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help to identify an old sprinfield lathe

jaimeeduardo705

Plastic
Joined
Feb 10, 2013
Location
monterrey, mexico
Hi, i recently bought a springfield lathe, it looks like a series 180, but i am not sure, the gearbox looks more round, and the speeds are quite different, could anyone help me identify it?
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Jaime,

l lost my Springfield catalog many years ago. I barley remember two different headstock variations in the time period yours and mine were built. Yours, I'm guessing, is a 18"- 20" model and the one my family had was a 22"-24" model. The thing I don't remember is how the model no. 180 applied. I want to say there was a 160, 180, and 200 back then that represented the size range, I just don't remember. Maybe one of the other machinery guru's that hang out here can shed some light on the subject.

Ken
 
A place near my old work had a Springfield and a similar sized Monarch out back, they had been replaced. That Springfield was a beast.... made the Monarch look small and lightweight.
 
Ken (4GSR) let me use his Dad's hulking Springfield to cut the metric thread on a tool when I was rebuilding the VW bug engine. That was October of 1982 according to the records scrawled on the garage wall still there today.;)
 
hi, thanks for the replies.

Yes, as everibody says, these springfields looks like they were build for really heavy duty. (in the world war era i wouldnt be surprised if they use them as ammo to catapult to the enemy tanks and the lathe would still work).

I was surprised to find a little oil pump inside the apron to lube the gears inside of it, never saw something like that before. The moment when i lift the headstock i had the feeling of lifting a v8 engine, really, almost same size and one of the shafts remind me of the tip from a crankshaft of an engine.

Anyway, this lathe had a really bad time, not for a lot of use, but for a lot of bad repairs, the linkage to engage the motor/brake is lost, to make it work, the adjustment from the clutch was all the way in. The shaft for changing the direction of the automatic advance is lost, i am making a new one, the morse cone of the tailstock looks like someone didnt clean the chips from the tools and install them without care.

However, the l1 cone of the headstock is really good (i dondnt think that someone ever remove the chuck before), the bearings, gears, oil pumps, ways, threds,etc look very good. When i finish the cleaning and wire it, it runs really smooth and easy in all the speeds. I am making some cuts and they look good.

i am looking to buy a manual from ebay, but as i mentioned before, i dont think this is a series 180, they have those little diferences, and i dont think the manual is going to be good for the rest of the repairs
 
Ken (4GSR) let me use his Dad's hulking Springfield to cut the metric thread on a tool when I was rebuilding the VW bug engine. That was October of 1982 according to the records scrawled on the garage wall still there today.;)


were you making a tap for cleaning the rear nut of the flywheel? or some bolt broke inside one of the halfs of the engine and you were making some kind of extractor?
 
Either puller or installer (?) for flywheel (?) if I recall correctly - the one with the 32 mm (?) thread.

Here are a couple of views (I apologize for having photos laying around of stuff I made over thirty years ago:D)
 

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Jaime,

The Springfield lathe my family had was equipped with a metric lead screw. The cross feed screw was English with a dial that had 254 marks on it for metric reading. The metric thread that John cut on it was the only thread cut on that lathe all the years we had it. We cut a lot of iron on that lathe over the years before we let go of it.
 








 
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