AVM MAS 140 lathe

The lathe is not on its final place. I have to remove the wood pallets. Now I can move it front and back a little only with one hand. It doesn't look safe. I'm thinking to add a thick rubber carpet under. I think that the floor tiles might crack if in direct contact with the metal.

Now I'm reading about the brazed and indexable tools. I want to buy a few but I didn't figured out what brands have good price/quality value. Also I'm looking for some metal bars. I'm considering at some point in the future to repaint the lathe. Somebody suggested that it might decrease it's value since it could be assumed that it was used a lot before painting. But I don't like this dull green.

Does anybody know where I could find the manual for this lathe? I sent an email on Lathes.co.uk but got no reply. I suppose they don't have it.

The hole in the front of the chuck body maybe an oiler. Shame about the front of the jaws, I would carefully face them back using a carbide tool, and reshamfer them. Do you have the outside jaw set?

Edited By old mart on 19/02/2023 16:26:21

Yes I have it. It doesn't have any wear marks.

If you make a saddle stop, the tool tip can be set within a gnats c--k of the jaws safely, and if using power feed that close, then cut away from the chuck.

I cleaned that hole in the chuck and indeed it is for oil:

There is metal swarf everywhere. I started to disassemble the DRO sensors and other small parts to clean it better:

I discovered that the carriage has an oil reservoir. This would be the third one on this lathe. The oil level looks ok

How do you know if this oil has to be replaced?

If it looks dirty. If it looks clear and clean it will be okay.

My lathe doesn't have a drill chuck. But is there a problem if I will use an ER collet instead? I'm thinking to buy an MT3 ER32 type. It has the advantage that I could use it also for a milling machine that I want to build.

I saw that there are MTA and MTB Morse tapers. I suppose that the one with a drawbar (MTB) can be used in more places than the first one?

One can buy (or make) a tang, if you ever needed one, and screw it into a threaded taper.

My advice is to buy a chuck. Changing jobbing drills, centre drills, spotting drills, etc for second operations will soon become a drag. I actually have a couple of chucks, fitted with centre drills, and use a keyless chuck for other purposes.

Well done you, looks like a pal-for-life lathe

Clean it up so she's nice and then be very-very-very clear about what you are doing if this is your first lathe

In the first few months there is a very high probability of you smashing your fingers or your lathe, don't ask how I know.

Put on a pair of glasses for your eyes, never leave them exposed

You have to learn how to move around it from the start, your hands and your feet and your brain need to learn where to go and where not to go

Plus you need to know exactly what all the knobs do

I used a slack headstock belt for my first few months which was like a safety clutch for when I cocked things up

After a few months of use you suddenly get serious and tighten up that headstock belt because you now know the basics of using a powerful machine tool

It's like driving a car, for the first few months you're still learning and need to be cautious

Good Luck and have fun

Edited By Ady1 on 28/02/2023 14:56:01

About changing fast the drills. In the local Sunday bazar I found this huge MT3 drill. It fits directly in the tail stock!
I bought it only because it was very cheap and it looks new. At the moment I don't see what I could do with it.

It will take a while until I'll use the lathe. I started to remove metal chips and since then then I keep removing parts. The chips are everywhere. They almost enterd inside the DRO sensors. This is how the lead screw was looking:

Now I'm thinking if I shouldn't take a look in the carriage as well. Although I don't want to do that because it seems very complicated. At least not now.

"Plus you need to know exactly what all the knobs do"
Actually I don't know what most of the knobs do. But in general I have a hunch. I'll figure it out when I start it.
More important are all the locations where you have to pour oil. I keep discovering those small metal balls that you have to push them to allow the oil to enter.

I couldn't resist not to try to repaint it. I started with the head stock cover. There the original paint was the most affected. I have a kind of gel that I'm using to remove paint. But this green paint is very hard. For two days I keep applying the stripping gel and it still looks like this:

Normally in 2-3 hours the paint should turn into foam and after wiping I would have clear metal. I think this rules out the option of removing the paint from the whole lathe. It will take weeks and a ton of gel.

I'm not worried about safety. I'm always extra careful. I'm playing also with big vacuum tubes up to 2-3kV DC for a long time. I'm using a good pair of safety googles for many years after a bad electrolytic capacitor made a dent on the celling after it decided that it had enough.

