Member postings for Russ B

Not sure about the Raglans, the 280 looks identical in many ways to the Harrison M300, same bed casting, same saddle, same headstock casting but the two speed change levers are mounted on top of the Myford but are still basically the same inside the box. The apron and the screw cutting box are different but elsewhere the similarities seem never ending!

It seems no one knows anything about their manufacturer but I’ve seen so few out in the wild I wonder if they ever produced them in any reasonable quantity. Someone must know something, I’d assumed they were made in nottingham but never seen any photos of the production, whereas there are many pics and history of the rest of the range. I’d be surprised if they weren’t made by Harrison.

Thanks, i’ll take a look. The lathe came with a user manual and parts diagrams but I don’t recall seeing any maintenance info beyond oiling etc

Edited By Russ B on 19/10/2020 19:40:40

Does anyone have a pdf manual they could share with me for the Colchester Bantam or Harrison M250, I just want to make sure I’ve adjusted the spindle bearings properly on my Myford 280 which looks like it’s cut from the same cloth as the above two machines.

Well, I got there in the end!

After all the trouble I had with the crossfeed dial I decided to strip and clean the compound, which turned into a full strip and clean of the compound slide.

Interestingly when I stripped the much smaller vickers dial, it was actually exactly the same internally, the graduated dials were just machined down to around 3/8th larger than the press fit hub as per martin’s photo above actually, you can see comparing his dials to mine, mine have much more meat on the dials!

After some comparison between the two, I reached the same conclusion but for a different reason which is kind of important just in order to understand what went wrong. Basically the press fit steel hubs internal spigot had been machined or rubbed down, presumably damaged OR a replacement part intended for what looks like the later design that Martin has NOS of? So when the knurled wheel was tightened, rather than locking the steel hub/graduated dial to the shoulder on the shaft it was pushing it into the steel mid plate. After machining the mid plate down there was then a small interference with the gear carrying backplate that retains the driven wheel and mid plate, only very minor, a quick hone and everything was as good as new, almost. The locating peg that holds the driven half of the assembly in place is a bit damaged, and slotted more than it should be! The whole assembly has obviously seen some abuse.

So all functional now, albeit without the imperial readout as I had to remove the damaged pinion gear.

Edited By Russ B on 10/10/2020 10:17:16

I have the B&Q cheapo hoover, wet and dry etc, has lasted me 8-9 years of hard use, building works, wood work, swarf oil etc. great piece of kit, i’d go straight out and buy another if it died tomorrow.

So, my steel mid section is actually thicker than yours, exactly 3/16” in the centre. It’s obviously been rubbing this for some time as it’s worn down a thou around the edges.

I’ve determined from careful measurement and sketches an interference between the steel mid plate and driver wheel of 0.1305mm or 5 thou, it’s right there on paper, double checked the dimensions and laid it out twice.

No way around it, it just doesn’t work.

If my mid steel plate was 4.5mm like yours, I’d have exactly 5 thou clearance..... sounds comfortable to me.

I need to get some 4.5mm plate or find someone with a small surface grinder!!

This where I got the idea maybe I was missing a shim on the shaft, to space the wheel off the steel plate slightly.

Edited By Russ B on 07/10/2020 22:11:27

Those photos confirm no shim. Is the driver dials steel hub pressed flush with the graduated gear ring (the side against the table in your photo)

Does anyone know where the little plastic gears can be sourced.

Size wise i’m not sure how big mine is. I’d say they functional top slide one is about 1.1/2” maybe 1.3/4” and the troublesome cross slide is maybe 2.1/4 ish, from memory which just looking at post seems to make sense.

The fixed steel mid section is thicker on yours with countersunk screws, mines just a plate with regular pz2 screws (not metric)

Yes the photos would still be very useful considering mine still doesn’t work on reassembly!

As i’ve said i think the steel hub isn’t pressed all the way into the driver/dial. This steel hub locates against the face of the first step on the shaft and because the gear/dial is standing proud it’s locking against the middle fixed steel plate when there should be a very small clearance I had initially wondered if I was missing a shim, but given the close tolerances of everything, Vickers probably didn’t need to shim anything!

Edited By Russ B on 07/10/2020 12:48:10

Martin I look forward to your reply.

I have now managed to get in to it. The two tapped holes are a red herring, they secure the centre steel plate to the backplate retaining the driven gear/dial.

It was simple a case of tapping the threaded end of the shaft back though the assembly. It was incredibly tight due to damage and burs on the shaft from a previously botched repair. To worsen matters the black steel hub which is a press fit into the driver gear/dial has been beaten to death with a hammer on the inside spigot which is a close fit inside another shaft, which caused it to seize.

Add to this that the press fit hub isn’t pressing all the way in, and they are the main causes of the issue. Someone’s had a go at fixing it, and beaten it to death. I’ve done my best to dress it up with a file and stone but Vickers really put some close tolerances on these things so it’s still drags slightly here or there.

