Warco 290V lathe

Had delivery of my new 290V lathe, not installed yet but got lid off crate and quality looks good. One thing that concerned me was that the inlet of the cooling fan cowl of the motor was hard against the splash guard, this cutting off the airflow as far as I can see. Anyone else noticed this?

Just e-mailed Warco so expect reply next working day, found their service excellent in my dealings with them with the purchase.

Demolishing my work shop as I decided to change a few things around, hopefully will have it installed next week.

Bill D.

Bill,

Congrats on your new arrival....

Before you get too far installing your new machine, could you indulge me with a photo or two of the motor installation please?

I've got the dc motor version from another seller, and looking to convert to 3 ph...my motor is about 2 in away from the splash guard, my initial thoughts were it was going to be tight fitting a 90 frame motor of 1.5 kW rating....

Your help,appreciated...

Hi Bill,

congratulation with your new lathe. I have just been down in the workshop checking my HBM 290 lathe - very similar to yours, except the paintwork. I can almost get two fingers in between the cooling fan cowl and the splash guard. The motor hardly gets warm when I use the lathe so it seems my motor gets adequate cooling. I would expect that no room between cowl and splash guard would result in a very hot motor?

Thor

If it's anything like my 280V then there is enough room for cooling air to pass, the fan runs on a separate motor so it does add an extra amount over just a fan.

Steve

Hi Thor, what sparked my interest in this is that as an engineering manager of an industrial fan company I am familiar with the importance of adequate clearance for cooling air into the motor cowl, (normal motor where the cooling fan is driven off the NDE of the motor shaft) in your case I would say a couple of inches is fine for a small motor like that.

Bowber, the separate cooling fan is an excellent idea for a variable speed motor, I just can't see where the air goes into the fan. as I said to Warco I am sure it is ok, the question was to satisfy my curiosity.

Bill D.

Just awaiting delivery of my own new Warco 290V-F so interested in the result of your enquiry about the motor fan cowl. My shed is a heavy duty site cabin but it does have a wooden floor, so the setting up and levelling might be an " interesting!" task.

Brian, reply I had off Warco was that gap between guard and fan cowl is not airtight so air will pass over motor.

I will leave it that I think as it is obvious that that is the only position so I guess it works ok.

My workshop floor (partitioned off garage) is concrete but a straight edge showed it not to be flat where the lath was going, have put a screed of self levelling compound, fingers crossed it doesn't break up.

The big day is Friday, engine hoist hire arranged and wife/ number 2 son at the ready to assist.

It's turned out to be a big job as I had to remove some of the partitioning and decided while it was all in a mess to re-arrange my storage/extend work bench.

Might get back to building Emma Victoria one day.

Bill D

Bill,

When I installed my 290 lookalike, I checked the floor too..Found it reasonably acceptable, but I placed a sheet of 19mm ply on the floor to act as a floating support..

As to the craneage, I bought the 1 tonne offering from Machinemart....

Point to note, I slung the lathe around the bed near the headstock end, being the heaviest....just be aware when lifting the lathe tries to rotate about its axis...(rolls )...good luck..

Edited By John Rudd on 25/08/2015 20:34:00

Thanks for the tip John, I did wonder about stability. Will have to devise some inventive strapping.

Bill

Bill

Goes without saying but... just make sure you don't wrap the sling around the leadscrew & the saddle drive shaft. I placed the tailstock to counterbalance the headstock but also used another sling around the bed behind the tailstock. As John says the lathe tries to swing where you don't want it to ( mine is a WM 250V - F ) but with the assistance of the finance director... SWMBO, managed to get it onto its stand, the awkward bit was lining the bolt holes up & square to the stand.

George.

I think I placed the rope around the web nearest the hs end....no chance of bending anything then......still scary tho' lifting a good 1/4 ton plus of cast iron......,from the ground up to 800mm or so.....but a big sigh of relief when it was located onto its stand......

Bill, you can get better access to the mounting bolts at the hs end if you remove the belt cover, 4 cap head screws inside.... Might need to take the belt off first...

Edited By John Rudd on 26/08/2015 15:43:31

Thanks John, stand all fastened down today, big lift tomorrow.

Bill D.

Bill,

any chance of you taking some photos of the motor on your lathe and where the vfd controller is located please?

cheers

John

Edited By John Rudd on 27/08/2015 21:34:22

John,

I converted a warco 280, the bed casting has threaded holes on the back at 80 frame foot mounting size. I perched a 1.1KW 4-pole motor on some studding and drove the spindle with taperlock v-belt pulleys and some nutlink belt. The large DC motor mounting plate was removed, and if you wish to retain the belt cover interlock then a bracket needs to be made for it, otherwise I found it extremely simple to implement.

I had to modify the splash guard on mine, though it was an earlier model with a smaller DC motor, there is more space on the later ones, so modifications may not be needed.

290V all installed, took a bit of grunting and shoving, those engine hoists never seem to have the feet in the place you need them. Sorry guys, looking back at posts realise I forgot to take pictures of the back end showing the motor.

It is quite tightly packed in, other clones might be slightly different I guess. The separate cooling fan starts up as soon as power is switched on. Found the noise a bit irritating at first (having spent over 50 years in industrial fan engineering, me complaining about fan noise is a bit like a fishmonger complaining about the smell of fish!) However felt around the back and could certainly feel an airflow, so feel happier about that.

Probably my new hearing aids added to the problem (incidentally, looking at my lathe it suddenly struck me that all this kit cost less than my hearing aids)

The other comment I would make at this early stage is how impressive the digital readout looks, however am I right in assuming that it is a bit over the top for a simple X-Y lathe readout, anyone else got the same display.

Just got to get my workshop back in order, taking the opportunity to have a few changes around.

Bill D.