Member postings for Jim Guthrie

Robert,

If your lathe doesn't have one fitted, I would look at getting a leadscrew clutch fitted. This means that you can use the handwheel on the leadscrew without having to disengage the gear train, especially if you've got a fine feed set up. I don't know if you can still source the ML10 leadscrew clutch but it's not a difficult accessory to make if you have to make your own. There should be a groove ground round your leadscrew at the headstock end which is the marker for the saw blade.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 03/05/2018 17:00:30

Robert,

The previous owner may have fitted the larger handwheel on the carriage to make movement of the carriage a bit easier. It's the one thing I don't like on my ML10 - that smallish handle on the saddle feed. So if you can get some risers to lift the lathe from the bench top you might find the larger handle better.

Jim.

Brian,

I think I remember Myford getting a bit of flack when the lathe first came out because of the steel spindle running in the cast iron headstock being one of the cost cutting factors they had implemented to keep the cost of the lathe down. The lathe was just over £100 in 1973 when I got mine. I remember that the three jaw, four jaw and Jacobs chuck pretty well doubled that price. The motor was second hand and came from a dealer in North London, picked up when I was on business in London. The motor is still going strong.

I got a bit of a scare when I ran the countershaft bearing surface by forgetting to lubricate it. So I fitted large wick fed lubricators to the headstock to aviod the same thing happening to the spindle.

Jim.

Adam,

The steel spindle in the early ML10 lathes runs in the cast iron of the headstock casting - no liners or bearings. Mine is a 1973 model and the spindle still runs perfectly with no play. I'm not sure what you would do if there was unacceptable wear - possibly boring out and fitting Oilite bearings which I had to do on my countershaft when I forgot to lubricate it. The countershaft also runs directly in cast iron.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 09/04/2018 17:12:42

I remember my father taking me up to Milngavie to see what was left in the early 50s. He would have been in his mid teens when it was first ran so probably made a\ big impression on him at the time. It does look as though it was scrapped by 1957 according to various reports but I dug up a thread on Hidden Glasgow where it was suggested that there might have been some ground level bits left standing.

http://www.hiddenglasgow.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1399

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 01/04/2018 20:49:10

Charles,

The leadscrew is Imperial - my ML10 is one of the early ones. But I think the main cross-slide body casting would be the same for metric or Imperial models.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 23/02/2018 08:36:23

Charles,

I have a spare short ML10 cross-slide body and leadscrew, left over after changing to the longer cross-slide a few years ago. They are yours for the postage if you need them.

Jim.

Dave,

Watch out for direct spindle mounting collet holders. I tried to acquire an ER25 one some years ago and I couldn't get one with less that 0.005" runout after two swaps with the retailer. I finally finished up getting a faceplate mounting holder and a threaded backplate from (the original) Myfords and doing my own machining and fitting.

Jim.

Dave,

0.01mm is 4/10 of a thou which is not too bad for an old lathe. I suspect that you are shifting the oil layer around. . I've got an original ML10 and I suspect that I would get a similar reading. You can tighten up the head bearings by taking out the clamp bolts and removing the spacing and removing one layer from the spacer in the clamp slit then reassemble and re-tighten to get the bearing tighter. But I suspect that to get a free running spindle you might have to leave a bit of clearance - maybe .01mm.

I note that you also quote thous somewhere else in your message and I guess that you might be suffering from what I suffer from when bouncing between metric and imperial - i.e. I expect precision to have at least three decimal places after the point and I often forget that 0.01mm is less than half of 0.001".

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 30/12/2017 09:20:16

Ignatz,

The same thing happened to the countershaft on my early ML10 not long after I got it - I forgot to oil the countershaft on a long job. I repaired it by inserting Oilite bushes in the countershaft casting and I must have made a new shaft. When I say I did the work, I actually got the help from colleagues at work who had access to machinery in the mechanical workshop to bore out the casting and mill new keyways in the shaft. It was about forty years ago and I can't remember the exact details and I would probably have to strip down the assembly to see if there were any clues as to exactly what was done. But the new shaft and the Oilite bushes are still working well today. I also apply 32 grade oil regularly so there has been little chance of the bushes drying out.

Jim.

Ignatz,

The two open ended spanners supplied with the plain bearing ML10 were

1/4"BSW:5/16"BSF + 3/16"BSW:1/4"BSF

5/16"BSW:3/8"BSF + 3/8"BSW:7/16" BSF

I can't remember ever having to look for another spanner for my ML10 in 40-odd years.

The Allen keys required were Imperial and there is one special one to use on the cap head screw holding the locking dog on the bull wheel. It has its end at around 70 degrees rather than the normal 90 degrees and is shorter than normal. This lets you get at the screw in behind the front headstock bearing.