I need to determine why the hub isn’t pressing all the way in tonight because it’s causing the driver gear/dial to rub on the steel centre part (which is secured with those 2 internal screws). The plastic gear inside is toast but I’d be happy just removing it for now if this press fit weren’t rubbing and seizing. Currently the only way to use the machine is to loosen the lock but fully and allow the graduated metric ring to spin freely, which makes it hard making things to a dimension!

To cut to the chase, hows this come apart!!? I don’t want to force anything but my reason for stripping it, is that it’s already seized solid, and I can’t zero the dial even with the lock ring backed right off. This, it’s hard to tell what should and shouldn’t be forced.

Those two holes, are possibly tapped, and m3 screw fits but i’m sure it’s imperials as the grub screws were.

Its a vickers dual metric/imperial dial and it’s been jammed since I bought this lathe. No doubt one of the planet gears (more likely, the only planet gear) is damaged.

It wouldn’t be a problem as I don’t tend to use imperial (it’s a metric machine) but when I loosen the lock nut to zero the dial, it’s jammed solid, and I like to zero especially with these dials as the major and minor graduations are a bit odd!

I get my inserts from Cutwel and live by thier recommended feeds/speeds/depths of cut using anything between the min and max recommended depending on the strength of the setup and part, but almost never outside of this.

 You are perhaps not by coincidence running almost a similar speed/feed to what I would use on my NC5330 coated CCMT tips (I use Korloy CCMT09T308-HMP) - keeping in mind I'm on a Colchester with 20mm tooling.

Feed's are recommended 0.1-0.3mm/rev, .....check

DOC 0.5-3.0mm ..... check.... but 0.75-1.00mm might solve your problem if your lathes up to it.

However...... 200rpm.........I would be aiming between 130-300 meters/min surface speed, you're under 30! As you approach 40mm you want to be SLOWING down to around 1000rpm (=130m/min) - if the chips aren't purple and bouncing off the ceiling, you're not doing it right.....

Worth noting.... my colchester has an automatic cutoff on the depth, so I can let it loose at 1000rpm&0.2mm/rev fairly care free, my Myford 280 has a graduated handweel on the saddle, when things are moving fast I mark the depth on the mm scale with big bright bold marker so I cut the feed when I get to the depth, requires concentration, and a knack......

Edited By Russ B on 07/09/2020 13:00:04

Edited By Russ B on 07/09/2020 13:03:30

Just my 2 pence, I think they're very good machines, I much prefer the reliability and pure power of the belt drive system to that of an electronic drive.

They're substantial enough to make good quality cuts on small parts, and certainly have the power, 2 points which can't be said for a lot of other similar sized machines.

Sure the round column means you lose x/y ordinates if/when you have to lower the head, but it's not hard to pick them up for the occasional times it has to happen, and with carefully selected tooling (mainly a set of stub drills) it's rarely an issue.

I can't think of a better machine for the price and sq footage, but thats all very personal, I don't need atom splitting accuracy, I like the power and reliability and heavy duty'ness of it.

* I should point out, there are 2 different sizes of this machine, they both look the same but next each, completely different, both capable, both solid. Some have plain tables with keep plates, some (most) have dovetail with tapered gibs. some have 8 speeds, some 10, some 12 etc. The older ones seem to have a better fit and finish than the newer ones I've had my hands on although I've owned 3 or 4 of the old ones, I've never owned a newer one so hard to pickout exactly why, could just need tweaking and setting up these days.

Edited By Russ B on 28/07/2020 13:04:19

Well the house has gone some £30k plus over my budget, certainly no regrets losing to a bid that high.

It has highlight the need to slim down the lathe collection somewhat and I think an extra few grand in savings will help us!

I'm going to see about putting the Myford on an advert here circa £2000 which after having looked on ebay, I think that might be considered cheap. This puts me in a strange position as it's stupid money if you ask me, but if thats what they go for, I need the money!

Bob, I'm in the UK

The house we wanted goes tomorrow, closed bids, I already know a friend is offering more than I have to offer, and more than I can comfortably afford, so I'll make my offer but I don't expect to get anything.

The more I've thought about this house, the less I think I like it, great house, very wealthy location, which is what makes it so expensive on the one hand, but also makes it so I could potentially invest a lot of money in to modifications, renovations etc and more than likely, gain money in equity!

Anyway, I think it'll go for a lot more than I can afford, it will be interesting to see who offers what, I think it could even be over 1/4 million mark which is just a crazy amount to say out aloud, but who knows!

Thanks to everyone for their input, I have used ebay before but in my mind, selling a lathe or machine tool is a bit like selling car, I wouldn't be comfortable at all bidding on a car I hadn't seen and thus I'm not comfortable with people bidding on a lathe they haven't seen, I just don't want any trouble, people coming to collect and it's not what they expected etc. - for that reason, shipping is certainly out the question I'm afraid.

