Lathe changing feedrate and buying advice please

This topic has 15 replies, 9 voices, and was last updated 2 December 2018 at 13:00 by Gas_mantle..

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1 December 2018 at 12:57 #383178
Men Ifr
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@menifr84251
All,

I don't own a lathe but am looking for something that will not take up too much space in my garage and will last, but also has 1" spindle bore.

I don't want to spend time fixing a worn out lathe, also don't really want the hassle of arranging delivery from hundreds of miles away so I'm considering the Chester Hobby store DB10 see here:

https://shop.chesterhobbystore.com/collections/lathes/products/db10-super-lathe

Other options would seem to be very well used Boxfords, Myford super 7 or a Colchester Bantam, all with the problem I don't know the condition and assuming ones for sale are too far for me to drive just to look at I would have to buy and gamble..

Any thoughts appreciated

Onto my next question – is it normal on say a Myford with no gearbox you have to change the gears everytime you want to change feedrate? But with a gearbox you just change the lever? Changing gears would seem like a lot of work but maybe not in practice?

The Chester (I think) has 3 gear positions but I've sent them an email what they do – they could either be very useful or next to useless – or may not change the feedrate at all – there is no information on the website and the pictures do not show the controls in enough detail.
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1 December 2018 at 12:57 #13360
Men Ifr
Participant
@menifr84251
Does changing feedrate usually involve a gear change?
1 December 2018 at 13:08 #383181
JasonB
Moderator
@jasonb
Looks like a similar arrangement to my WM280. The lever marked ABC will give three different feed rates from whatever gear train has been set up on the banjo. In practice I find the gear train that gives the slowest feeds can be left setup all the time with the lever giving enough variety of feeds so you really only need to alter the gear train when you what to go from feeds to screwcutting or back again.
1 December 2018 at 13:31 #383185
peak4
Participant
@peak4
I can't speak for anything about the Chester, but if you're requirement for a 1" bore stands, you can eliminate a normal Super 7 from your searches.
I'll stand to be corrected, but I don't think there's many Boxfords suitable either, though I think the later VSLs were big enough.

Bill
1 December 2018 at 14:11 #383192
Men Ifr
Participant
@menifr84251
Jason/Peak thanks for the replies,

Yes the Chester is quite good because it has a 26mm bore via MT4. The bore on a ML7 is quite small – 15mm maybe 3/8" perhaps but the super 7 gets a bigger bore I thought 1.5" though could be wrong – the problem is every-one wants a super 7 so they are pricey. I would have to check the boxford but to get me up and running the Chester seems like the least hassle way – and no more expensive than a boxford/super 7 it seems.

Good to know the 3 speed gearbox is useful on the Chester then.
1 December 2018 at 14:49 #383202
peak4
Participant
@peak4
There is/was a big bore Super 7, but not that common and priced accordingly.

Still available from the new Myford company, but at at a price I personally couldn't justify.

I've just bought a used Warco 1330 for about £2k, so I'd still have enough left for a couple of interesting motorbikes as well compared to the new Myford.

I don't know where you live, but ebay might be worth a look

Bill
1 December 2018 at 15:23 #383213
Men Ifr
Participant
@menifr84251
Yes a big bore new super 7 is out of my price range!!
1 December 2018 at 21:32 #383273
Howard Lewis
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@howardlewis46836
If you don't want the hassle of changing changewheels, you need a lathe with a Norton box, such as second hand Warco BH600, Chester Craftsman, Engineers ToolRoom BL12-24, or a Raglan unless you can find a good machine ex Injdustry, or an ex College Myford with a Norton Box.

The Warco BH 600 and the two clones will provide a minimum feed rate of 0.0047"/rev . There is one compound gear (120/127T) between the mandrel and the input to the Norton box. These will provide 24 feeds or thread pitches, (standard pitches and some total oddballs – if you want them) by moving two levers, before you need to resort to changing the wheel on the mandrel, see below.

The Norton box allows the feedrate to be doubled / halved, by moving just one lever..For some Metric pitches, it is necessary to change the 40T on the Mandrel for one with (From memory) 36 or 32T, which are supplied with the lathe.

The Raglan is a 4MT bore Mandrel (29mm?)_while the Warco BH600, Chester Craftsman and BL12-24 have 5MT bore Mandrels (38mm) and should have a 5MT-3MT open end sleeve for the Mandrel.

Purely as a plug. a pal is selling his well equipped Raglan. Having used it a little, I think that it is versatile machine, and reckoned to be better than Myford 7 Series; if only because in addition to the Norton box, it has power feeds on both axes. To extend the range of feeds, or threads, further, beyond the 24 or so available, there are also changewheels to bring in even more ranges!

