Show us your lathe

[waddycall]

2 x 1.5" #8 woodscrews into brown plugs. Belt can be moved as the motors not exactly firmly fixed! It was only meant to be a temporary measure 2 years ago. Like so many other things...

 

[Disco_Mark]

Been enjoying this thread, but can't believe I haven't replied sooner...

This was rescued from the scrap man recently after it had fallen on its front. A friend had already done the necessary repairs whilst it languished in the scrapyard, so I just had to get some tooling...

It's a myford 254plus, 5" centre height by 20"ish between centres. Nothing like as nice to look at as my two previous ml7's but in a different league performance-wise.

The dro is built from a kit using Chinese scales. It was actually built years ago for my first ml7, but never got fitted. Amazingly the whole lot fitted perfectly onto the 254.

Cheers
Mark

 

[Keith 66]

Heres the pride of my workshop, A Harrison 140 built in 1971 supplied to Seevic college & liberated from there 18 months ago. It has had an easy life & been well maintained. It came with a large quantity of original tooling, 3 & 4 jaw chucks, face plates, change wheels, milling table, collet set etc etc.
It has its original manual & factory test chart.
Im looking for a fixed steady for it if anyone has one going!
I have a spare 9" faceplate, milling table & collet set as well if anyone is interested!
Its been working this morning turning some rowlock pins for a rowing gig.

 

[Shox Dr]

Someone was asking about a table. have a look in the wanted section. As for a fixed steady they do come up on ebay but can fetch daft money. I end ed up making one for my M300

What's the one on the floor to fit?

 

[Keith 66]

Sharp eyes! Im pretty sure the one on the floor is off a Colchester Student or Master, i could machine it to fit i suppose but the base would be a bit thin.

 

[rory1]

Purchased recently off of eBay. Harrison L13 with the dual speed motor, put it into position this evening on my own with a telehandler, a few lengths of pipe and a big bar!

I have the tail stock but a hadn't fitted it when I took the pic, came with a three jaw, faceplate and driving plate, I'm looking for a L-0 4 jaw for it now.

Just need to work out how to power it from the single phase supply now.

 

[hareng]

Think that will be costly to power up being a dual speed old 5hp motor, may be like starting a 15hp. Its the initial current draw on them old motors but looking on the bright side it hasn't got to power the gearbox with clutch engaged might be lucky keep us posted.

 

[DrNik]

heres a horror story, fell of a pallet and was going to be scrapped £300 later, it works sort of, put a single phase motor on it, loadsa slack in everything well thats the excuse for my sloppy workmanship

 

[jackjosh]

Once moved from the garage to the workshop I will post a pic of my single phase Raglan Littlejohn mk2 with the Norton screwcutting gearbox.

 

[Henrik]

Here's mine:





Not as versatile as a real lathe in many ways (e.g. no tailstock yet, but I'll use the overarm for that at some point, no taper turning, which I will fix with a separate top slide), but on the other hand it's got other benefits (space, huge swing if required (for the size), gearbox etc etc).

For my needs, it's perfect at the moment, as I simply have not got the space in the garage for a lathe, and it lets me do at least simple lathe operations, which is realistically all I'd do anyway.

I'm hoping to use it to build a CNC lathe at some point (not retro fitted onto this machine), but other projects are taking priority.

 

[MattF]

heres a horror story

One here which isn't exactly a horror story, but it is definitely in need of some work before it's usable.

Currently taken a break from the large green saw now that it's to the point where it literally only needs a few bronze bushes to finish it off, and trying to get this one mostly done. This and the saw took/take up so much room when in pieces that they were at the top of the list for restoration, just so I could make some room.

It's coming along steadily, but does need a lot of work. Pretty much every single piece of it has some degree of rust, so they're all having to be derusted one by one. Beds and such won't be pristine when it's done, due to the amount of rust pitting, but the general mass of metal should is good, so the pitting shouldn't, hopefully, be a problem. It's amazing just how many pieces you have to sort when you strip something down though.

This is one bit which was sorted a while ago. The nuts and such are a good indicator of how the most exposed surfaces come up once the rust is gone.

Considering the condition it was in though, not too bad, IMHO.

Anyone noticed that I seem to have a thing for rusty old metal?

 

[Pete.]

Nice job on bringing that round Matt. Do you ever do any hand scraping?

 

[dan.taylor.1]

Would somebody explain what scraping is?? I keep hearing it on forums but don't know what it is!?

Dan

 

[shenion]

Lathes, mills etc have sliding surfaces; usually dovetails. You want them to be perfectly flat.

The usual procedure is to cover one surface with bluing; basically a thin dye. The slide the parts together. The high spots will wipe the bluing off. Then you use a scraper to remove the high spots.

It is slow an tedious but creates a perfectly flat surface.

 

[MattF]

Nice job on bringing that round Matt. Do you ever do any hand scraping?

Not unless I absolutely have to. Generally, I don't mind a slight bit of wear. Most of the time it's easily enough compensated for by other means. It's like when you automatically compensate for backlash, without even thinking about it. Likely most of us never need worry about a thou or so of play when we're machining something, so scraping is one of those things I class as a necessary last resort rather than a preferred choice.

If it's gone past that point though, then scraping is the only feasible option. I have a couple of old files which have been adapted for scraping.

 

[dan.taylor.1]

Cheers shenion, excuse the ignorance, but what do you mean by a scraper, the scrapers I'm used to use the cut throat razor blades, or have a sharpened steel blade like a wide screwdriver blade.

Dan

 

[brightspark]

engineers hand scraper

heres one but u can make your own out of an old file or pick them up cheap from autojumbles http://www.tesco.com/direct/faithfu...pid=306-3804&gclid=CIKVuJ7S-7oCFUrJtAod9VwAiw

 

[Pete.]

I make my own. Won a bag of K9 carbide tips for a few quid on eBay and I just braze them onto a steel shank. I also made one by brazing on a carbide slip gauge also a couple of quid off eBay. Something like this

 

[MattF]

Sounds like you actually enjoy scraping Pete. Do those carbide tipped ones work well?

 

[zardoz]

Gorgeous things lathes.
I have dim memories of using one at school and wondering at the power it seemd to posess.
Dont have one myself, but would love one.

Agree with Mr chunkolini here. I too used one at school, (also milling and shaping machines. Things schools dont have now) dont own one, but would love one.