I digress but only slightly and on track with Howards post above..... I sold a phone recently on ebay, I thought it would be worth good money, it went for £80ish, not bad. The buyer who received it then sent me photos of a slightly bent phone, so much so the LCD glass had popped out the front, it wasn't like that when I sent it, and there is no way the box had sustained any damage without it first braking (hard plastic box, it could take my whole weight with ease) - despite me having clear and accurate photo's of the item before sending it (ie. the ones on the auction!) I still got bloody fleeced for extra money off, with a buyer refusing to return the phone over and over, instead demanding a partial refund, he even accepted the return postage label, that I paid for, and then didn't return it, claiming that due to covid his post office was shut and he didn't want to walk the extra 5-10 minutes to the next closest. Anyway, I did nothing wrong, I still got fleeced, I could've left it and let ebay take up the case but ultimately it was a lot of hassle for one d**k head, I just gave him the extra £15 he so desperately wanted put it behind me, I have more than enough to worry about, and clearly, £15 means a lot more to this guy and than it does to me with the time and effort he put in, for me it was more the principal of it all.

Anyway, I'll consider my options carefully, I like the sound of these ebay classified adverts, I haven't heard of them before, I will look in to it.

As people have said, I think I'll keep a few items, the Myford 280 although in need of a regrind to be perfect, is an amazing machine and worth much less than the 7, because people just seem to go nuts for Super 7's. I'll probably keep the Myford VMC, i've used probably a dozen of these machines, but only 2 of them were actual Myford branded ones, and the difference is substantial, they're rock stead, solid machines, anything and everything that moves, glides but is solid when you need it to be, the knock offs seem lumpy and noisy by comparison, especially on heavy intermittent cuts, fly cutting etc, they sound bloody hollow and some of them could vibrate across the floor if I tried doing cuts as heavy as I could on the myford!

I know people cry about the Myford fan boys, and I know they're expensive, but they did make nice machines all things considered!

Well I'm part way though multiple projects, but the missus has a found a house, a real fixer upper with land, double integrated garage, it's a dream, I can see myself there till the end of my days. We need just about every penny we can get, and with all the house work, I'm not going to be needing any of my much loved metal working equipment for the forseeable future. I don't really want to sell it, but I know I won't have time to use or maintain it properly. Just wondered what things might be worth as a job lot vs sell quick and cheap privately, has anyone dealt with any traders before, I guess they don't pay much!?

I've got the following, I may keep my 280 lathe and my mill as they're not easy to come by these days and they're not really transportable without a van

Myford Super 7 (later power cross feed version + quick change box & stand, steadies, chucks, face & drive plat QC tool post,, all the usual stuff etc)
Myford 280 Lathe (all metric, power crossfeed + gearbox, double vee and flat bed)
Myford ML7 (needs a lick of paint) with QC toolpost + spare freshly reground bed + spare headstock, tailstock and other spares)
Myford VMC + DRO (proper one, glass scales) & central lube
10" Alfred Eriksen shaper
Kennedy Hexacut hacksaw
3 coolant pump systems (one modern, 2 good old lumps)
4 axis Gecko G540 CNC controller + PC + 48v PSU + 3x 300+Nm steppers + cables + ball screws etc etc bolt on and go basically, ballscrews are off a BF20 mill, also has brackets and couplings for a sieg X1/SX1

On top of this, are 2 or 3 cupboards full of all sorts of cutters, arbour, drills, chucks, vices, angle tables, surface plate, scraping equipment, metrology kit - all sorts - I'll keep some basic stuff, but I don't use a lot of it so will make sure all the above machines are well tooled.

Any thoughts/offers?

Never made spark plugs, but doesn’t Corian start melting over 100c?

Once you seal a concrete slab, you introduce hydrostatic pressure under the slab which can lift/twist/crack the slab, as well as trapping the moisture therefor increasing its content and potentially creating heave issues.

Far better to address the cause rather than try to halt the effect, I'd try to consider any changes that could be easily made externally to mitigate the moisture, perhaps a simple french drain nearby, or check gullys and gutters aren't blocked, or leaves have rotted down in inaccessible places creating a higher than ground level sponge slowly releasing water.

Edited By Russ B on 11/06/2020 13:22:02

Steve, it's not that much bigger to be honest.its of the more modern boxy design, similar to how a Chinese 3.5" centre lathe is half the size of a Myford 3.5 centre (ML7 or Super7) it's significantly lower for some unknown reason, but in terms of floor space, it slotted in exactly where my Super 7 / Boxford was, it does end up being closer to the wall corner (tailstock end) but there's still a good foot in the corner for me stand metal and plastic stock up.