I found a felt disc for my grinder. The brass steady rest pins are now shiny again:

Edited By Sonic Escape on 28/02/2023 19:26:05

Edited By Sonic Escape on 28/02/2023 19:26:43

Edited By Sonic Escape on 28/02/2023 19:28:32

Drills on a MT shank are generally somewhat more rigid than an equivalent size drill in a chuck, in a non-production setting that usually translates to being able to drill bigger holes (which is great if you need to make something with a large hole in it as drilling is one of the fastest metal removal methods, compensating for boring being one of the slowest).

If you find yourself doing multiples or even whole batches of a specific part for a project, then you can purchase MT drills in smaller sizes which will allow you to both drill more aggressively and switch the drills in and out faster, which is a god-send if you have a lot of parts to make.

The Leadscrew can be cleaned by running it with the half nuts disengaged and holding a clean toothbrush against then thread, so that the brush travels along and pushes any debris out of the end of the thread.

i e. move the Saddle to towards the Headstock and set bthe tumbler reverse so tnat the brush travels towards the Tailstock This should push the debris out of the end of the thread..

When the right hand end of the thread is clean, move the Saddle to the Tailstock end, and set the tumblr reverse so that the brush travels towards the Headstock.

iIn this way tghe Leadscrew shoulkd be be clean from end to end.

Hooward.

doesn't appear to be one for the 140, but others may be useful.

https://passion-usinages.forumgratuit.org/f32-tours-lathes

And don't throw anything away no matter how useless it appears, only get rid of swarf and useless scrap

It's amazing how some apparently useless pieces of metal suddenly become useful or essential

I have bits of stairlift and old imperial bits which have suddenly become super useful after lying about for years

And get the swarf issues sorted, a bed protector, a leadscrew protector, anything that saves you time and protects your lathe is a good thing, time spent not cleaning up is time spent doing interesting lathe stuff

Edited By Ady1 on 01/03/2023 00:41:43

My advice: Stop worrying about a bit of swarf on that shaft. As above, easily cleaned. It will collect swarf whenever swarf is being spread around by metal cutting operations. However much you clean it, it will re-occur. A clean screw, virtually clear of oil is the best way to help stop material sticking to it.

One can install telescopic covers to protect the screw from swarf impinging on the screw.

But, basically, that screw is only used when threading, not with general cutting duties, so it will not be worn unduly - like many hobby lathes - as it will (doubtless?) be stationary at all other times? The main risk might be that of swarf being carried into the half nuts within the apron. Without knowing the actual arrangement on that machine, I will just say it is not an issue worth worrying about with my 50 year old lathe.

I have (like many others, I suppose) a range of what we call ’blacksmith’s drills’. One does not need an extra piece of equipment in the chain - so more rigid - to take up more space and create more possible overhang. Most hobby lathes don’t need a larger drill chuck than 13mm, or 16mm at most. With a small hobby lathe, one does need to step up in size more carefully, to avoid overloading the drive. My largest is probably a 1 1/4” example.

Re dents in the ceiling - I remember a rather deep imprint in the high ceiling from a peroxide calorimeter which exploded (any dampness within the reactants was the cause) when attempting a coal analysis. I only used an adiabatic bomb calorimeter for that job!

I continued to clean the lathe and made some discoveries. After removing the dirt I noticed that someone used the tail stock as an anvil. I guess it's not advisable to do that.

It leaks oil. Very slowly. One drop every 2-3 days. Mostly under the carriage. Is this normal?

At the right end of the lead screw I saw some fresh grease accumulated. Not like the black one that is on the rest of the screw. I found this interesting so I unscrewed the nearby oil nipple. An the hole was full of grease.

From what I read so far here and in other places I think there should be oil. Is is possible that this lathe is made to work with grease there? Or maybe somebody put the wrong stuff at some point? I can try to pour some acetone there to remove the grease.

That is a slow moving application with little load.  Either oil of grease would suffice. I would likely grease it.

Edited By not done it yet on 04/03/2023 13:58:50

If they've used grease pump air through the nipple to clear the hole slightly, then pump light machine oil through

I use a push pump on my shaper, you can get cheaper ones on ebay

+1.

I wouldn't worry about a drop of oil from the carriage. Running a lathe with gearboxes & powered feeds can often be a 'damp' business, partly because not all lathes are completely oil-tight, also because some operations benefit from lubricant anyway. The tray of my lathe is rarely 'dry'.

That said, the seals behind 'oil-level' windows are a favourite place for leaks to develop. If you wipe the apron down you may be able to see where the oil is coming from.

My lathe is still on the wooden pallets it was brought on. At first it didn't seem complicated to lower it to the floor. But in fact it is not that simple. Apart from renting a forklift, I can't think of anything... Is there a safe method to remove the pallets?