Thread: What is a Toolroom lathe?

Originally Posted by slhouetteV8

So the biggest comment so far in regards to the a toolroom lathe is they have more mass and the hand wheels are a delight to use. Delightful hand wheels.

Now if it were a car I could see the need for a little luxury but it's a tool.

Hi Silhouette,
I think you will find that hand wheels being a delight to use means that they are smooth to turn throughout the entire length of the screw with no tight spots or gritty feel which indicates true alignment of the nut with the screw and the dovetails are even for the full length. I also get the feeling you already knew that.

Phil

Hey Phil, yeah I'm only teasing, ill have to start using the smilies I much prefer quality where I can afford it and can fully appreciate nice hand wheels.

Originally Posted by Hunch

May interest you, quoted local price for regrind to toolroom quality.....

Bed regrind vees and flats, underside keep faces / saddle regrind / hand scrape in slides, / regrind and fit keep plates / regrind fit tailstock shoe.


$ 880-00 ball park ( gst exclusive ). You dismantle and send in just the bed & saddle, tailstock shoe.

$880? Bargain! Seriously-if that price is for a Graz re-grind I think it's a steal. What am I missing?

Greg

(I'd love to have my Hembrug re-ground, but it needs a special grinder, so I'll have to lap the hardened ways instead.)

I agree with Greg, that sounds too cheap. People on PM usually talk about bed grinds in 4 figures. Would like to know what Phil thinks.
Edit: But I guess the 'laughing like a drain' smiley indicates you think it's a bit suss too Bill?

Yeah and that's enough cheek from up the back too. At least mine runs.

Originally Posted by Anorak Bob

A real draw card for the HLV-H is the availability of parts and accessories. A search for Hardinge on US Ebay usually reveals around 2500 items. A large number of those items are for the HLV-H.

In contrast, a Schaublin search today came up with 111 items. I have not seen an accessory for a Schaublin 125 or 135 in nearly two years of daily trawling Ebay in search of accessories for my mill of which there have been 3.

BT

Bob, yep that's one of the biggies for me. There is a huge amount of information and spares available for them. The threading operation is also supposed to be an absolute delight to use.

Re the 260, it's all relative Bob. Compared to a genuine toolroom lathe it's a POS, but compared to a current Chinese offering about the same in reverse. No problems with the Hercus lathes, but having been labeled a religious nutter because I was happy with my Apple products I thought if I starting waxing lyrical about my lathes I'm sure I then be accused as the leader of some cult!! Having said that, the new one is still sitting on its wheels, not having had a chance to pursue it further. I have however got significantly better at rendering brickwork ... not a lot of lathe use in that though

Ewan that's a sad tale, it sounds as if you got an especially bad one and that's always disappointing in itself. It does little to encourage my enthusiasm for them though.

Pete

Sitting on its wheels. They those caravan jockey wheels you stole aboard in your hand luggage Pete? You and I won't pretend our lathes are anything more than they were intended to be. Still, having owned one for ten years, I now couldn't do without it.

Sure I'd like something better but better and affordable are pretty thin on the ground over here. I just happened to be real real lucky with the mill.

BT

Originally Posted by Anorak Bob

PDW,

My question of Pete was not about a comparison of a little Hercus with a toolroom lathe but simply a query regarding his apparent disappointment with the 260.

I thought Pete would be enamored with his recent acquisition, a brand new, gearbox equipped metric lathe.

I don't own a 260 but I have had some experience with the older nine inch lathes and I am aware of their abilities and limitations. While I have never used a toolroom lathe, I did see a stunning '50s CVA when I visited a local toolmaker's shop. That lathe was in it's own league, as much an artform as a machine.

BT

As Pete F said, it's relative. I'd agree the Hercus is way above the equivalent machines sourced from China being sold today except - maybe - for the bed as I'm not sure if the Hercus is hardened or not and I think the Chinese ones are.

If the CVA you're referring to is the one I think it is, it's a knock-off copy of the Monarch 10EE without the 10EE drive system. I agree, a very nice machine. One sold last year less than 2 km from my house in Sydney and I was very, very tempted to bid on it. It went for not much over $3K IIRC, which - if it was in excellent condition - was a very good price.

If you want/need a lathe *now*, you go & buy new within your budget. Given enough time you can trade up to a higher quality used machine.

That optimist glass something has a Colchester Chipmaster converted with a VFD listed for over $5K on Ebay ATM. I'd like to know what he's smoking.... OTOH one with no drive system at all sold for around $1800 on Ebay a week or so back.

The mass issue is important. My Emco Maximat 11 is at least as accurate as the Chipmaster but it can't take the same depth of cut/feed without suffering more deflection. I was using the Chipmaster to make a run of wheels for a sawmill carriage at one point, boring them out for bearings. Once I had the cuts worked out for the first one, I could just do the rest without bothering to stop & measure between cuts. The rigidity buys you that level of repeatability and the rigidity comes from mass and good design.

Pity the Chipmaster doesn't have a single tooth dog clutch in its drive train though.....

