes I did get another lathe, promised my wife no more but this one needed a home, well she takes care of dogs and cats until she finds them a home and I am doing the same with the lahtes, but someone will have to come and get them when I am gone, this is a Leymann, Model 2013 (20 inch swing, 13 foot between centers) built in 1933 and was shipped to T&P Iron works in Sulphur Louisiana, did find out that the building is still there, going to get by there and see if I can find out more infomation, wish I could find someone that run it that would be neat, I have all the parts moving will only have to make the shifting handle and on dog lever inside the head stock, the Lehmann people were so wonderful to talk to, they are going to send me information on this lathe going to have fun with the cleaning of it, not looking forward to that, Lathe Nut

 

[mgbrv8]

Is that a Harbor Freight roll/shear/break. How do you like it?

Dave

Mine, at about six tonnes, is such a delicate little thing.

It's got a magnetic XY sensor system on it though, so I can put the cutting tool back to within 0.001" quite accurately.

 

[bb218]

They were dirty when I took the photos. Mike

 

[jimchelt]

Hello to all members
I'm 66, too fat, bald but still interested in almost anything technical. I'm constantly amazed by what men in sheds can do with fairly modest equipment and have been inspired by a neighbour to 'have a go' myself. So, here is a picture of my little lathe. It's a Lorch LL-S, a very nice instrument makers machine. I am open to all advice ( and encouragement) and will be visiting this great site for inspiration and sheer delight in what can be done.
Jim
(based in Cheltenham in the UK)

 

[Cheshire Steve]

Seeking something small for delicate work I picked up this lathe. I sent the details to Tony Griffiths (of www.lathes.co.uk) and he hadn't seen one before so posted it on his 'unknown' list (http://www.lathes.co.uk/unknown66/). Almost certainly home-made it is not clear if it was made from a kit or based on an article in one of the magazines, or a complete one-off - but the use of cast-in-place white metal bearings and similarly secured twin bar bed seems both unusual and yet quite a practical way to get a precision lathe without precision boring equipment. It has been kicked around and the bed bars are out of line and one headstock bearing is missing, but when I get some Babbitt metal and some new bed bars I should be able to remake it as it was intended.

If anyone knows of anything like it, I would be very interested to find out.

 

[Tin Falcon]

some sort of "Kit lathe" i remember seeing somthing similar. this one is sort of similar but also different a "Counin" ??

[URL="http://books.google.com/books?id=ReMDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA182&lpg=PA182&dq=lathe+kit&source=bl&ots=Y3TtN4hfFz&sig=NxXw4_ua2DWjfQRyu-THVfTonmo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=GNhFUJaoA-e66wG7nIGYDg&ved=0CFkQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=l"Student project model makers Lathe[/URL]
Tin

 

[Cheshire Steve]

Thanks for the link to Practical Mechanics - hadn't seen that article, though plenty of Emco Unimat's around with twin bar bed (and cross-slide too), which look similar. I have been wondering about making a spacer piece for the tail end and adding a lead-screw. So this could end up even more similar.

The odd thing here is that the crude facing of the headstock casting suggests the maker didn't have any precision equipment. Instead, all the alignment was achieved by casting in place. A bit of research suggests that using a smoky candle to soot up a polished headstock spindle, it is possible to cast the bearing in place and leave a perfectly fitted spindle. The way bars are secured in the headstock by casting in place, presumably using tinning or turned grooves to ensure they are securely held. The tailstock white metal is again cast in place. Provided you jig to make the bars flat and parallel before casting, it seems a way to make an accurate tool using crude tools, which is fairly clever.

You mentioned 'Counin' - can't find a reference to that. There was a larger lathe design by Henry Greenly that used poured in place white metal bearings for headstock and tailstock (that was about 1915), and a similar design in a book by Raymond Francis Yates in 1922 which had twin bar bed. There is some info here : http://www.lathes.co.uk/greenly/

Yates' book is on-line, this link might work. The chapter shows a twin-bar larger lathe and the bearings being poured in situ.
http://www.archive.org/stream/laworkforbeginn00yategoog#page/n196/mode/2up

It is almost as if the principle in this book has been adapted to make a watchmaker's lathe. Back in the 1920 and 1930s, pouring white metal in place to make bearings was quite commonplace - so it might easily be of that vintage.

