DAPPH
as dyslexik as I'm daft
- Messages
- 6,470
- Location
- Near to Cross Hands Llanelli SouthWales GB
I had the chance to buy a 77 year old ex War Department Atlas 10" F metalwork lathe yesterday for a song , so I did.
The lathe was purchased in 1946 at the War Departments dispersal sale , when the owner died his son inherited it he is now 68 and downsizing big time .
It has stencilled on the back " war colours only " which are battleship grey though the inside of the bed is bright red
Both guys were engineering officers on submarines and have looked after the lathe very well , there are six tiny dings on the back of the bed where some work has come free and slapped the bed and a broken leg on the hand wheel on the compound cross slide .
It's been an interesting exercise , meting the guy , collecting it, transporting it home , getting it out the KIA and up on the stand ..
Thankfully I've three pulley sets, one of which is a 2 tonne chain hoist and a couple of big joists running across the garage roof . My wheel chair hoist was also employed at one stage .
It has most of the original tooling and loads of screw cutting and feed gearing . Most of the tools are of American origin, some of th bigger Morse taper drills don't look as though they have ever been used . Same with lots of the gear wheels as they are still covered in a thick yellow preservative .
I've spent today getting it back on the cast iron stand and tidying the remainder of my " man cupboard " because the effective foot print is 2 foot by five foot .
Tonight I spent a couple of hours getting to know it , cleaning and oiling and filling grease caps etc. , I stripped down the compound slide washed it in paraffin to remove years of crud , dried it then lightly oiled it or sprayed it with silicone spray .. Cor it runs back and forth like a dream.
Tomorrow I'll be truing up the machine with loads of shim's, as it will have had almost 24 hours to settle to it's new home , when that's done I'll strip off all the back gears , give them & all the other unused gears & tooling a paraffin wash and a dry off then reassemble things & oil those things that are allowed to be oiled/greased .
I'm leaving the old GEC drive motor alone for the capacitor can is as big as a 1/3 pint Brasso can and the cable covering is all nicely cracked .
One thing I noticed is that unlike the American state side versions shown in the manual there is no on off switch on the lathe so I think I'll install one with an emergency stop button as well .
Come Monday , I hope to have it fully serviced and ready to start playing so I can see if it is good enough for me to turn a load of aluminium spacers , that someone has said they'd do and haven't even though they've had £42 's worth of ally bar off me.
The lathe was purchased in 1946 at the War Departments dispersal sale , when the owner died his son inherited it he is now 68 and downsizing big time .
It has stencilled on the back " war colours only " which are battleship grey though the inside of the bed is bright red
Both guys were engineering officers on submarines and have looked after the lathe very well , there are six tiny dings on the back of the bed where some work has come free and slapped the bed and a broken leg on the hand wheel on the compound cross slide .
It's been an interesting exercise , meting the guy , collecting it, transporting it home , getting it out the KIA and up on the stand ..
Thankfully I've three pulley sets, one of which is a 2 tonne chain hoist and a couple of big joists running across the garage roof . My wheel chair hoist was also employed at one stage .
It has most of the original tooling and loads of screw cutting and feed gearing . Most of the tools are of American origin, some of th bigger Morse taper drills don't look as though they have ever been used . Same with lots of the gear wheels as they are still covered in a thick yellow preservative .
I've spent today getting it back on the cast iron stand and tidying the remainder of my " man cupboard " because the effective foot print is 2 foot by five foot .
Tonight I spent a couple of hours getting to know it , cleaning and oiling and filling grease caps etc. , I stripped down the compound slide washed it in paraffin to remove years of crud , dried it then lightly oiled it or sprayed it with silicone spray .. Cor it runs back and forth like a dream.
Tomorrow I'll be truing up the machine with loads of shim's, as it will have had almost 24 hours to settle to it's new home , when that's done I'll strip off all the back gears , give them & all the other unused gears & tooling a paraffin wash and a dry off then reassemble things & oil those things that are allowed to be oiled/greased .
I'm leaving the old GEC drive motor alone for the capacitor can is as big as a 1/3 pint Brasso can and the cable covering is all nicely cracked .
One thing I noticed is that unlike the American state side versions shown in the manual there is no on off switch on the lathe so I think I'll install one with an emergency stop button as well .
Come Monday , I hope to have it fully serviced and ready to start playing so I can see if it is good enough for me to turn a load of aluminium spacers , that someone has said they'd do and haven't even though they've had £42 's worth of ally bar off me.