Member postings for Karl Mansson

Hello!

It's been a while since I last posted. My Habegger DLZTE with 102mm center height is up and running.

I'm trying to come up with a good system for parting and I managed to come by some parting inserts rather cheaply a little while back. They are Sandvik N151.2-300 inserts, 3mm wide that is. I also, from a different source, found a parting blade that turned out to be one size too small for these inserts.

I'm torn between selling the blade or selling the inserts. The blade is for 2mm wide tips. What would you recommend for a machine of my size? I am planning on working on some 45-50mm diameter steel stock in the future, which will fit a chuck in my machine but not the collets.

I am also thinking I would make a rear parting toolpost. Mostly due to the solutions with separate holders looking like they have a great deal of flex and overhang. I was thinking I would copy the mechanics of one of the Sandvik holders for their blades and mill it with a dove tail cutter directly into the toolpost. It would make for a rigid and compact solution. I've read quite a bit about the pros and cons of front and rear mounted parting tools and I've come to the conclusion that both work about equally well. I'm using a Tripan 111 quick change system and apart from the holders being pretty pricey they don't take the Sandvik blades direclty but would need an intermediary block.

I also thought about making my own parting blade. I have a piece of what I think is silver steel that would fit the bill quite nicely. But then again, seeing as the parting blades sold are about 120 pounds each, I'm thinking there is something to them not directly abvious to the naked eye?

Looking forwards to your input on this!

Best regards
Karl

I could have sworn I posted an update on this earlier but apparently not.

I got the parts apart! The last two screws were hidden behind the large bearing for the lead screw. Very complicated disassembly, this... I got the gear box off of the shaft but now I can't get the tumbler out of there.

As I mentioned earlier the shaft for the central tumbler wheel had a C-clip on it, indicating that the shaft is supposed to be a sliding fit through the bearing. I tried tapping it out earlier but it went a mm or so before sticking. So I thought I'd try to get the bearing out of the housing instead as most other bearings have been a slip fit into the castings on this machine. Got it a cm out or so but the the sound from my brass drift became very solid. I think I may have wedged a piece of dirt between the journal and the bearing. I've tried re-seating the bearing on the shaft and I've used a plastic bushing to take the strain off of the bearing while attempting to tap it home. I'm going to make a better bushing out of brass or copper as I suspect the shock isn't transferred properly. I don't have a press so I'll have to use my trusty old hammer and a brass drift.

Thanks againfor all the suggestions! I'll post pictures of what I'm dealing with this time around later. Any more suggestions on tackling this would be most welcome!

Best regards

Karl

Thank you for all the suggestions, gentlemen!

I did get the nut loos last night! I got myself a larger c-spanner and grabbed the shaft with a pipe wrench with some aluminium in between as protection.

The bad news is that it made no difference whatsoever. I got the leadscrew out but the sections of the gearbox still won't budge. I removed a C-clip from a shaft that I then tried tapping out. I soon realized that it was probably designed to be removed once the cover for the change wheels was taken off and had an integral gear on it. So I stopped and tried tapping it back the other way but I must have moved someting on the shaft because now it won't seat fully. So now I HAVE to get the thing apart.

Suggestions? I'm afraid I'll break a casting if I try prying more. I've tried tapping a knife edge into the seams between parts but so far nothing has given way. I'll inspect it again today with fresh eyes but I've already gone over it something like 20 times and still can't find any screws holding it together.

Best regards

Karl

Edited By Karl Mansson on 16/03/2019 12:15:44

I give up.

I've tried getting this gear box off for something like two weeks now. I've taken every screw I can see out of it and it won't budge. The whole gear box is a layer cake with four parts. I've gotten the front end off, which holds the feed rod for the apron. What is left is the rear cover for the changewheels and the tumbler mechanism in a separate housing behind it. I've take pictures from inside the the rear foot of the bed and can see at least one threaded hole there which I assume holds a screw that I haven't undone. To get at it I need to get the change wheel cover off. I've removed everything fastener I can see except for the large flange nut pictured. It holds the large bearing for the leadscrew (this lathe has dual feeds). I find it strange because in the rest of the lathe the bearings will come out of their housings rather easily axially. Then again, this is a bearing that will see a fair amount of axial load being a lead screw bearing. So you'd want to keep it very closely aligned axially.

The casting flexes a little bit when I apply pressure at the top and reveals the separation between the parts. It does not at the bottom. Almost all of the parts have been painted over so it's hard to tell if that's why the parts are stuck together of if there are som fasteners I've missed left in there. The only thing I can SEE though is this nut and I think it may be compressing the other parts.

