Only for Myford lathes

So I thought I would start a thread (I hope it is in the right section) sorry Neil if it's not. Anyway a very short history. I many years ago bought a Boxford lathe from a college clear out. Whitwood college near Castleford for a measly sum of £50 After a friend tightened up a few bits on it the thing worked ok. I made many bits on it. Then got too consumed with my Electrical contracting business that I had no spare time so I sold it for the same amount to a friend, who still has it. That was over 20 yrs ago. So move on to retirement. I have just recently purchased a Myford Super 7B 1977 vintage lathe. I was going down the Chinese route at some £550. But ended up buying this of which I do not regret, but up around the £3000 point now with purchase & all the bits i keep buying. Note to oneself (stop going on E-bay). This model has a clutch, powered cross feed, Quick change gearbox, broad bed cross slide & all the other features of that model era. I travelled to Kent from Leeds to pick it up. God the traffic, i'm glad I am retired as used to travel to London & the south quite a lot, I digress. So we lifted it onto the bench & I thought yes what a lovely piece of kit. Trouble is I can never leave anything alone. So I have fitted a Dro Tacho. New belts meaning the headstock had to be stripped. A inverter & when it eventually comes a 3ph motor. I have ordered a wedge type 250-111 quick change tool post from the good old US of A. I have built a control panel for the inverter & had a tray made for it to sit on a work bench. Eventually I will be using it & have lots of jobs waiting to be done. So anyone reading this with any Myford lathe ,,, what have you done to yours since you have had it.

I bought my ML7 brand new in 1973 from the old Reeves (£150!) when they were in Birmingham and it is still my prefered lathe. It's been in constant use since then. Apart from fitting a 3ph motor with inverter some years ago I haven't had to do much to it at all. I soon replaced the original tool post with a quick change job which made tool changing much easier.

I did recently pick up a virtually brand new spindle and a set of NOS white metal bearing shells which I fitted last year but it didn't really need it. I had scraped the original shells a couple of years ago but the wear was very slight.

One improvement I made last year was to replace the original Vee belts with the cogged variety which are more flexible and it now runs much smoother than before.

John

Wow I bet there are not that many people who have stayed faithful to one model for so long. What sort of work do you do with it.

Converted a S7 to CNC.

Did you put that on youtube, as I've seen one on there.

It's been used pretty much for everything within it's capacity. Mostly building steam locos but also making motorbike bits and telescope parts. Before I had a milling machine, all of my milling was done on it using a vertical slide.

I've now also got a Denham Junior that someone gave me so that's used for anything that won't fit in the Myford.

I've stayed 'faithful' to the Myford because it's a very good lathe and I've never felt the need to replace it

John

Bought mine second-hand in Swindon (thank you Mr Esson) about 30 years ago, after starting with a Unimat 3, from Sergeants (still have it!) The Myford is a 7b TriLeva, with clutch, long cross-slide and Cowells capstan tailstock feed. I fitted a 3 phase motor and vfd and have a mass of collets , TTA, dividing head , metal saw etc. Over equipped for the very little, poor quality output BUT, I thoroughly enjoy myself (most of the time!) Big problem is a 'tool Magpie Complex', so have (at last count, some 5 or 6 other lathes (Pultra, Unimat SL, watchmakers (plural) Cowells ME , etc.) For anyone potentially suffering a similar affliction, quantity (in my case) is NO substitute for quality! ... Too old to reform!

Re. Myfords, for me, they were better documented than anything else (at the time) and expertise was (and probably still is) more readily available than for anything else. A good choice then, and no regrets now.

rgds

Bill

There's more than one, but I haven't.

So was it worth doing the CNC conversion. I bet it took a while setting up.

I started with a perris and moved on to a ML 10,in 85 was given ab type Drummond I then trded in the Myford for a S7 in 87 vintage 57 without gearbox but a very accurate machine which Myford reground in 2005 .I then bought a S7 plus from Myfords closing down sale 2011 it was 10 years old.I had it seviced by Pete and Darron Made a full length taper turning attachment ,a large fixed steady ,a toolpost grinder,a quick change tool post and various other things that make machining easier.Using the myfords to their capabilities,mine are excellent but if I was building a large model I would need a larger lathe.

Frank

Not done a lot to mine mechanically, fitted a VFD/motor, Tacho and DRO. It came with a load of extra's including a Dixson QCT have since purchased more toolholders and that's about it.

H

Was that a Metric machine or still the old Imperial.

Steve.

Absolutely. Not too much time but done in stages over the years as I learned more.

Brilliant. Sounds like you built the ultimate small machine.

My son and I bought a clapped 1957 model ML7 for $400 at a garage sale some years ago and reconditioned every single piece of it. Nothing had been left undamaged by previous owner. Even had hammer marks on the bed. But did not need a regrind as within tolerance dimensionally. So did not cost a lot to rebuild. Fix rather than buy in most cases.

Did the wide-guide conversion, cleaned up the inner bedways where the tailstock runs by using the carriage as a hand-driven shaper with a cutting tool clamped to the vertical slide for feed, then scraped the headstock bearings.

Now it is a good serviceable, very accurate lathe. No measurable taper over a 6" test cut as measured with a standard mike. Will take a .100" deep cut without chatter. Drives carbide insert tooling no problem. Lovely little machine.

Not a Rolls Royce to be sure, but good for what they were in the day, an affordable serious amateur's lathe. It'll do every thing I need for the foreseeable future. I use the fixed steady a lot to get around the small hole up the middle of the spindle. I find the Myford steady a little flimsy, the fingers can move under heavy load parting off 2" bar etc, so will probably make up my own heavy duty steady with brass-tipped 7/16" screws for fingers as I did on my old Drummond.

Edited By Hopper on 13/01/2020 00:24:22

My story. About 5 years ago I was in the position where I had a Myford Speed 10 which I had bought to get me started in the hobby. I decided to upgrade and wrote a list of where I was trying to get to.

This list was a Myford Super 7, gearbox, industrial stand, 2-axis DRO and variable speed.

I found one which had the ind. stand, 3 phase motor, gearbox, but was long bed, advertised in ME and bought it.

I added speed control first which enabled me to power it from single phase. I then added the DRO and, eventually, a tailstock read-out.

Thus, it's about as good as it gets with a Super 7. It copes with all I need to do in model engineering. Occasionally I dream of getting a Harrison 250 or 300, mainly because it's a "Big Boys Lathe" and I used a Harrison at school 60 years ago, but then I realise I can do everything I need to with what I have. Incidentally, it's a whole lot easier to find a Myford in good nick than it is a Harrison, which are mostly very much factory-worn.

Edited By Clive India on 13/01/2020 09:09:11

Sounds very nice; did it have a hardened bed?

That must have been a very rewarding project.

Had you thought to try a Martin Cleeve-style bush-type steady?

Bought my very first Myford a ML7 with stand, clutch and Quick-change gearbox just before Christmas 2019.

Came with the manuals for the lathe and gearbox, a promotional pamphlet and a couple of books one by Mr Westbury and one by Mr Bradley.

A collection of disassembled parts, so an interesting project!

Looks to be all there, not sure of the age as the bed is well coated with grease preservative.

Just need to find some time!

I expect I'll be posting some questions here in due course!!

Dave J

Regret not - so nearly as good as it gets!