Fretters
Well-known member
This is actually something I started about three months ago, but it got put on hold for a while. Bought it around the start of the year. These are the sellers photos, so apologies for the quality.
Never had any intention of tarting this one up as such, for the time being. It's a simple case of get it up and running and used, but it may get a full restore later on. Obviously a fair bit of rust to deal with on certain pieces though. It's an old Ehrlich lathe, 5-1/4" centre height. Needed something a bit larger and sturdier than the Warwick which has been my jobber lathe for the last several years, (3-1/2" centre height), so that I could get some larger pieces sorted. The big Drummond is still a good way from being finished, so when this one came up locally for a respectable price, I bought it. Nowt fancy, and still not up and running as yet, but it's getting there. I got it to this state before sidetracking for a while.
The headstock unit is now clamped down and mostly reassembled. Just need to refit the thrust washer, (having a devil of a time finding a suitably sized replacement, so the original is going back in there for the time being), and dig out a new spring for the tumble reverse lever. That leaves just refitting the leadscrew and sorting the countershaft assembly. The headstock unit refitted and reassembled.
Most of the work on this one has been general cleaning up, derusting and sorting out odds and sods. One example being that someone had forced metric studs into the rear headstock bearing retainer, so I had to whip those out, retap and make some fresh studs. The tailstock clamping bolt had seen better days too, so I had to repair that as well. The new bearing cap studs.
The flat is due to the off centre boring. It would have fouled the bearing without having the flat on there.
The tailstock clamp bolt repair. Dropped the ball a tad on that one and made it a tad skinny, so the thread is missing the peaks, but there's plenty of contact area on the thread as is. The tailstock uses an eccentric locking mechanism, so the nut is only loosely placed on there, with the locking being done by a cam pulling the tailstock plate tightly up into position on the underside of the ways.
Never had any intention of tarting this one up as such, for the time being. It's a simple case of get it up and running and used, but it may get a full restore later on. Obviously a fair bit of rust to deal with on certain pieces though. It's an old Ehrlich lathe, 5-1/4" centre height. Needed something a bit larger and sturdier than the Warwick which has been my jobber lathe for the last several years, (3-1/2" centre height), so that I could get some larger pieces sorted. The big Drummond is still a good way from being finished, so when this one came up locally for a respectable price, I bought it. Nowt fancy, and still not up and running as yet, but it's getting there. I got it to this state before sidetracking for a while.
The headstock unit is now clamped down and mostly reassembled. Just need to refit the thrust washer, (having a devil of a time finding a suitably sized replacement, so the original is going back in there for the time being), and dig out a new spring for the tumble reverse lever. That leaves just refitting the leadscrew and sorting the countershaft assembly. The headstock unit refitted and reassembled.
Most of the work on this one has been general cleaning up, derusting and sorting out odds and sods. One example being that someone had forced metric studs into the rear headstock bearing retainer, so I had to whip those out, retap and make some fresh studs. The tailstock clamping bolt had seen better days too, so I had to repair that as well. The new bearing cap studs.
The flat is due to the off centre boring. It would have fouled the bearing without having the flat on there.
The tailstock clamp bolt repair. Dropped the ball a tad on that one and made it a tad skinny, so the thread is missing the peaks, but there's plenty of contact area on the thread as is. The tailstock uses an eccentric locking mechanism, so the nut is only loosely placed on there, with the locking being done by a cam pulling the tailstock plate tightly up into position on the underside of the ways.
Last edited:
).