Thread: MYFORD ML7 what is it worth?

No you don't you know me, but there is an old saying " it takes one to know one"

Originally Posted by China

Can't imagine why anybody would part with an ml7 and keep a chinese lathe

I can!

Myfords have a piddly little throat size. Even the current ones.Great quality but this is one element of the design that severely limits it to small items.

Maybe the chinese copy, and there is gotta be one, has a larger bore chuck.

Mate has one with the gear box with no backlash on the cross slide wheel.
Very impressed, I am, but not enough to buy the current model with all the fruit and lay out $18000. You read it correctly, if what my mate yells me is correct and he is very rarely wrong in these things.

Grahame

Some people obviouslsy took my comment the wrong way I intended for it to be a reflection on build quality, I have a ml7 and I have chinese lathe the latter is no where near as good and replacement parts are expensive back gear bushes $20.00 each + freight = $60.00, and they keep failing it should have rollers. The myford has been going for 10 years with no probs I certainly agree $18000 is way to much

Why would you buy bushes when you have a lathe?
I made up 12 bronze bushes for my old lathe a few years back. Took me an afternoon and $20.00 worth of stock. That's $720.00 worth of bushes by your numbers.... :eek:

I do agree that spindle bore size is not adequate on some of the older English, American and Aus, lathes. I have an old IXL Invicta which is buitifully built. The ways are spot on after 60 years. Spindle bore is 7/8" which limits the machine to smaller work, however. I do not believe that I can match the machine in skills yet though, and I have been doing this as a hobby for a good while now. I don't like chinese machines either. Waste of valuable natural resources in my book. If only they put in a little bit of extra effort, they could turn out much better machines that would last.

Trouble is if they do put extra quality in the Chinese lathes then it costs and they loose their market. Taiwanese lathes are better quality but they cost more and therefore target a different market than the Chinese lathes.

A micky duck toolroom lathe probably costs $30k upwards so it is unfair to compare them to the budget lathe. I am only guessing on the price based on a ML7 being $18K.

Like all things you get what you pay for and if you think about it you get a lot of lathe for a $1,000 Chinese lathe.

I,m not sure that it has to be that way Rod.
I have thought about this for a long time, and I have some ideas on the subject. It would be good discuss and get different ideas on the subject.
Way OT though, so I might post the question on its own.

Fossil, the reason I have not made my own bushes is that until very recently it would have cost me valuable time as I was running a one man woodturning shop, metal turning was more of a hobby, having said that I am now semi retired and will have more time to pursue such things and will probably give it a go

Saw this lately a Myford 2001 model


http://www.lautard.com/latheforsale.html


I was not far off the first time Moot point probably as the lathe would be sold by now.

Grahame