PDW

I had a budget price of $3,000 to regrind my bed. $800 sounds like the price to regrind a lathe of hercus size. The big problem is size. With a bed 1.8m long there are few grinders around that can fit it on the bed.

Michael

Originally Posted by Ueee

Pete,
Ken has saved me having to say some things, but here's some more. Y ways are just machined, not ground, x gib has been over scraped and needs shimming, quill lock moves quill back and causes knocking in splines (fix by Dave J), top bearing is not tapered(also fix by Dave J)belts cannot be tightened sufficiently in some speeds as the motor pulley hits the back of the housing, poor assembly and lubing when delivered, "fine" down feed doesn't always engage properly (probably lube in clutch) EVERYTHING rattles when doing interrupted cuts with carbide. Basically just poor attention to detail at all levels, from design through to assembly.

The biggest downer though is just the feel of the machine. My lathe, although some 55 years old just feels gorgeous to use. Sometimes i just want to spin the handweels just to feel the silky smoothness. The HM50 feels neither smooth nor silky, although i am planing a full strip-down, clean and lube, maybe it will improve the feel.
If you have never experienced this feeling with a machine, then try to before trying a Chinese one, you will immediately feel the difference.

Having said that the machine does a great job at what it was bought to do- roughing out re-enactment swords ready for linishing. In this regards at has paid for itself many times over, and i never thought i would be using it more for much engineering work.

Ewan

Hi Ewan,
A strip down will make it a smoother machine to operate, I know it did mine on both the first mill and this one. Don't forget to split the nuts to take out backlash while you are there. I found both my Y and Z axis nuts to be sitting to high/low and needed to add shims to them, which made the axis feel a lot better.
I have plans to bore the head casting and press a sleeve into it, then bore and hone that to be a good fit. A piece of hollow cast to do the job is $110.

As Ray said they come out of different factories (I was told by H&F there where 3 or 4). When they had trouble with the warped tables on the HM52's they imported a container load of HM52's from another manufacturer until there original one got there act together (their words) As I was told by them they where sending over green castings and by the time they arrived they where warped.. This batch of HM52 B's arrived with hardened tables which aged the tables.

Ray tried to buy one but found there where no HM52 (B) mills left, but a container was coming in. When they arrived they where not the same as the B models, so I would say they where more expensive so they went back with there standard manufacturer as the problem had been fixed with the tables. As Ray said they are after profits, when I had all my troubles I was told by one guy in the service department "these are only cheap machines" To which I replied $5000 might be cheap to you but not to me. I also told him they never advertised them as cheap Chinese mills, but did advertise them as "A quality machine sold for over 20 years"

I noticed after I was publicly talking about the HM52 (B) they started advertising the HM50 as a B model, bit of a coincidence.

As for the Hercus V's Chinese lathes, I sold my old 9inch Hercus and bought a 12 x 36 lathe from Gasweld. I wouldn't buy one of those smaller Chinese lathes, but my lathe would run rings around my old Hercus lathe, I was very pleased to say the least with the upgrade. I don't have much experience with the H&F's AL335 so I cant comment on what they are like, but they are not put together as well as mine is, and I have also read about a few problems with them.

The mate that bought my Hercus lathe was looking at one of those smaller Chinese lathes. I said to him he would be better off with the Hercus over one of those, and he replied that everyone was telling him that, so he went with the Hercus. As far as I know he still has it.

If it was a choice between a small Chinese lathe and a Hercus I would go the Hercus, but when some of the Hercus lathes are getting up in price toward the price of a lathe like mine, then I would go Chinese.

As for "Tool room lathe" I see some of the Chinese factories selling lathes as tool room lathes. I think they are just using the name to sell there product.

Dave

Dave what size cast is it.

Many of the Hercus lathes (or any used lathe for that matter) are worn when sold on, I was just lucky to find a new one. Deciding between a used Hercus and a new Chinese machine is always a tricky problem. There's no doubt the Chinese machine will be a lucky dip, but at least they're unworn.

Dave I don't know how much you paid for your 12 x 36, but the current price is over $3K for one from H&F. Very few Hercus lathes would sell for that sort of money, indeed most sell for around 1/2 that, so I'm not sure it's a valid comparison. Some would undoubtably find the extra capacity handy however, depending on what they're doing of course.

Pete

For what it is worth . Last month, I looked at a 1960's Sheraton model AR 9" ( tapered roller head ) , same as my current lathe . It is a ex Frankston TAFE machine .

It needed a general cleanup , but was in good condition overall .

Bed was good , surface rust on it here and there . Half nuts very tight . No broken teeth on any gears . 3 phase motor . Solid original stand .

It sold for $800 which was cheap I think . With some work, it would be a nice machine .

Mike

Originally Posted by pipeclay

Dave what size cast is it.

3 x 4 1/2 x 13 inch long from memory, I have it written down on paper in the shed. It was in stock in Newcastle and that was including GST, it was somewhere around $110-$113.

Dave
Edit,
My mill has a 90mm quill.

Did you price solid at the same time,solid is normally cheaper.