Colchester Bantam Mk1 1600

[Dieselman 63]

It's good to see it so near to completion. I do like the aesthetic touch with the red felt

Don't forget to paint the tail stock

Don’t you like Colchester’s light brown-grey?

It’s been good to see you getting into some more restoration with your compressor mate, I had a good read through that.

 

[Ton-up]

matching toolboxes too....

 

[Dieselman 63]

matching toolboxes too....

I know! Couldn’t resist getting another, one to take to work and one to keep all my engineering things in.

 

[Dieselman 63]

With everything gathering a bit of pace, I dug out the gib strips for the saddle. These are in quite a state, amazing to think this is what the machine looked like three years ago


Time flies!

 

[Farside]

Love the GT40 homage on the toolboxes.
Only missing a color (sic) stripe, but that might be a bit too much of an overdone thing. The single 40 and blue background does quite well.

 

[Dieselman 63]

Love the GT40 homage on the toolboxes.
Only missing a color (sic) stripe, but that might be a bit too much of an overdone thing. The single 40 and blue background does quite well.

There is a stripe on the front...

 

[Farside]

There is a stripe on the front...

I take it back, it looks right.

 

[Dieselman 63]

Today I painted and fixed the lamp bracket to the headstock, it looks good.

I cleaned up the rear adjustable gib, that needed to be fitted before the mother of all attachments goes on, the taper turner. These were in ‘as removed’ condition, very dirty and took a good effort to get cleaned.

I have some painting to do on the main taper casting, but I thought I’d fit the it as it’s one less thing to lose the screws for.

The apron is filled and is in primer. Once that gets painted it’s gonna be a big step forward!

 

[God mode restorations]

Today I painted and fixed the lamp bracket to the headstock, it looks good.

I cleaned up the rear adjustable gib, that needed to be fitted before the mother of all attachments goes on, the taper turner. These were in ‘as removed’ condition, very dirty and took a good effort to get cleaned.

I have some painting to do on the main taper casting, but I thought I’d fit the it as it’s one less thing to lose the screws for.

The apron is filled and is in primer. Once that gets painted it’s gonna be a big step forward!

Happy days mate. Nice work.

 

[Agroshield]

Love the GT40 homage on the toolboxes.

The red on the lathe should have been the orange on the GT40 livery. And maybe a subtle highlight on the 40tpi threading plate.

 

[Dieselman 63]

The red on the lathe should have been the orange on the GT40 livery. And maybe a subtle highlight on the 40tpi threading plate.

I’d rather not have a Gulf racing lathe.

I did try to replicate the bicolour plaques, but the paint was too difficult to do. Different colours have different consistencies so it all fell apart. The Bantam one had red and blue for the speeds, but it didnt work sadly.

 

[Dieselman 63]

Today was good. I rebuilt the apron, which was hard going as I had to remember how it all went back together - takes a few goes! There’s circlips in there too, always a fun time. The originals had rusted through so I had to buy new.

It’s on though, and I’m well pleased! The saddle is laden both sides now, apron on the front and tta on the back - the Bantam is well-built and of heavy construction. Tomorrow I will look at the cross slide - it needs cleaning and all the screw holes are manky as. No rest for the wicked!

 

[Dieselman 63]

Taper turning attachment on. The cross slide screw is different when you put the attachment on so it’s a big job, and one I don’t really want to do again.

Next job, the cross slide itself.

 

[slim_boy_fat]

Coming along nicely, keep up the good work.

 

[Dieselman 63]

Coming along nicely, keep up the good work.

Lockdown has provided me with the means to get this done (infinite boredom!)

 

[Dieselman 63]

Feed rod and lead screw bracket reinstalled. This wasn’t easy, quite fiddly but we got there in the end. These things are a lot easier to take apart than reassemble!

Bad news, I seem to have lost 4/6 gib screws from the cross slide. Total mystery. They’re in none of the places I store lathe parts. And I’ve also lost the scribe point from my M&W scribe. Not happy.

 

[Agroshield]

Out of interest, how easy is it to get UNC stuff in your place?

Do you have the collar for the outboard end of the feed shaft? I ask because it was only on one out of three machines that passed under my eyes.

 

[Seadog]

I seem to have lost 4/6 gib screws from the cross slide. Total mystery. They’re in none of the places I store lathe parts. And I’ve also lost the scribe point from my M&W scribe.

Perhaps they've gone off together

 

[Dieselman 63]

Out of interest, how easy is it to get UNC stuff in your place?

Do you have the collar for the outboard end of the feed shaft? I ask because it was only on one out of three machines that passed under my eyes.

My old work had oodles of UNC and UNF, we had a lot of American construction machinery which was all imperial - great fun. I would estimate it is quite easy as we would get boxes of the stuff weekly, but large gauge, I think 5/16 or 1/4 was our smallest, though if they make it they probably do all the sizes.

Yes I do have the collar on the inside, but not the outer end. It stops the feed shaft from slipping out as you’ll know. I think Colchester began to get economical as production advanced! The studs on early models were lovely hex stock with threaded ends - on later ones just thread bar.

Interestingly I noticed my taper turner has a serial 0103... thanks very much for that link btw.

 

[Dieselman 63]

Perhaps they've gone off together

For a grand tour of attractive mid-century British machine tools, but of course!