Need help with buying a lathe

[yaidunno]

Lathe looks to be in fair shape. I'd expect to spend some time disassembling, cleaning, and re lubricating the moving parts. Inspect the bed ways carefully, especially on the chuck end (where the carriage would be most often). I see it comes with a nice tool post holder, thread dial, and tail stock chuck. Off to a pretty good start. Expect to shell out a few Benjamin's for tooling, depending on how serious you want to get with things.

Really though, for that price, you simply cant go wrong. Get that stuff in your shop and start making chips!

 

[Jamie V]

He said he has a few extra chucks too.

 

[BFBOB]

I have little to offer, so skipped to the end. Sorry if this has been mentioned: Be sure it can cut SAE and Metric threads. May be standard by now, but when I bought mine 30 years ago, the same lathe came in all three versions, M, S, and both.

 

[Diesel_Crawler]

Lathe looks to be in fair shape. I'd expect to spend some time disassembling, cleaning, and re lubricating the moving parts. Inspect the bed ways carefully, especially on the chuck end (where the carriage would be most often). I see it comes with a nice tool post holder, thread dial, and tail stock chuck. Off to a pretty good start. Expect to shell out a few Benjamin's for tooling, depending on how serious you want to get with things.

Really though, for that price, you simply cant go wrong. Get that stuff in your shop and start making chips!

2nd on a good cleaning, hey seem like fare machines but I would do a really good tear down and clean and relube. But its worth the money.

 

[zkling]

I'm sure some are going to be shocked hearing this from me, but. If you can I would spend a bit more money or time looking and purchase a ready to use machine. No offense intended, but you do not have the knowledge at this time to properly go through a precision metal working machine and bring it back up to proper operating condition without guidance. Learning to run a lathe or mill can be challenging. Learning to rebuild a machine without knowing the basics of how it works, then trying to learn how to use it, is going to be very frustrating. It will be very hard for people to help you at distance not knowing if the problem is something you are doing or an internal problem with the machine itself.

Those look to be in pretty rough shape and to have been sitting for a while. If your goal is to learn to run a lathe productively in a reasonable amount of time. Keep looking. However if you want a long term project that could potentially be a time and $ sink hole. Well I think you found a good one.

Again not trying to insult or discourage you, just some advice from someone that has been there done that. Is that a good deal for those machines? Possibly, depending on their inspection condition. Just be forewarned that it could turn ugly fast and repairing machine tools can be very expensive.

 

[ez-duzit]

Except for the serious neglect, these look like capable machines. And $1600 is such small money for that package. But you'd necessarily need to take responsibility for assessing and restoring the weather damage. I'd buy it if inspection warrants.

 

[JoeFin]

Sorry I didn't take more time for a proper response

I'm looking at 2 very wise choices for a home shop mill and a lathe and I'm thinking the guy knew his machines pretty well. Yes they have been neglected and it will take some investment of time and energy to get them back to pristine looking condition. But the person who knew enough to purchase those 2 machines most likely knew enough to avoid any thing that clapped out from decades of production and abuse.

Not that I'm saying don't take your time to thoroughly inspect them - just that other then some dirt and slight surface rust - I don't think you'll find much wrong with them.

The 1 thing you want to ask about on the lathe is if he has the "Steady Rest" for it. It will look some thing like this one

and with the milling machine I see 1 collet in the machine but he should have the remaining set of collets and perhaps a milling vise to go with it. They'll look some thing like this

Also since he selling off the machines I would ask if he has any tooling he wants to let go of too.

Now you could make the same mistake I did and spend less on "Better Looking" Asian machines and "Think" you got a good deal. But after fighting loose tolerances, soft metal, indicator dials basically lying to you (turn dial .030" and tool moves .035") if you really want to make any thing of value, worth having - you'll end up "Upgrading" to 2 machines like those

 

[Jamie V]

I started this journey looking for just a lathe and then found these. I've considered buying both and selling the mill to offset the cost of the lathe (not sure what the mill is worth) but if by selling the mill I can get the lathe for dirt cheap that might be an option.

I'm no machinist but I am very very mechanically inclined. So taking it apart I'm pretty sure I could handle. The guy said I can see them both run so that's a plus. Be nice to have someone who knows these machines look at them with me but that's not a likely option.

 

[JoeFin]

I started this journey looking for just a lathe and then found these. I've considered buying both and selling the mill to offset the cost of the lathe (not sure what the mill is worth) but if by selling the mill I can get the lathe for dirt cheap that might be an option.

You might want to keep both at that price because your not likely to see a deal that good again.

Depends on what your doing with them but if your into custom bikes, cars, or racing they are invaluable

I built this one for my son

 

[Jamie V]

This was my last build

 

[Adam.C]

Jamie, I can infer from your comments here that it would be a HUGE mistake for you to click on these machine restoration links:

Bridgeport Restoration

SB 13 Restoration

I'm afraid you may come across these on your own and uwittingly get sucked in (as I was).

People who like machines and machinery, especially those who favor clean, high performance items should probably avoid these links as well.

I found this gentleman's work to be wholly inspirational. Like you, he was mechanically inclined and had spent some time in his youth working with machines. Otherwise he just dug in.

Only recommendation from me, if you notice in these threads (and some others like them), the OP asks for help at several key points during his build and instantly receives help, offers of parts etc. It is my belief that the tools you looked at are fairly common. Aside from those specifics, I would steer you toward the very common and collectable tools that you can very easily get parts for, find online support, and sell quickly.

Oh, and keep the mill.

BTW, Brad doesn't live that far from you.

 

[Jamie V]

I'm already sucked in. That's how I ended up with my racedeck floor.

 

[Jamie V]

Picts

 

[Jamie V]

BTW, Brad doesn't live that far from you.

Who is Brad and I need to meet him.

 

[Adam.C]

Who is Brad and I need to meet him.

He is the op in those threads. He has a couple you tube videos too. I am away from home or I would go with you to meet him. He seems like a really great guy. I loved the molasses dip.

That floor is completely awesome.

 

[Jamie V]

I PM'd Brad on PM so hopefully he chimes in.