Murad Antartica Lathe ??

Hi Folks can anyone help?

I recently purchased a box of unnamed and unsized lathe pieces consisting of a fixed steady, travelling steady, damaged tool slide and screw, and a collection of 17 various similar toothed keyed gear wheels.

My intention was to adapt the fixed steady for use in my Mk2 Bantam 2000 with a centre height of 6.5 inches.

The fixed steady was much smaller than it appeared in the photo at 4.0 inch centre height and therefore not practical for a suitable conversion to 6.6 inch.
I am now left with a box of unidentified bits to try and sell on and to recoup some of my losses.

From my study of the archive on the www.lathes.Co website I think the parts are common from a Murad Antarctica lathe with both steadies having a 4.0 centre height, The tool slide screw has an acme like thread form of 7/16 x 10 TPI and the collection of 19 gear wheels all being 3/8 wide with a keyed 3/4 Central bore. As you see the fixed steady sits on to a bed V way unlike the Murad Cadet Lathe and that is why I suspect it’s all from a Murad Antarctica lathe. Any advice or photos or web directions you can give much appreciated, as I have found info on the Murad Antarctica lathes rather limited so far.

Thanks and Regards

James G Quinn

Some of your bits look like a south bend, which on the balance of probabilities you've got more chance of running into randomly

Edited By Ady1 on 17/08/2023 20:22:15

Hi Andy,

Good call, I have looked at the 8ins and 9ins Southbend models past on the www.lathes website and it shows the tool slide to be a very similar shape and style and the travelling steady in one shot to be similar and also one shot shows the little cast iron tray used for holding a spanner. I will take some more pics with a scaled rule showing some more dimensions and put it on eBay and hopefully someone out there will need some of it.

Thanks for your advice. regards.

James