Lathe rescue

[davidwdyer]

I don't know if you remember, but last year this old girl followed me home.

I got it from a scrap dealer. He sold it and delivered it for $640.

This is NOT a restoration project!

[davidwdyer]

Here is how she looks today.

[davidwdyer]

There were two gears ruined in the lower gear box.

I had another guy here make me two new ones. He turned down the old gears and pressed the new gears over them.

Then he pinned them. Sorry no pictures of the new gears, but they looked good. He charged me 200 bucks.

[davidwdyer]

Here's where they came from and what the gear train looked like disassembled.

[davidwdyer]

I had a guy help me with this since I had never done anything like this before and I ended up paying him about $200.

We also had to take the motor off and change the seals.

Speaking of that, the lube oil for the lathe is in a kind of a drawer which slips in the side under motor.

The old lube was jelly. What a mess!

We cleaned up this gear box, mounted the new gears and reassembled it. Works great!

This VDF lathe is made in Germany. It does both metric and inch threads.

[davidwdyer]

Another expense I had was a chuck. I found this 15 inch four jaw chuck here in Brazil, new for $240.

The jaws do not adjust individually. They all move together.

[davidwdyer]

The backing plate was another expense. I had to have it cut out of steel plate and another machinist make it round for me. About $160.

I don't have any other lathes capable of handling anything this big.

I then had to locate and drill the holes for the "hub" of the lathe and the chuck.

Of course, there was fitting the chuck. The whole process came out pretty well.

[davidwdyer]

This lathe is from 1948. It was made so the motor only ran in one direction.

Reversing was done mechanically inside the main gearbox.

But it seems that at one time the clutch mechanism which switched from forward to reverse gave out.

With the old lathe, parts were probably a problem.

So some unhappy human being took a welding rod and "solved" the problem.

[davidwdyer]

This meant that to obtain reverse, I installed an electric switch.

Then I just cut off the long bar which controlled forward and reverse.

You can see that the original lathe has three long bars across the front (actually, one lead screw and two bars) while now it has two.


So far, this seems to be a good solution.

[davidwdyer]

There is a guy here who has offered to scrape it completely: the bed, cross slide, etc. work on the lead screws and make all new for $2,500.

Right now I'm just waiting to see how it all works. It is just a hobby for me and I've honestly never used a lathe this big. It may be that

I don't need the ultimate precision for the moment. Right now it seems as if have about $1500 in it.

You are welcome to weigh in on this decision.

[BCRider]

Very nice work so far. And for a project which is not a restoration it looks like you've done a lot of restorative work...

By all means do a series of checks for alignment and wear first to determine if there is enough wear to justify any scraping.

I'm thinking you'd want to run the usual leveling and "two collar" alignment checks and any tuning to eliminate any bed twist that might be present due to how it is sitting on the floor. Part of that is that you can also check the tail stock for any off center and sag of the ram. For a new machine I'd say the two collar procedure to eliminate twist would be easily also the final setting. But for an older lathe I can see the advantage of first leveling the ends of the bed with a precision machinist's level and then checking with the level in a few ways for an initial test for wear on the ways.

Another good option for checking for wear is a tested straight edge and shims. The straight edge is best if it's truly straight but even if there is an arch to it if you can confirm the amount with a surface plate or by other means (measure width over the length then test for height flipped each way) you can include this fudge factor in the tests done to the bed.

It might well be that there's some but not enough wear to justify a full scraping job. Especially when it's just a hobby as you say. The nice thing about these tests is that much can be done with a dial or test gauge and a few good ways of holding the gauge.

[old mart]

You might not need the scraping done, it is surprising how well the turning for a worn lathe can be. Plenty of actual test turning is required, and you may find its strengths and weaknesses. A four jaw independent chuck would be nice, it could probably share the backplate with the scroll chuck.

[davidwdyer]

Very nice work so far. And for a project which is not a restoration it looks like you've done a lot of restorative work...

By all means do a series of checks for alignment and wear first to determine if there is enough wear to justify any scraping.

I'm thinking you'd want to run the usual leveling and "two collar" alignment checks and any tuning to eliminate any bed twist that might be present due to how it is sitting on the floor. Part of that is that you can also check the tail stock for any off center and sag of the ram. For a new machine I'd say the two collar procedure to eliminate twist would be easily also the final setting. But for an older lathe I can see the advantage of first leveling the ends of the bed with a precision machinist's level and then checking with the level in a few ways for an initial test for wear on the ways.

Another good option for checking for wear is a tested straight edge and shims. The straight edge is best if it's truly straight but even if there is an arch to it if you can confirm the amount with a surface plate or by other means (measure width over the length then test for height flipped each way) you can include this fudge factor in the tests done to the bed.

It might well be that there's some but not enough wear to justify a full scraping job. Especially when it's just a hobby as you say. The nice thing about these tests is that much can be done with a dial or test gauge and a few good ways of holding the gauge.

Yes, I've still got a lot of adjusting to do. I do have a "precision level" from China and amazingly, it is dead level as it sits. I also centered the live center with the chuck.

It is a touch high, but left and right I got adjusted. I can see that several shims have been put in the tail stock to try to keep it level with the chuck.

[davidwdyer]

You might not need the scraping done, it is surprising how well the turning for a worn lathe can be. Plenty of actual test turning is required, and you may find its strengths and weaknesses. A four jaw independent chuck would be nice, it could probably share the backplate with the scroll chuck.

I'm sure a four jaw would be nice, but with the weight of that thing, I don't think I'll be changing it very often.

I can only lift with the engine hoist seen in the background of the second picture.

[davidwdyer]

The steady rest on the end of the lathe did not come with it. It was also found in the dirt at another salvage yard.

When I first saw it just after buying the lathe, the guy wanted a lot of money for it. Just the other day I saw it again

and the price had dropped by almost two thirds. Another reason I didn't buy it the first time (besides the price) was because it was too narrow for the lathe bed.

But when he offered it to me for $240 I bought it and made a new base.