 

[lathe nut]

Well its not a total lathe but one of those Smithy Midas 1220XL, combo's, I got it on Craig's list, it was a real good deal and cleaned up real nice, I always wanted one don't know much about them but it was cute, that fellow had a lot of things in those draws and those dies are all Left Hand thread ? this is the last one no more lathes, promise, that is what I told my Wife, she does not believe me ?

 

[napoleonb]

If anyone knows of anything like it, I would be very interested to find out.

At our school the wood-working department has got just such a little lathe but of a later date if i'd guess. No name or maker brand though. Yours seem to have been chopped as there had been another "foot" just a meter futher. Original those things were intended for turning wooden pegs for chairs or stairs, so they were quite long. Hope this helps a bit.

 

[BritishReactionResearch]

Hello,

All these shiny American lathes are very nice but I'm afraid there can be only one:-

 

[peatrich]

This is my old 1953 Myford ML7. I have a vertical slide, with an after market vice attached to it, at the moment, so that I can mill the cylinder of an engine to a pleasing shape. Obviously I have other shop tools as well, to complement it, but they aren't unusual enough to comment on.

I haven't owned the lathe for very long and I am finding using it a steep learning curve.

Fortunately it has had a gentle life, apart from the fact that someone thought it would be a good idea to grind the end of the lathe bed at some time to accommodate something bigger than 7"diameter!

I am in the middle of building my first engine, an oscillator, and just wish I had started this hobby years ago - I'm six years older than the lathe and in far worse condition; I don't work without complaining and I'm nowhere near as accurate...

 

[Cheshire Steve]

At our school the wood-working department has got just such a little lathe but of a later date if i'd guess. No name or maker brand though. Yours seem to have been chopped as there had been another "foot" just a meter futher. Original those things were intended for turning wooden pegs for chairs or stairs, so they were quite long. Hope this helps a bit.

Interesting thought - that would be something like a Coronet wood lathe, they have twin bar beds with the headstock just clamped to the bars, and a simple woodturners tool rest. The use of bars in place of a precision ground bed is a way to get a lathe bed at modest cost, though probably not quite as stiff as a large casting. Its a great way to make your own lathe. Coronet started making these in the 1970s, I am not sure if there were twin bar wood lathes before that - Coronets were single bar before the 1970s. I think Record and Sorby adopted the design too, it is probably a common design now, made in China and badged differently in every country.

http://www.lathes.co.uk/coronet major/page4.html

My lathe came from a clockmakers workshop which also contained some very fine watchmakers/clockmakers lathes - which I couldn't afford. Watch and clock makers do often use a simple tool rest, not unlike a wood turner's rest, with a tool called a graver - although much smaller scale of course. However I really doubt this is an adapted wood lathe, though it would be interesting to know when twin bar bed wood lathes first came out.

 

[BritishReactionResearch]

Hello Peatrich,

Thats a lovely old Myford. I have seen that gap bed "modification" on others too, sometimes not completed as elegantly as on yours. Do you find that your machine turns parallel alright?

Odd to think of the age of some of the machines we use. My Harrison M250 is a mere whippersnapper at 30 years old!

 

[peatrich]

Hello Peatrich,

Thats a lovely old Myford. I have seen that gap bed "modification" on others too, sometimes not completed as elegantly as on yours. Do you find that your machine turns parallel alright?

Hi
I spent some time checking it over before I bought it and I think it has either had fairly light use, or has been looked after and maintained. I spent some time stripping, cleaning and setting up the slides to make sure they were adjusted properly when I got it home and I'm very happy with it. In the picture I'm using a 3 jaw for skimming brass bar to shape and if anything that is where any inaccuracy lies.

kind regards

Peter

 

[albertorc19]

This is my 7X12 lathe sold in Mexico by Phase II. It is the same Mini Lathe available for model engineers around the world under different labels but it is the same lathe made by Central Machinery in China. Not a bad piece of equipment if a Myford, Emco or a similar lathe is out of your league. I made the bench myself.

 

[Propforward]

That's a nice lathe - but I have to say WOW to the bench. That is a very fine piece of craftsmanship.