Another mod you might consider is fitting a calibrated ring to the leadscrew handle so that you can move the saddle by known, accurate amounts. If you do this, you will need a leadscrew clutch to avoid having to put your gearing out of mesh when using the hand wheel. There should be a groove ground round the leadscrew which showed where to cut the it for the Myford clutch.

I note that one of your lathe's previous owners did what I did, and fitted wick fed lubricators requiring a cut out on the belt guard.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 12/07/2017 11:25:35

Paul,

Cutting into manageable pieces could be possible but a major consideration would be the wiring and control circuitry. In permanent layout the wiring tends to "grow like Topsy" and can become a major job to re-instate it after a move. It would probably be quicker to start all over again. You've also got to find someone who has 9m x 7m of space to spare. I don't know about houses in Australia, but houses with a spare room of that size would be getting into the mansion size in the UK. Your local model railway club members should be able to give you good on-the-spot advice.

Jim.

Paul,

If the layout was not designed to be moved then I would forget about trying to move it. It's an unfortunate reality that very few model railway layouts in a permanent situation can ever be moved successfully and most are scrapped in situ. Sometimes parts of a layout can be saved and that's about as good as it can get since chopping up the baseboards to get them out of the venue usually causes a large amount of damage to the layout as a whole.

The best that can be done is collect and sell all the locomotives and rolling stock and what buildings and other accessories can be removed easily without damage. It might also be possible to lift the track and sell that off as well. You'll need to get a lot of help to do this - especially in five weeks. I would try and contact a local model railway club to get advice and help.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 27/05/2017 09:00:08

I suspect I was taught that same mnemonic at the BBC Engineering Training department in 1961 and I've never forgotten it. It finishes with "...but virgins go west", and I'll avoid the start to avoid the moderators' wrath.

Jim.

If you are going to change the power drive motor, consider making it reversible. On my Centec 2A, the previous owner had changed the Centec supplied single direction motor with a reversible one and it does give more flexibility when used as a vertical mill.

Jim.

Matt,

It will probably be a method of reproducing the effect of a leadscrew clutch. Turning the leadscrew by hand with the tumbler lever in neutral is extremely difficult, especially if you have a gear train setup for very fine feed.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 16/09/2016 08:28:07

Have you slackened off the front spindle bearing screw to see if the bearing will spring out a bit to free up the spindle? I think I would be reluctant to try running the lathe with a very stiff spindle since the heat generated could cause even more problems. My spindle rotates easily by hand and I might consider looking at removing a leaf of the shims to tighten it up. But that would be the first adjustment ever in over forty years - Myford's statement that a steel spindle in cast iron would be long lasting seems to have been proven.

Jim.

My workshop is just under 10' x 8' with a 7' high ceiling and a 1.5kW heater copes well in all the low temperatures we have had over the past twenty years (Bristol area). In coldest winter weeks it uses about 25 - 30kWH. At the moment it's usage is dropping into the low teens of kWH and I suspect that it will have dropped to zero in a few weeks time.

Another method of heating I have seen recommended is using a low wattage "black heat" heater under a lathe or milling machine with a cover over the machine so that the machine sits in relatively warm, dry conditions and condensation is avoided. This would be a lot cheaper than trying to heat a whole workshop. You can find these heaters if you search for "piano heaters" in Google.

Jim.

I keep my workshop ambient temperature above the dew point using a small electric convertor heater. It keeps the shop above 45F and only really gets used in wintertime. My present workshop, in the back of my garage, has had this setup for more than twenty years and I have had no rust problems on my lathe and milling machine, and all the tools. I insulated the workshop section of the garage so that the heating doesn't cost me a fortune in winter.

A good knock on of this system is that the heavy iron in the workshop stays at around the temperature in winter and you don't have the discomfort of working a lathe or milling machine with its parts close to freezing point.

Jim.

Like Chris says, I would try loosening off the clamp screws on the spindle bearings to see if that improves matters. Otherwise, I think I would try slackening off the thrust bearing at the end of the spindle - its a threaded ring which is locked on the rear spindle thread by a hex socket grub screw - and give the spindle end a few gentle taps with a rubber mallet to see if you can move it horizontally. If you can, then I would take the spindle out completely by removing the drive gear off the end along with the thrust locking ring, and push the spindle through the headstock and pulley. You can then inspect the spindle and headstock bearings to make sure that there has been no damage to them. It might be worth checking the pulley bearing as well.

[Edit]  Forgot to add that you also have to release the bull wheel/pulley assembly from the spindle.  On my machine there is a socket grub screw in front of the bull wheel,  just behind the front bearing.

Jim.

Edited By Jim Guthrie on 16/03/2015 09:55:28