Kerry 1124 lathe - some healing required

I'm chasing a bit of a needle in a haystack khere.

I have a Kerry 1124 lathe, which I bought cheaply way back. Although I've shown it nothing but love, at least one previous owner was less caring, The top slide has suffed a nasty crash, and the thread cutting plate has disappeared, to name just two of the issues it has.

More recently, I discovered why i've been making under-size parts all these years. I thought it was just poor technique - which of course it was - but compounded by the fact the cross slide has a metric dial, 2mm per turn, but the leadscrew itself appears to be imperial, and moves 2.54mm per turn.

I've looked around for something to replace it with, but never quite taken the plunge. Since buying it, I've acquired quite a lot of tooling for it, which I don't really want to have to buy all over again. In the end, what I would really like is just a better version of what I already have.

So, getting - finally - to the point, I would be very grateful for any leads either to a complete lathe that might be for sale or anyone with suitable spares for a Kerry 1124 or compatible machine.

Thanks very much

Andrew,

Is it your wish to have a metric screw or an imperial dial? What are main leadscrew and compound leadscrew metric or imperial?

Could be that someone has swapped all the screws and that's why the threading plate is missing, it would no longer be relevant.

Pete.

Hi Pete

In general I would say it's a metric machine. I'm going to use the wrong term now, forgive me, but the "main leadscrew" for screwcutting has a 4mm pitch and all the dials are graduated in mm. Since discovering the mis-matched part, I've bought a cheap digital display, one of these digital verniers with a remote display, but it would be good to have a screw that matches the dial

Cheers

Andrew

Hi Andrew, welcome to the forum, hopefully someone who can help will be along soon.

Neil

Hello Andrew,

Have you looked at Tony Griffiths website www.lathes.co.uk. The archive covers Kerry lathes and there is one good detailed photo of the screwcutting plate [imperial] on a Kerry 11 inch swing lathe.

There might be more information in the write up and even to be gleaned from the other lathes featured. He DOES sell spare parts as well.

I hope that is useful information for you

Regards Brian

You need a dial with 100 divisions for your 10 tpi leadscrew, to read in thousandths of an inch. It may be possible to fit a digital scale and not have to worry about the thread pitch.

Actually, his 2mm (if it's 200 graduation) dial is perfect for a 10tpi cross-slide screw. It'll just be diameter-reading instead of radius.

I just looked at the lathesdotco site and thought ‘if that is what you have, why you would want to change it or buy another?’ It looks like a very comprehensive machine of considerable quality.

Is it just the cross slide feed screw that is 10tpi? Simply changing this (and the nut) to the appropriate metric version should put the lathe back very much to original spec? A job which likely could be done quite cheaply.

A manual is available from that site - which is likely to have a pic of the threading plate in it somewhere? Although a metric version may be less common.

Certainly a much preferable ‘healing’ than selling/scrapping/changing it, I would have thought.

According to the site (I think), they were a popular lathe in education. If yours was one of those it is likely not overly worn and it might explain the ‘crash’!

Dead right, Pete, I would just get used to a diameter in inches reading. I fitted a 3mm pitch cross slide leadscrew to the imperial Smart & Brown model A and made a 0-118 dial for it. Since most turning involves creeping up on the last bit, the tiny error in 0.118" verses 3mm is of no consequence.

My Monarch lathe is diameter-reading and I find it much better. Only problem is they also made the compound diameter-reading so you have to remember to double the scale for any required in-feed.

I've always advocated making 10tpi single-start screws as replacement for the 2-start ones in Bantams/Chipmaster lathes because the screws are easier to make and you can use the same dials to become diameter-reading ones.

Thanks for the contributions The Lathes.co.uk entry for my lathe is very familiar, it was instrumental in me buying it in the first place, though the particular version I have is different from the one featured, I'm not sure if it was a late model or perhaps a slightly cheaper variant in as much as the drive to the power feed and leadscrew is simpler and thus the thread cutting tables I've seen so far don't match. In brief, the "standard" 1124 has 2 x 2 position levers to the left of the screwcutting gearbox, giving 4 possible combinations, whereas mine has a single lever with three positions. I've used a digital rpm meter to work out the relative gearing, but the resulting pitch selections are oddly limited when calculated this way. Anyway, as I say, I appreciate the comments thanks all.

Every lathe I have seen a 3-position lever on, the lever has been for 1x 2x 4x feed/lead rates, so you would set gears for 1mm, 2mm, 4mm pitch (according to the lever position), or otherwise 0.75, 1.5, 3mm pitch, if you follow me.

You'll need the appropriate gears for the end cluster. Do you have those? If so, providing the stud gear, gearbox input gear tooth counts plus what other gears you have would help towards building up a table of change-gears for various threads.