Howard

Edited By Howard Lewis on 01/12/2018 21:39:52

Edited By Howard Lewis on 01/12/2018 21:42:52
1 December 2018 at 21:51 #383276
Ian Skeldon 2
Participant
@ianskeldon2
I have a Chester DB 10, and unless you are absolutely sure you won't need to cut imperial threads in the future then forget it. I had a need (and still do) to cut various BSP threads, both internal and external and had a lot of hassal trying to achieve it with the DB10. The compound slide needed a lot of work to get rid of inaccurate manufacturing faults. Finally, I seem to be chasing backlash every couple of weeks and don't use it that much.

I am sorry but I couldn't make a suggestion as to what would be better, a good used lathe would be ideal but making sure it really is good and accurate is never going to be easy.

Good luck with whatever you choose.
2 December 2018 at 00:00 #383284
Gas_mantle.
Participant
@gas_mantle
I've had my DB10 about 18 months and can't fault it for the price.

As for the control knobs I'm not sure what the righthand one does as mine has 2 knobs both marked ABC which gives a choice of 9 feed rates.
2 December 2018 at 05:15 #383286
thaiguzzi
Participant
@thaiguzzi
Posted by peak4 on 01/12/2018 13:31:59:

I can't speak for anything about the Chester, but if you're requirement for a 1" bore stands, you can eliminate a normal Super 7 from your searches.
I'll stand to be corrected, but I don't think there's many Boxfords suitable either, though I think the later VSLs were big enough.

Bill

Of the lathes he mentioned, Myfords, most Boxfords (20mm) until the very last versions, and even early Bantams were smaller than 1" in the spindle bore.
2 December 2018 at 06:55 #383289
JasonB
Moderator
@jasonb
The lathe in questing will be the DB10 Super as they don't list the DB10 now hence the differences in levers.

The three on this machine do foward/rev of screw/shaft, the three speeds and select either feed shaft or lead screw.
2 December 2018 at 09:43 #383298
Ian Skeldon 2
Participant
@ianskeldon2
Gas_Mantle don't get me wrong, for the money my lathe was not terrible, but it wasn't great either. It was cutting a 0.2mm taper over 100mm to start with, correcting it was nightmare as there is no adjustment built in or available, so I then had to sacrifice an old file and bugger about making a scraper, then bluing and scraping for hours until I got a perfect parallel cut.

Can you cut a true 14tpi thread on your lathe? If so how? please share your knowledge I found that to be another big issue to resolve.

The compound slide was running downhill, when I looked at it closely, the ways and gig angles don't match either. All in all it has been a long slow journey to get the lathe doing what it should have been doing out of the box. As the OP has been going on about acheiving great accuracy with his mill in another thread, I doubt evry much that he would be happy with the DB10, unless I was just unlucky?
2 December 2018 at 11:00 #383304
Hopper
Participant
@hopper
Do you REALLY need a 1" bore spindle? Most jobs can be done in a Myford etc by using a fixed steady and having the job stick out of the chuck through the steady. The only time when you absolutely need the large bore spindle is for jobs longer than the lathe bed so can't be accommodated with the fixed steady. (EG, some motorcycle fork tubes if you want to machine the ends of them.)

You can see from the previous posts, and from several threads running on the forum at the moment that you make your choice between buying used, which may or may not be in good condition, or buying low-cost new, which may or may not work properly straight out of the box.
2 December 2018 at 11:13 #383309
ega
Participant
@ega
Posted by Hopper on 02/12/2018 11:00:30:

Do you REALLY need a 1" bore spindle? Most jobs can be done in a Myford etc by using a fixed steady and having the job stick out of the chuck through the steady….

As a standard bore Myford user, I would agree; but the extra spindle capacity is very handy and often avoids the accumulation of unusable short ends of material. The 1" bore makes sense as the typical 4" three jaw chuck passes this size.

I suspect that the steady, along with the faceplate and between-centres turning, are less used than they should be.
2 December 2018 at 13:00 #383335
Gas_mantle.
Participant
@gas_mantle
Posted by Ian Skeldon 2 on 02/12/2018 09:43:30:

Gas_Mantle don't get me wrong, for the money my lathe was not terrible, but it wasn't great either. It was cutting a 0.2mm taper over 100mm to start with, correcting it was nightmare as there is no adjustment built in or available, so I then had to sacrifice an old file and bugger about making a scraper, then bluing and scraping for hours until I got a perfect parallel cut.

Can you cut a true 14tpi thread on your lathe? If so how? please share your knowledge I found that to be another big issue to resolve.

The compound slide was running downhill, when I looked at it closely, the ways and gig angles don't match either. All in all it has been a long slow journey to get the lathe doing what it should have been doing out of the box. As the OP has been going on about acheiving great accuracy with his mill in another thread, I doubt evry much that he would be happy with the DB10, unless I was just unlucky?

Ian I wasn't having a dig at your posting, it's fairly well known that these Chinesium machines vary in quality even from the same supplier. I was just making the point that mine is fine and in my opinion it's worth what I paid.

As for the thread cutting I have no idea what my machine would cope like, for the type of work I do I never need to cut them – in about 3yrs of owning a lathe it is something I've never done.
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