New machines for workshop

Jelly, re your post and comment

"I suspect that a rebuilt (and warrantied) DSG or a new "Trens" ex Slovenia would both be cheaper than and more satisfying than a new Colchester (or a new Chester)."

I will have a look at the Trens tomorrow, but I suspect they will be out of my price range. The only one I could find on line was 20 years old and $9,000 almost. I will also give DSG a call, but I think that the majority of their machines, beautiful as they are, will also be too rich and probably a bit bigger than I want. I always recall the headstocks being huge and I'm not sure if they made metric versions.

I have actually used a TOS lathe previously, when I was in the Merchant Navy. One of the ships I was on in the very early 80's, was one of 5 built in Poland and they had TOS lathes on them. They were as I recall quite big machines with probably a 2 mtr bed on them. But the machine had everything you could wish for on a centre lathe. Lots of speeds, lots of threading, and I'm sure a high speed lever for the feeds. You could get the saddle from one end of the bed to the other in seconds. Though I may be mixing that one up with a Stanko on a ship built in Russia.

The less said about that ship the better, although the workshop was really well equipped, it needed to be. I have never had a ship fall apart as often as that one did. One memorable job was having to machine a wear sleeve out of 4" mild steel bar, (it was all we had) to keep the sh*t pump from leaking from the main shaft gland. The leak was that bad it leaked more raw sewage into the waste tank room than actually got pumped over the side of the ship. (When you could still do that sort of thing). It ran like that for a couple of months before I left it. I do remember having to cut off the length of bar with a hacksaw as the power machine had no suitable blades.

My guess is that a UK/European Manufactured/Re-Manufactured lathe would probably be pushing at the the limits of your budget, but by the same token you are in the position where you could actually spend your whole lathe budget on a lathe, and be up and running from the day you take delivery, so maybe it's worth it?

The DSG's and the TOS/Trens's are both pretty heavy beasts, just massive (literally) amounts of cast iron used everywhere (especially in the headstock); my TOS toolroom lathe weighs in a 2 tonnes for a 320 x 1000 capacity, and a 13"x36" DSG is about 2.8 tonnes - both comparable in size with a Warco GH1330 which weighs about 580kg.

To match or slightly exceed the Triumph in size (Trens SU50 or DSG Type 15), you're looking at 3.8 - 4.5 tonnes with either of those brands.

DSG did do metric lathes and I would think most re-builds get new metric leadscrews and nuts...

As a near-complete aside in relation to DSG and leadscrews; I did see one (It could have been a Lang, but I'm pretty sure it was DSG) configured with dual leadscrews, a selector, two half-nut levers, and an interesting dual layer thread chasing dial, unsure if that was a factory special or a user improvement but always thought it was cool.

The TOS's from Trencin, the polish brands from Andrechowska, and the Stanko's all shared the rapid travel feature as part of their generally high specification, the difference (to my knowledge) is that the TOS and Polish lathes have a 4-way joystick on the apron, whilst the Stanko has a conventional feed selectors (two-position, or three when equipped with power top-slide) driven off the feed-shaft, and the rapid feeds are push-button controlled running a separate 3-phase motor mounted directly to the side of the apron.

Edited By Jelly on 26/10/2022 13:35:42

Jelly,

I'm waiting on prices at the moment from Trens.

I have found a DSG 1307 * 40 for £7K but DSG, (Now in Preston), think a rebuild would be between £5K & £10K. Then there is the hassle of getting it there etc.

The same site with the 1307 also has a Colchester VS 2500, it's in budget but is almost twice as old as I am really looking at.

I have time to be picky so will carry on looking, I must admit though that the Trens SN 32 looks good, although I would have to check if I can get a toolpost to fit it that will take the 25mm tooling.

Cheers.

Glad to have been somewhat helpful.

If you did weigh things up and go the DSG route (with that 1307 or another similar lathe), then I can recommend both "R.R. Memmory Haulage" and "Hansard Haulage" for that kind of thing, moving heavy objects including machine tools, and Hiab-ing them on and off the wagons is their bread and butter so they can be just left to get on with it quite safely.

R.R. Memmory in particular also have some specialised smaller vehicles and trailers for delivering very heavy objects to locations that you'd normally only be able to access by car, which might be of assistance with the final leg to your workshop.

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Regards a tool-post for the Trens SN32, my TOS S32 has the same Multifix B offered with the SN32 which works very well with 25mm tooling (25x130 is the "standard" holder for that size of toolpost, but it's sometimes easier to use the 32x140 holders for 25mm tools as they're less snug).

I believe the Cross Slide and Top Slide used on the SN32 is the same design as was used on the S32, and only the apron differs between them (on that assembly, there's other major differences).

Whilst it is possible my holders may have been modified by the previous owner to allow them to go lower to get on center with 25mm tools, but it doesn't look like they have; so I suspect Trens is just being conservative in their tech spec's.

Edited By Jelly on 26/10/2022 17:13:19

I need to clarify this after having a closer look this evening.

The S32 and Multifix B combination works with 25mm tools for me because my 25mm tooling is all CNMG and WNMG, where the cutting edge is below the top face of the holder due to the geometry.

For HSS/Brazed tools which have been ground to use the top of the blank as a cutting edge, or CCMT (and similar) type insert holders, the Multifix holders would need to be modified for that system to work, and 20mm would be the maximum as standard.