Has anyone got any experience of Warco GH1236 lathe

[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

Has anyone got any experience of Warco GH1236 lathe. dose it have the power for most work and to machine hard metals like 316 stainless steel. are there any problems that are common to this machine.

[Martin CottrellParticipant @martincottrell21329]

Hi Alex,

Firstly, welcome to the forum! Hopefully my reply can offer a little more relevance to your initial enquiry. I have the predecessor to the Warco GH1236, the GH1232, which I bought new about 3 years ago. It is essentially the same machine in terms of power and capacity (slightly less distance between centres on mine) and a slightly different headstock gearbox but offering broadly the same range of speeds.

I bought my lathe specifically for the ability to turn large diameters in the gap as I am building a 4" Little Samson traction engine and have successfully machined some very large iron castings including the 17.5" diameter rear wheels. In attempting to turn the rear wheels, I soon discovered that the lowest speed of 65 rpm was still uncomfortably too fast. I therefore bit the bullet & invested in a 3 phase motor & inverter kit which enabled me to slow the speed down to the appropriate speed to machine the wheel castings. That said, I was pushing the lathe to the very limits of its capacity and speed rather than any lack of torque was the issue that required the motor change. To all intents & purposes the supplied motor would be more than adequate for most turning operations encountered.

Most of my turning to date has been cast iron, mild steel & bronze but I have turned some 304 Stainless steel. approx 2.5" diameter, which the lathe coped with without any complaints. You will no doubt get some replies warning you to avoid any lathe of Chinese origin. I am purely offering my own experiences as an amateur hobby user. In my opinion my lathe is robustly built, capable of taking heavy cuts without complaint and crucially capable of repeatable accuracy to the tolerances I require for my hobby use. For instance a couple of days ago I turned a 9" long shaft of 1.5" diameter mild steel between centres, took a 0.002" finishing cut to hit required diameter & the shaft came out parallel to within 0.001" over the 9" length, well pleased was I!

Generally I'm really pleased with my lathe although I do have one minor niggle. The lead screw has a telescopic spring steel swarf protector fitted which limits the saddle travel towards the headstock. This makes faceplate work and turning between centres awkward requiring long tool overhang from the tool post to get close to the faceplate in particular. Fortunately I haven't yet needed to do much faceplate work but for between centres work I tend to turn up a centre in the 3 jaw chuck and use that to bring the end of the work within reach of a normally mounted tool in the tool post.

Hope this has helped you, any other questions, please ask away! Regards Martin.

[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

Hi Martin that is very helpful It not going to have a hard life of I was to get one as if I really have big jobs I have access to a Colchester student and a Harrison m500 plus 7 cnc lathe so you comment has been most helpful

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

It's an odd thing about chinese lathes. They may have the oddities such as the 2 that Martin mentions. Others can be a bit lacking in the minimum lowest speed area as well.

The lathe you have asked about isn't that far off a student really. All that may offer is a 3hp motor rather than 2. That too according to lathes co uk has a rather high lowest speed. Not sure that is correct on the MK2 model but I used one a long time ago and did a lot more on other machines. The M500 is a much bigger and more powerful machine and also has the low speed most might want. Not all people could cope with a 12hp motor. Even something like a Triumph 2000 which was very popular uses a 7.5hp motor.

On Martin's comment on 17.5" dia wheels the cutting speed would be 300 ft/min. Which is pretty high and could cause a number of machines problems. For comparison this page gives some numbers for HSS. For carbide many would just double them.

**LINK**

If you don't receive any sensible answers on turning 316 I would suggest that you join practicalmachinist. Stainless steel topics often crops up there so even a search might help. If you give people an idea of the size of the work and the power of the machine etc I am pretty sure that there are people who would give you some idea of what to expect in terms of feeds, speeds and depth of cut.

Hope that doesn't upset Neil. If it upsets JS great.

John

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[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

I did compare it to the Colchester which is a very good machine with 27 as low and 1800 as high speed and the Harrison has 22 low and 1600 high if I remember I am a machinists by trade so I know it will depend on the Feeds and speeds for the metal but just wanted to know If it had the gut in it

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

Gut for what ?

Comparing it with a Student. Similar but less HP. Build wise both probably have had the gear head designed to cope with the torque at their lowest speed.

Say the chinese had designed it for 3hp. Chances are that given the same work to do the student would last longer as it would be very likely to be more heavily built. I'd say that is probably true of all of the machines warco sell in that range.

Martin mentioned the plus of the warco. 1 thou taper over 9". Also that he can get a decent finish with at 2 thou cut. I suspect it would take a lot of good luck to find a Student that will do that and as affordable to the same degree.

What your asking really depends on diameter and how fast you want to work. That is likely to depend on the power of the motor and the gearing. I think you need to talk to some one who machines it regularly. My limited experience with the stuff I had problems with is that sharp tools are essential and don't allow any rubbing. That was using the usual HSS drill on the particular material I had. I've no idea what carbide would do but would expect it to consume more power when turning even when used at HSS speeds.

John

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[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

If you have the run of machines at work you might want a smaller one at home until you retire and then see if you need a bigger than 1236 to continue. No point in running 2hp for all the 1in dia stuff you also want unless you have a big solar array earning you credits with your energy supplier.

[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

i don't retire for 44 years and 10 months though maybe a bit of a time to wait

[David Standing 1Participant @davidstanding1]

Posted by Alex Bellringer on 31/12/2016 14:50:01:

i don't retire for 44 years and 10 months though maybe a bit of a time to wait

Holy shit, I hope Baz hasn't depressed you too much! .

[pgk pgkParticipant @pgkpgk17461]

Posted by Alex Bellringer on 31/12/2016 14:50:01:

i don't retire for 44 years and 10 months though maybe a bit of a time to wait

..so mid 50's and anticipating further increases in retirement age?

[Andrew EntwistleParticipant @andrewentwistle]

Hi Alex,

I ordered a GH1236 for the workshop at work about three years ago and have found it to be very accurate. Power has not been an issue with cutting 316 stainless or even invar, but then we usually use 0.04mm tip radius inserts designed for stainless, taking light cuts. I changed the motor to a 2HP 3-phase motor with inverter for slow start/stop with large delicate parts and easier threading. I would definitely consider one for home when I make space to upgrade.

Andrew.

[Alex BellringerParticipant @alexbellringer65330]

That is very helpful Andrew I will of course be using carbide tipped tools if I did get one just got to go and have a look at one now

[simon Hewitt 1Participant @simonhewitt1]

I have a GH1236 for about 6 months now. I love it, find it very accurate and powerful in model engineer terms, take cuts up to 2 mm in some cases. My only complaint is that some of the nuts and bolts frequently used seem to be made of cheese. The studs that hold the top slide and banjo bolt have had to be replaced. I can be a bit heavy handed, but stripping a M10 with an open ended spanner? replaced with 8.8 grade and no problems since. Its noisy, and top speed (1200) is a bit limiting for small brass parts (but perhaps they don't want the risk of that huge 4-jaw running any faster). The slipping clutch on the feed shaft is good (needs adjusting to be just right), and I like the cross-shaft motor control, and love the foot brake, especially for threading. DRO is excellent, high precision, seems very accurate and repeatable. Its such a change after years of 1960s worn out lathes, measure, subtract, add the cut, its right.

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