EDIT: does your machine perhaps resemble anything on this page?

http://www.lathes.co.uk/harrison-early-l5/

Edited By Pete Rimmer on 01/12/2019 01:17:08

Those Kerrys are very nice lathes.

Try S/H parts from ;

Home and Workshop machinery

or

G&M Tools

or

Quillstar

or John Ward at Lathe Parts UK - very helpful fella who does quality work at very reasonable prices. He will make you anything like a one off feed screw or nut.

I also have an 11 x 24 Kerry, imperial model with the angled tailstock handle - you'll know what I mean if you have one. I think you will be very lucky to find spares, but they will be worth the effort of making. You will end up with a very good lathe. If you need any photos taking I will be pleased to oblige, just P.M. me.

It sounds as though you have an unusual beast, the Kerry I have has 9 headstock speeds selected by 2 knobs with 3 positions.

My only quibble is that it doesn't cut 19 tpi (3/8 & 1/4" BSP)- but that won't bother you in metric! Changewheels on mine are 18 dp, but I don't know what the train would be on a metric model. My Tony Griffiths instruction book lists translation wheels for my imperial machine but nothing else. The book is worth getting anyway, as it has a lot of cross sectional drawings, which are useful if you need to make parts.

Martin

Thanks once again. This was my first post to this forum, it's great to know there are such knowledgeable and helpful people out there.

To add some detail to what I've mentioned, I've uploaded some pictures to an album. This is one, showing the damage to the top slide and hence a quest for one in better condition.

PS,

Yes, Pete Rimmer, you are quite right, as you suggest, the ABC control translates into 1 x, 2 x, 4 x feed

(based on measurements with a digital RPM meter)

What I haven't quite worked out yet is what change gear options there may be. There were no additional gears supplied when I bought it .

As far as I can see pitches of 0.5mm, 0.75mm, 1mm, 1.5mm, 2,0mm and 3,0mm are possible with the existing setup, but not 1.25mm or 1.75mm

I'm such a novice with all this....LOL

Andrew, the photos in your album show a lathe with a full screwcutting gearbox. Is that your one?

The lever being 3-position rather than 2-position is probably due to the machine being metric rather than imperial, I would guess.

Edited By Pete Rimmer on 01/12/2019 12:31:36

Andrew;

About the feed screw dials. My 1124 is inch, but I have *no idea* what the cross slide and compound rest feed screws are.

I do everything in metric, so have put 0-25mm dial indicators on, indicators screwed to aluminium blocks, and old hard disk magnets double-sided taped to said blocks. Also have rods attached to cross slide and compound rest. If I exceed the movement of the dial indicator, the magnets ensure I don't to damage.

So far, my "temporary fix" before getting a DRO has held up for a couple of decades now.

Also, one non-CNC mill (Centec) has a 2 axis DRO, and, again, I have no idea what thread pitch the screw dials are.

Anyway, just food for thought

Andrew, I had another look at your photos and you have a 127/100 compound gear in the end train. With your 4mm screw this can only be because the previous owner was cutting imperial threads on the metric machine. Perhaps he also changed the cross-slide screw for an imperial one because he preferred to work in imperial.

Perhaps the missing screwcutting chart is due to him having an anathema to the metric system, just as my father did (though he would never vandalise a machine because of it)?

In any case, if you want to revert to all-metric it would not be too difficult requiring only the cross slide screw replacement and to re-arrange the end-gearing back to how it should be (or to what works). If you wanted to build a screwcutting chart for metric and/or imperial that would not be difficult either, but it will take a bit of input from yourself as to what gearing options there are to work with.

Thanks guys

So, to summarise what I've learned from the exchange so far

1) First of all, thanks for reaffirrming my original view, that I have a nice lathe and it's worth putting some effort into addressing the odd niggles. Hunting through my hard drive, I found an old file that shows I bought it in 2003 for £250, plus £115 for an inverter to run it from single phase. On a £ per year / per hour of entertainment, I've done OK I think.

2) I will contact the suppliers suggested above to see whether they have any bits, eg top slide, given the state of mine. If I draw a blank, maybe I will see if I can get someone to repair it by building it up with braze..

3) It probably makes sense to give up on changing the cross slide leadscrew. I removed it for another look this afternoon, and iboth it and the nut seem in good order. I think teh path of least resistance will be to make a new dial that reads 2.5mm per turn, accept that it will be 2.54mm and then use the digital readout / care when I get close to size.

4) Revisit the gear train, with a longer term objective of finding or making additional gears to fill the gaps in the screwcutting range.

I feel my enthusiasm has been rekindled......