Ok, fair enough. It's on the Lansing, MI craigslist. $500 lathe. The bottom of the change gearbox selector is broken off, and the piece is missing. Several gears cannot be selected. There is a ton of slop in the carriage drive, after we figured out how to engage the leadscrew, it takes quite a while before the carriage will move. There is a threading dial. It has a 2hp motor with a homemade lima conversion, using v-belts on the flat belt pulley. It doesn't have enough power to spin the spindle if the reduction pin isn't removed. There are several teeth missing from the leadscrew / gearbox drive gearing on the left. Not a showstopper i think though. Couple of broken spots on guards. Both threading screw and leadscrew do turn once you get the combinations of levers figured out. It was very difficult to get the carriage to lock down to check for wear in the ways near the headstock. I wasn't able to do it well enough to get a read on way wear. 4 jaw chuck only, it was described as having some tooling included, but frankly, most of that was for other machines he had in the shop. I saw about 15 or so lathe bars with carbide inserts, but i think this is more a HSS machine, probably can't get feed/speed rates up high enough to do a good job with carbide. No taper attachment, no live/dead centers/drill chuck, steady or follow rest. Pretty bare really. And with no idea of who made it, no way to get spares for it. For having no real tooling, no 3 jaw, and the problems it had, i thought it was overpriced. He wanted me to decide yesterday, as he had two more gentlemen interested. Seller is out of town until next tuesday, he's moving to the carolinas, and has to clean the building out by thanksgiving weekend. If he doesn't find takers he will be scrapping. Frankly, i think he's going to have a hard time finding a buyer for the lathe. He estimated it at 1000 lbs, after looking at it, i'd guess more like 6000. It looks to be every bit of 18-19" swing, 60" centers. Bed looks to be about 8ft long. All cast iron. I do believe it could be disassembled enough to get it down to 2000-3000 lb pieces. Legs unbolt from the bed. Headstock and tailstock come off. Lima conversion will unbolt. Still a big move for someone in a hurry.
He said he has made parts on it, former machinist, but it did take 20 minutes on the phone with him and his son to get the spindle and leadscrew both moving, so he can't be that familiar with it.
This may be a good fit for the right person, but it wasn't me for sure.
Caveat emptor!
