Member postings for Simon Rundsvoll

Simon

You have already received a lot of sage advice here, so I thought I would just chip-in with an historical note about the maker of your chuck: **LINK**

https://oldtoolheaven.com/related/goodell-pratt-history.htm

Damaged and worn as the lathe bed may be: It appears that you have good headstock bearings and a fine chuck … With your obvious enthusiasm for it; one way or another that machine will surely end-up capable of doing good work.

MichaelG.

Wow - shiny. It looks like you have been polishing it on a buffing wheel. Didn't we have a thread on this lathe model a couple of months back when I mentioned I have never seen any spare parts on ebay for it. The spindle thread is unusually fine so not similar to any of the other small lathes.
There are loads of little chucks on ebay though so you just need to make a backplate. You need another lathe for that. Just make the threaded part initially in cast iron bar in case it doesn't come out right. Then solder on a disc and finish on you lathe to make sure it is true. Actually as the current chuck is poor why not remove it and true up the backplate in situ?

It is not a screwcutting lathe. Therefore the bed is only to hold bits together and you could use a bit of angle iron instead. It is completely pointless to regrind the bed. All the real work is done by the saddle/cross slide/topslide assembly.

It is a good lathe for clockmaking, model railways, small engineering up to G1, not just an ornamental antique except for the fact that it is so shiny.

Use an industrial sewing machine motor to power it; which also gives you variable speed.

That second tailstock is interesting - can you provide a better photo of just that please.

I recommend starting by using the lathe to cut metal rather than measuring. Measuring is difficult and understanding the results more so. Getting either wrong can lead to unnecessary remedial work and making the lathe worse.

In contrast, cutting metal is relatively easy to do and it makes faults very obvious. Bent spindle, knackered bearings, head and tailstock misalignment, loose headstock, unacceptably worn bed, worn jaws, damaged chuck internals, cracked parts, broken keys, broken & maladjusted gibs, worn worms, backlash, broken shear pins, jambed collars, missing parts, blocked oil-ways, damaged nose thread etc. Running a lathe reveals problems that are hard to measure - like overheating bearings and horrible mechanical noises!

Many of these are cheap easy fixes, others difficult and expensive, possibly show-stoppers. Although she looks lovely, that lathe could be BER. (Beyond economic repair.) I advise putting the lathe 'as is' through it's paces to identify as many faults as possible before deciding what to do about them.

So don't start by laying a straight-edge on the bed and going immediately for an expensive regrind! Cutting metal highlights other issues, and the bed may not be worth fixing. A rust pit under the tailstock is unlikely to matter, whereas a deep hollow ground into the headstock end is trouble. But note it's possible to do good work on a rather badly worn lathe - how important the wear is depends on what the lathe is used for. Don't fixate on the bed or anything else: before spending money, cut metal and evaluate whatever it reveals.

With luck cutting metal will allow everything that matters to be fixed in short order. But cutting may only the first step. Although a good way of identifying lots of problems and giving a rough idea how serious they are, measuring is the next step, and essential for fine adjustments. For example if a DTI or micrometer shows the happily working lathe cuts a taper, measurement is needed to identify and correct the cause - might be bed-twist, which is fixed by "levelling", or the headstock needs realigning. Both are delicate adjustments.

I would only buy the lathe in it's present condition as an ornamental antique. It's obviously been beautifully cleaned up, but she's a very old lady, and condition as a working precision machine is unknown - could be anything between good or scrap. Unfortunately it's not difficult to tart lathes up, and anything of that age looking that gorgeous makes me suspicious. Appearance is secondary to me. Buying a second-hand lathe for work rather than decoration, I'd insist on seeing it run before buying it.

That said, lathes are fairly robust, and quite a few ancient survivors are in remarkably good condition. It depends on the machine's history - many were thrashed by men working hard to earn a crust and were scrapped decades ago. Others were used for light repair or prototyping work. A few sat on a bench, or in a crate, for 50 years. Lathes owned by hobbyists mostly have a very easy life. Not unusual for good lathes to end up rusting slowly away in a damp cellar, in which case the damage varies from fatal to cosmetic. When an item becomes BER depends on how much time and effort the owner wants to spend. In my case, not much, because I own tools to use them. But restoring old equipment is a respectable hobby in itself. Men cheerfully spend years bringing historic gear back to life. Heritage repair may not be for me, but I admire those who do it, and their results.

Regrinds - anyone able to name any firms doing this work at the moment? They seem to be disappearing.

Dave

Backplates.

These are most unlikely to be availabe "off the shelf".

Recently, to enable a friend to mount a 4 jaw chuck on his small lathe, we had to make a backplate.

The nearest that we could get as raw material was a 100mm plate with a 26.5 mm central bore.

Having measured the bore, a plug was made to have a 0.00!" interference. This was fitted by the "Heat and Freeze" technique.

The backplate was then put into the 3 jaw chuck on a larger lathe to be bored ready to be tapped 3/4 x 10 BSW to suit the spindle on the lathe..

When this had been done a dummy spindle was turned and screwcut, before being finished with a die. (This entailed making a Die Holder for the 2" diameter Die! )

The backplate was then screwed onto this dummy spindle, tfaced and to reduce the diameter to 80 mm and to produce the register.

Fortunately, the backplate had been tapped M6 on the required PCD, so it was just a matter of opening up the holes to clearance, to enable chuck and backplate to be united.

You are going to have do somethinbg similar for your lathe. finish machining the backplate, once it has been fitted to your lathe.

Hopefully, the chuck will then hold work closer to true.

Howard.