15x60 von wyck

Long time reader and forum follower, first time posting after finally registering this week. Sorry for my first post being a help post but....

I just finished building my own garage and I stumbled upon a 15x60 von wyck manual lathe that needed a good home....for a great price. I am bringing it home this weekend and very little info on these old girls is avail on the internet. I'm looking for a rough weight on this beast to make shure I can unload it when I get it home.

Any help would be appreciated, heck any info would be great! I can't wait to get her cleaned up and making chips!
Thanks
Matt

I'd figure on about 3,000 lbs. These old lathes were built for line shaft drive (from overhead power transmission shafts). As people adapted them to be driven by electric motors, a common means was to use a kind of "arm" or "bracket" mounted off the back side of the bed casting. These "arms" or "brackets" were sometimes purchased as ready-made items, and were a fairly heavy iron casting. These brackets may have had a multi-speed gearbox or a countershaft with cone pulley as well as the electric motor. Or, some people made a similar setup using steel angle, plate, and similar. An old car or truck transmission often was used in place of a machine tool drive gearbox (such as "drive all", or "unidrive", or the Lima motors with integral multispeed gearboxes). In any case, if you find this sort of drive on your von Wyck lathe, I'd suggest you dismantle it before moving the lathe. It will raise the center of gravity and make the lathe dangerously top heavy when you go to move it, and more prone to tipping over. Removing the drive system from the lathe will also reduce the weight.

My other piece of advice is to jack the lathe up and fasten it to timber skids. For a lathe of the size you have bought, some 4 x 4's or 6 x 6's will do just fine. I cut the skids with a chainsaw, and cut the ends on about a 45 degree angle. This creates "sled runners", and makes machinery moves a lot easier. It lets you move the lathe on pipe rollers, and with the skids having "sled runner" ends, you can get the lathe onto a trailer with a comealong. I bring a chainsaw and lag screws when I move some machinery. Skids, pipe rollers, and a couple of pinch bars can do some amazing things and lets you waltz machine tools into places where you can't get a skid steer loader or forklift. 3000 lbs of lathe, if you take your time and use the old methods, should work out OK. When you go to move the lathe, make sure to lock the carriage and tailstock to the bedways. Sounds silly to say it, but who needs a tailstock sliding off the end of the bedways when you are trying to load the lathe onto a trailer ?

Thanks for the reply. I was pplanning on the 4x4s and some sheets of plywood also. The guy has access to a loader. I am planning on borrowing our machine casters/jack from work that we use for moving cncs around. That'll atleasts get it to the door and on the trailer. Just worried about unloading it at home.

Although we just had a foot of snow, should make it slide a little easier.
Somebody already swapped on a car 3speed transmission. Thanks for the reminder of locking down the carriage and tailstock...id hate to have to pick the tailstock out of somebody's windshield halfway home