This became a long winded buildup to my question, just wanted you to know what I've tried so far and how the problem looks at the moment.

How do I get this nut off? This is the largest of its kind on this lathe. I have a single pronged spanner that I've used on the others and the best way to use it has been to use it to lock the nut and then turn the screw. I can't get a grip on this without damaging I'm afraid. I've used one of the change wheels for leverage but then getting the spanner in behind it becomes a problem. Plus I need to hold the change wheel by hand as not to damage it. I've put some penetrating oil on it now and I'll revisit it in a day or two.

I know this is an unusual lathe but if anyone has any specific advice on this lathe I'd love to hear it. Or if someone can point me to an authority on Habegger lathes. This is a Habegger DLZTE.
I'll also take any advice I can get in regards to removing nuts such as these.

The reason I want to get the gear box off is to be able to better handle the lathe bed for paint stripping and painting witout risking damaging the gear box castings.

Best regards

Karl

I got the bed clean enough to measure it and over the entire length it looks like it's out no more than 0.05mm. There is a myriad of different mating and sliding surfaces on this, with a lower slide that the apron runs on. This slide is more worn and closer to 0.1mm lower compared to the bed in the last 1/3 towards the chuck. Not sure how that would affect the precision of the lathe, as it seems like the actual bed is in pretty decent condition. Overall it looks like this lathe was more abused than it was worn down.

I don't even know how I would set up this machine for re-grinding, let alone checking and scraping. Lots of anlges to take into consideration...

I got the bed clean enough to measure it and over the entire length it looks like it's out no more than 0.05mm. There is a myriad of different mating and sliding surfaces on this, with a lower slide that the apron runs on. This slide is more worn and closer to 0.1mm lower compared to the bed in the last 1/3 towards the chuck. Not sure how that would affect the precision of the lathe, as it seems like the actual bed is in pretty decent condition. Overall it looks like this lathe was more abused than it was worn down.

I don't even know how I would set up this machine for re-grinding, let alone checking and scraping. Lots of anlges to take into consideration...

Thank you! I'd like to think i got lucky on this one. There is a lot of work to do in terms of cleaning up, checkingand possibly even scraping. Most parts don't seem too worn out, many just dinged or damaged cosmetically. There are some areas with pitting in the bed and I haven't measured anything yet. They apron hangs off a second slide way on the front of the machine, making me think that this lathe will be a beast to regrind. So much geometry to take into consideration.

Originally these were made well on par with the Schaublin lathes of the time. This particular design seems to be made with wear resistance in mind, it has a separate drive shaft for the feeds, and the lead screw is reserved for screw cutting only. The lead screw nuts were incredibly dirty but look like they are practically unworn.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bxr59DtuJda_Z0xsYmxaaEZtLWM/view

The DLZTE is towards the end of the catalogue I linked above.

Thank you Hopper, yes I'm starting to feel that would be the best approach. At the moment I'd just like to keep the hand wheel assembly from rattling around in the apron casting when I'm handling it for painting. Guess I'll just have to wedge it in there with some soft material.

Thank you for the suggestion, Ed! I tried that and they wouldn't budge. The drive shaft is out now though. I think I can clean and re-pack the bearings adequately now. The only remaining part is the handwheel assembly and the bearing there.

Unclear how? That they don't show the whole shaft?

There is a bearing on either end of the drive shaft. I've managed to wriggle that past the gear stack that is left now, and as I suspected the bearing on the other end cleared the housing. Yes, the teeth on the shaft are machined directly into it.

The part that remains now is the hand wheel assembly. Still not enough room to persuade that one out of there.

Thank you for the suggestion! I came across that technique while looking for a solution to this problem. Pretty clever but as you say, not applicable in this case.

I'm repainting the lathe and all cast parts. I want to be able to clean the parts as thoroughly as possible and strip them of old paint. Also, from catalogues I can guesstimate that this lathe was made in the 1950s. There is plenty of semi dried up grease in the bearings and on various parts of the lathe. I'm not even sure if these bearings are supposed to be greased or if they should be lubricated by the oil bath that these gears run in. There is a planetary gear system in the handwheel assembly that simply oozes black grease and that is really crunchy to the turn.

I've managed to spray some bearings out with brake cleaner and will re-inject those with fresh grease (the rear headstock bearings for instance) but for these that were more poorly shielded I'd like to clean them in an ultrasonic. Or at least get their associated arbors out so that I can strip and paint the housings.

Karl

Hello! I tried searching the forum on this subject but came up short.

I'm continuing the taking apart of my Habegger DLZTE screw cutting lathe and I've gotten as far as the apron. All the mechanics in the lathe so far seem to be in a fair conditions but cosmetically it's terrible with a lot of painted over screws and joints between parts.

