Warco service

I have had a couple of small problems in my recently aquired 290V lathe that required a replacement part, both times the response was immediate and parts despatched same day

I also raised a query with them about absence of a carriage lock that was shown in the operators manual, their response was to offer to collect and refund cost.

The sales blurb does not suggest a carriage lock to be fair.

I decided to live with it rather than all the hassle of removing it and I do like the lathe, lots of features and quality as good as you might reasonably expect for the money.

My thanks to Warco for excellent customer care.

Bill D

Bill I thought they used the same carrage as the 280 which has a cap head screw on the righthand side to lock the carrage?

Glad you have had good service, which is more than ive had with them, a few years ago i ordered a lathe from them at the midland model engineering show, they promised me delivery within a week, six weeks later no lathe more excuses, so i asked for a refund, that was an ordeal in itself.

Upon visiting the show a few weeks ago with a friend, he ordered a mill from them, after i told him about my tale of woe, he thought whats the chances of that happening again!!!, they promised him delivery the end of the following week, guess what he is still waiting, he spoke to them yesterday, told him another two to three weeks, they just came up with all sorts of stupid excuses, the best one was, they get sent out, on a first come first served basis, he ordered it at 10.45 on the first day of the show!!, all in all they dont have the mills in stock, as he offered to go collect it in person, why not just be honest in the first place and say six to eight weeks delivery, what i can see, they must just take orders at the shows, then order them from china, hence the ridiculous waiting time.

My 290 has a carriage lock in the position described by Jason. 6mm Allen key on the right hand side. Trouble is if you have bought it with a readout fitted it is obscured by the scale case. I have had very good service from Warco I did have to wait for delivery of my lathe but that is the price you pay for goods from half way round the world.

Michael

... why not just be honest in the first place and say six to eight weeks delivery, what i can see, they must just take orders at the shows, then order them from china, hence the ridiculous waiting time...

I believe this may well be the case; I ordered mine from the Harrogate Exhib' in 2012 & was told it would be 6 - 8 weeks delivery there & then so they were up front with it... it arrived 8 weeks later.

George.

Edited By mechman48 on 12/11/2015 22:07:19

+1 for the carriage lock screw on the right - but worth saying that the first one they sent me did not engage properly, it made the carriage harder to move but didn't lock. Yours could be there but just not engaging at all.

The replacement (not just that, couple of other issues) locks up tight, and while the position is a pain with the DRO scale, I made a little spanner thing with a very short stub of allen key - this stays in place and locks with a quarter turn, works great now.

What is a pain, is there really is no cross slide lock (presumably because of the tapered gib), Part of the reason I chose the 290 over the 1236 was the separate mill head available, so this is an issue.

Dan

Dan, I'd be very surprised if there isn't a lock screw on your cross-slide, it's probably being obscured by the DRO. When I installed a rather large-ish Easson scale on my 13x40 I lost access to both locks and a carriage oil point (at the rear). The carriage lock was fixed by the same general approach as you took, but the cross-slide lock took a little more work. Instead of mounting the DRO scale directly on the cross-slide, I mounted it on a (approx) 10mm x 40mm section ali bar which in turn is mounted to the side of the slide. Then I made a pin out of a cap-head bolt, turned a slight eccentric on the end, and installed it vertically through the bar, adjacent to the lock screw. I replaced the lock screw with a plain pin that is actuated by the eccentric. It only takes a fraction of a turn of the cap-head to lock the slide, and a small allen key lives there permanently.

A friend of mine ordered a milling machine from them at the end of August and he is still waiting for it !!

Phil

Cross slide lock is one of the 4 gib screws that does not have a lock nut, again possibly hidden by the DRO scale.

J

PS my lathe arrived within a week of ordering

Edited By JasonB on 13/11/2015 07:25:25

Roger and Jason,

There are no 4 gib screws - the newer ones (or at least my two) have a tapered gib, with adjustment screws at the front and back - no screws or holes at all on the sides of the cross slide.

Dan

How strange... Do you have a manual that has a parts breakdown? If that doesn't show anything, I'd be on the phone to Warco... It doesn't seem rational to me.

Roger,

Manual is out of date in several respects, and shows a version with gib screws and a lock screw at the sides.

I agree it doesn't make sense - Warco have confirmed and said they had never noticed, but did offer to take it back and refund. Unfortunately despite this and some other issues, it is still the best fit for what I want (from any of the uk suppliers), so I decided to keep it.

If I do fit the milling head, will have to come up with something to lock it, not a big problem at the moment.

Mmm, although it can be a bit annoying if you have been told otherwise, I wouldn't worry too much at waiting up to several weeks for delivery of a new machine. At least it means they are waiting for new stock before sending you one of those.

When I ordersd my new Warco gear head lathe, I was told around 6-8 weeks delivery, as they had none in stock. But just 2 weeks later the machine turned up. When I finaly found the time to inspect it a week and two power cuts later after delivery, I discovered it was not a new lathe, as I had ordered and payed full price for, but was in fact a 2 1/2 year old ex demo machine in a terrible mechanical state. It was the very same demo machine I had looked at in their showroom, and told them they must not send.

But from what I have seen over the years, there seems to be more instances of good service from Warco, expressed by customers, than not so good.

I will have another look. At first I thought I had found the carriage lock mentioned in the manual.

There are four socket head screws, two each side which I assume hold the carriage to the apron and a further two nearer the bed, one each side of the cross slide, I thought these were the carriage locking ones as you can see them going into a stepped block underneath the slideway. Locking them up however left a few thou gap so when Warco confirmed that there is no lock I decided the block was to prevent lifting of the carriage.

Bill D

On the 280s (and earlier 290s)the lock is the one on the right near side of the carrage nearest the centre of the bed, part 13 is clamped to the bed by the screw. The matching screw on te other side and one from hold a longer block to stop the carrage lifting

The other 4 screws (two each side) hold the front of the apron to the carrage