Fortis Lathe fixed steady

I have a Fortis Lathe that came without a fixed steady. I know this was related to the Clausing 100 so wondered if anyone can point me in the right direction for getting sizing etc to either build one or find one at a reasonable price for someone on a very low budget. Would a Harrison version fit for example?
I would love any information related to the Fortis lathe too as at present I have very little knowledge of it.

Mark

Try WWW.lathes machine tool archive for information and handbooks. can't help with accessories sorry.

Robert Butler

As Robert says, use the lathes.co.uk to try to narrow down the search for the Clausing equivalent (or nearest), then have a look on This page on Keith Rucker's site. You might be able to find some info in one of those publications. There's certainly a picture of a steady rest in the accessories catalogue. It looks to be a pretty standard design.

John

If the purpose is purely need , could you make one (particularly if you have a few dimensions / an illustration that can be scaled )

Easier if youy have access to a mill, otherwise some filing invoved.

Looks may be less important than ability to do what is required.

If sticking as closely as possible to prototype than you are looking to find a genuine article somewhere.

Howard

Thank you for the responses, I will check them out. I did think making one may be an option too

As the price of fixed steadies to fit the Smart & Brown model A at the museum was ridiculusly high, and we have milling capacity, I bought two cheap ones on ebay. One was C shaped and would manage about 50mm diameter and the other was a two part hinged one with about 75mm capacity. The bases were modified to bolt onto aluminium 40mm square barstock milled to fit the bed profile, so the centre point of each was on the spindle axis and each using a bolt through clamp. The large one had an extra set of fingers made by us with little ball races to complement the original bronze ones. The work very well and cost very little. I was extremely lucky with getting a travelling steady as an unidentified one came up cheap and turned out to be the exact one for the lathe.

The standard Drummond ones were rubbish so I fabricated my own

If you can do basic welding it makes these kind of tasks a lot easier, the original was ridiculously limited in its capacity and I made a far more useful version

The only caveat I would add is the finger tips should be phosphor bronze or suchlike bearing material to make life easier, the rest of the design is up to you

Edited By Ady1 on 16/08/2023 13:26:34

It might be worth pricing one up as Warco at the moment for one of their 6" centre height lathes.
They have a 15% off sale at the moment.

Bill

The Hemingway kits high capacity steady is very adaptable to a range of machine centre heights, priced at about £65 plus postage. I made one for my Myford 254+ as the originals are very expensive and have a limited range, not a difficult project and I'm sure could be constructed on the lathe and vertical slide if no mill is available. Annoyingly mine came with a horrible piece of old rusty zinc plated studding for the adjusters, but a piece of stainless studding from Ebay sorted that, the steady tips as supplied are brass so I substituted bronze, otherwise a reasonable kit. Might be worth speaking to hemingway if you are interested and they could advise on the best base to supply, the base is the part that changes to adapt to various machines.

Thank you for the latest comments, I will look into these & making one sounds a good project