The latest problem with the apron is getting the gear stacks out. I'm stuck with the gears directly behind the hand wheel. And without getting that gear off of there, I can't get the driving rod for the feeds out.

Almost all rotary, manual functions on this lathe have ball bearings and they are rather snugly fitted into the castings. I can either push them out by hand or the come loose with just a little amount of tapping with a plastic shaft. They are however rock solid on their respective arbors. Probably a press fit. Several of the components feature captive gears or captive designs where it appears to me that I need to get the bearing off of the arbor in order to disassemble correctly. I can't see how I could get a tool into any of these situations though, without running the risk of damaging things.

As is the case in my attached photos, the middle wheel is captive between the first and the bearing. The first, smaller wheel will pass through the hole in the casting in the front of the apron but not with the captive gear trailing it.

I've tried placing a plastic spacer between the captive gear and the casting and tapping the spindle out with a brass rod but it won't budge. Is this supposed to be set up in a press in order to be disassembled or am I missing something. It seems impractical from a service point of view. I think the feed rod will come out with the bearings still attached as the holes in the castings are through holes, but the bearings won't clear the gear stack that is causing the problem. I've tried shimmying it out of there but no luck.

All help is appreciated!

Best regards

Karl

Edited By Karl Mansson on 17/02/2019 14:16:37

Thank you for all the suggestions!

I haven't gotten any further in this as I'm still in the process of cleaning the lathe. I do however think that matching the hardness of the surrounding material would be preferrable to both harder or softer. The saddle is also cast iron and I'd like to prevent the repaired spot from either directly scoring the mating part or being prone to embedding hard chips that in turn will score the saddle.

For anyone interested I've worked out that this is not in fact a DLZF. It's a DLZTE with a plain, bronze bearing as a a front bearing and witout the 5:1 reduction gear of the DLZF. I'll post updates of the repair and the whole lathe when I get further.

Best regards

Karl

Edited By Karl Mansson on 16/02/2019 14:29:52

Double post.

Edited By Karl Mansson on 12/02/2019 19:35:20

I was thinking WR-2. Or maybe you were asking Clive which one he used 25 years ago?

Chris, I had not looked at Devcon until now. Their WR-2 seems like a good fit. Still, I don't know how any of these hold up over time as I dont' have experience with them. It does appear to be cheaper than at least Moglice.

Photos of the crash damage. There seems to be pretty extensive pitting as well, I'm not sure how that got there. The castings on these machines are supposedly very good. You can see the perfect, scraped surfaces from underneath the headstock. Sorry about the orientation of the images, the forum doesn't seem to recognize orientation data from my iPhone.

Regards

Karl

Thank you both!

Michael, in the handbook you linked to they describe a different material called STF for repairing scores in the ways. I can't find it from Diamant but the description resembles the one of Diamants "Plasticmetal". Seems to be more along the lines of what I need.

Regards

Karl

Hello!

I recently bough a used and misused Habegger DLZF. While some areas of the lathe are practically unworn (and I still have more cleaning to do Before I can measure the wear in the machine) other areas have pretty nasty defects from crash damage in the slide ways of the lathe bed. I suspect this lathe has been run primarily with a chuck, as this is where most of the damage is. I intend to run it mostly with the W20 collets that came with it and this places me with the saddle just over the damaged areas. I've run a fine stone over the affected areas to see if I can reduce any high spots and I Think i can manage that. Still, I would like to fill in any larger voids in order to prevent chips getting between the bed and slideways causing undue wear.

Does anyone have a good way of doing this?

I've tried to read up on the subject and came across JB weld (deemed to be too soft and prone to embedding chips and dirt) various spray welding techniques (a bit complicated for me) and a two Component putty called Moglice, made by the German Company Diamant. Moglice is advertised as a slide way casting compound with low friction coefficient and high wear resistance. It seems quite ideal for this apart from the fact that I don't intend to cast the entire length of the bed. I also can't find it for sale anywhere, at least not in small quantities. Something matching in colour would of course be preferrable but in this case I'll take function over form.

If anyone has used Moglice on their Machines: is a repair such as the one I'm discussing above feasible? Would it be able to stone the Moglice down to the level of the surrounding material after it's hardened?

Any and all other suggestions are welcome!

Best regards

Karl

Edited By Karl Mansson on 12/02/2019 13:12:14

Thank you Clive!

White lead huh. I'll have to be carful where I throw the paper towels I used to Clean it up.

I'll have to make a dibbler then! A Word I was not expecting to use today.

Thank you to everyone who partook in this mystery.

Best regards

Karl