Help me to identify and value lathes

[sammystoxParticipant @sammystox]

Good morning,

I am in need of some help please. My great uncle has recently passed away and left us an Aladdin’s cave of tools, lathes and antiques. I know his lathes were very precious to him and he made sure to tell me not just to get rid of them when he passed as they can be quite valuable. I have two so far that need to be identified and if possible a rough value so that I don’t let them go for much less than they are worth as I have no idea at all about any of these things.
Thank you in advance

Sammy

[bernard towersParticipant @bernardtowers37738]

Suggest you trawl eBay for an idea of prices but the watchmakers lathe has the magic name on it so will effect the price.

[sammystoxParticipant @sammystox]

Thank you,

I have looked on eBay, I’ve seen that the black and yellow one has sold for around £200 but the other one I’m struggling to find a match? Magic name??? Will that decrease the value?

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi, they are both worth a good price, but the Boley may be worth a lot more, especially if they have tooling to go with them.

You might get some good advice from Tony at Lathes and you may be able to advertise them on his web site.

Regards Nick.

[Dave HalfordParticipant @davehalford22513]

Well, if I type the magic name into Ebay i get loads of prices. Use the advanced search and tick sold items to weed out the silly ones.

[DC31kParticipant @dc31k]

The value of the Boley lathe will be in the accessories that are included with it. The same goes for the Unimat.

What is shown in the picture has a low value because you cannot do anything useful with it.

It would only be bought as spare parts by someone who already has one and wants the lever-operated tailstock and lever-operated slide. If you can find the collets, that would add at least 50% to what you would sell it for.

It would be good to browse the lathes.co.uk pages for the Boley make and then search around for anything and everything that looks as if it belongs to or with the lathe.

[PeteParticipant @pete41194]

Both are well regarded brand name lathes, especially that Boley. And as others have said, the amount of tooling you have has a large to possibly massive effect on price. Your location as well as possible shipping costs can as well. Don’t be in a rush to sell what you might have. Carefully cleaning and re-oiling as well as great detail pictures can also help the final price as well.Condition and certainly any rust can also seriously devalue either lathe and certainly so for any tooling. Scroll down in this link to help identify any tooling for that Boley. https://www.lathes.co.uk/boley/page3.html And I think it would be unlikely to have lathes like that and not have a fair amount of the quite expensive accessories to go with them.

I’m just not knowledgeable enough about either lathe to give anything like a proper value estimate, but without question there’s others here who certainly can.

[Robert Atkinson 2Participant @robertatkinson2]

The top lathe looks like a Boley WW watchmakers lathe. Value at least £300 possibly a lot more depending on whater other bits are with it.
The EMCO unimat (yellow one) is worth at least £250.
Ebay is probably the best place for a quick sale at a reasonable price.

Robert.

[Robert Atkinson 2]

On Robert Atkinson 2 Said:

The top lathe looks like a Boley WW watchmakers lathe.

 

I’m not familiar with watchmakers’ lathes but the Boley appears to have lever feeds on all movements. Doesn’t this suggest a machine more intended for repetitive industrial use with small components?

I agree that the OP needs to photograph the whole package with accessories and also, preferably, with a drive system for on-line auction.

Also agree that the Unimat has a fairly well established value and should sell readily.

 

[PeteParticipant @pete41194]

A lot depends on if there’s also the more conventional cross, top slides and tail stock as well. Without knowing what else might be identified and available, the real value can’t be properly estimated.

[Author]

Posts