Myford dividing head body casting material

Having restored the world's most abused Myford lathe some years ago HERE I now have a line on the world's most abused Myford dividing head, complete with matching (in abuse) vertical slide.

A mate of a mate has it, in a small town about 100 miles from where I live. I offered him $100 (50 Quid) for it as an interesting paperweight, sight unseen on the basis of the pic. But he is holding out for $200. Which I am uninclined to pay as it really does look rough. To say the least.

Question: Is the main dividing head's body casting Mazak like most of Myford's bits and pieces, or is it cast iron? Because I reckon if it is Mazak that main spindle will be electrolytically corroded in there permanently and the whole thing will be beyond repair, even for a masochist like me.

I suppose the dividing head is worth a few bob in good conditon, but not sure this one will ever reach that standard. And I already have a GHT dividing head that I rarely use so not overkeen on a derusting-remaking project if it's too hard.

The wet tropical climate really does awful things to machinery left out in open sheds or under high-set houses. Crying shame.

Mine is cast iron

Every one that I have seen has a cast iron body. I certainly wouldn’t pay more than 50 quid for it though.

The slide and div head have got to be worth £100 - even in that state. the head body is cast iron. Noel.

Thanks Baz. Then there is some chance it might be salvageable, if a guy wanted project to do. Which I don't really. Every time I look at that pic it looks worse. The feedscrew on that vertical slide looks pretty bad, and the T slot table looks like the rust is 1mm deep or more maybe. Would require facing off so the job gets bigger and bigger. Yes I think I will stick to the 100 dollars/50 quid -- and hope he does not accept it!

I used to have one, main parts are of cast iron, it will be a bargain for 100 dollars/£50, I think with your skill you will soon have it in very good working order once again. But you say you have GHT one, so do you need two ? I sold mine when I built the stepper motor job in MEW several years ago. John

100 bananas looks very fair, it's pretty bashed up but these things are always worth saving

Have those spindle tension lugs been welded together??

(The spindle nose looks bent to me, like its been dropped, but jpeg pictures can deceive the eye)

I wouldn't up my bid unless I got a look at it first

Edited By Ady1 on 03/01/2023 10:47:37

How many plates does it have? I paid ~£200 for one with 4 plates in reasonable condition, must be at least 15 years back, at an exhibition. Yes the body is cast iron and these are desirable units, low profile to fit on a smaller mill and easy to upgrade to digital.

Other pics including of the conversion components in one of my albums. My main concern would be the state of the MT2 taper and whether you could clean it up. Highly unlikely that the spindle is bent, it is pretty massive. Actually £100 is a fair price I think, he would get much more on eBay judging by some of the junk that sells there.

Hi John Haine, nice looking conversion there.

No, it only has one index plate with it. I already drilled the 812 holes in the plates for VDH so not keen to do more!

My mate is going up there this week so he will take a look at it for me and send more pics. He is an aircraft engineer with the best home workshop ever,full of lathes and mills, so knows what to look for.

It's tempting, but...

It is a shame that magnets don't work on photographs

Cheers, Tim

Hi Hopper

I agree with Noel Shelly above, the DH and vertical slide together are easily worth £100 even if they need some elbow grease.

Cheers

Dave

Now that would be a good trick! A photographic magnet.

My mate is up there for work for the rest of the week so he will have a look at it -- and apply a magnet -- while he is there, and bring it home with him if it turns out to be salvageable. That one photo just looks nasty to me though.

Plates are easy to make or 3D print. Clean up spindle with MT reamer. The swivelling slide is worth a bit too. Still a bargain at £150, OK at £200 when you think about how long it takes to make an equivalent.

Hopper

Purely selfish, but I hope you do get it, always enjoy your interesting posts and this would be a good one!

Dave

Pete,

Why not up your offer a little, $150-170.

That's less than £100 in our money.

By the way, enjoyed your current article in MEW and a FRONT page picture, special!!!

Geoff

Thanks Geoff. Yes my 15 minutes of fame, on the cover of the Rolling Stone, I mean the MEW.

Well, look what found its way to Hoppers House of Engineering Horrors today. I ended up giving the guy his 100 Quid's worth of local beer tokens for it, after my mate checked it out for me and declared it salvageable. I was not so sure when I picked it up. It is really pretty 'orrible in its 'orribleness.

A crying shame to see such a fine piece of equipment allowed to get to that state. The tropical climate does terrible things to machinery. It came from up on the Atherton Tablelands where they get about 6 feet of rain a year and most farmers keep their gear in open sided sheds to catch the cooling breezes, which bring the rain in with them unfortunately. But I think we will be able to restore it to useable condition. Somebody has to!

I thought about putting Evaporust on it, someting I have not tried before. But our local "SuperCheap" auto parts store charges $40 (20 Quid) for 1 litre, so I rapidly rethought that one. SuperCheap in name but not super cheap in nature. So it is spending the night soaking in degreaser in my parts washer and we will see what we have in the morning when all the gunge is removed.

So far, nothing on it moves, but I have not tried more than a casual flick of the wrist. The main handle will turn under pressure but very stiff so I left that alone until it can be soaked in degreaser then WD40 etc. Vertical slide screw seems stuck solid in that Mazak feed nut. Could be electrolytic corrosion there perhaps. And the visible bit of the screw looks pretty ugly.

It only has one indexing plate, the number of hole circles ranging from 32 to 91. So I might make the other two or three to complete the set out of 6mm aluminium plate. Easier to cut out into circles and easier to drill the needed 600 or so holes in.

But right now I am busy with a major motorbike project taking up most of my limited shed time so this might be a longer term project in dribs and drabs when I want a break from bike work.

Not much wrong with that a good clean will not fix,a later version of the Vslide with 2 holding bolts,  you even got a couple of genuine  face plate clamps as well. It is complete, all the right bits, no screws or parts missing. Noel.

Edited By noel shelley on 18/01/2023 10:47:21

Edited By noel shelley on 18/01/2023 10:49:28

Yes I was rather tickled to get the two little clamps included. Always wanted some with the little tag sticking out, but have never seen any before. Nice.

Yes preliminary inspection and a tentative scrub with a wire brush looks like most of the rust is superficial and will come off. It is not etched 2mm deep like the cross slide on my ML7 when I got it. 9pm here right now so a good soak overnight will reveal the truth tomorrow.

Hopper,

Look up on using molasses to remove rust, dirt cheap ans quite good, apparently.

K