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taiwan lathe ? (job shop)

Andy221

Cast Iron
Joined
Mar 13, 2013
Location
moorhead mn
I apologize for my original thread, I should have been more specific.

My question is in regards to the heavy 13 and 16 inch new south bend lathes. And this will be in a job shop setting. I see they have Japanese bearings and I'm sure south bend puts out a good lathe but, what I am wondering is it tool room quality and since I am going to be spending around $20000, I would like to know if it is a better decision to purchase another brand or not and what the pros and cons of a new south bend lathe are.

As far as spelling, my bad. Thanks again, Anderson
 
As far as I have heard, the current larger South Bend lathes are made in exactly the same factory that they have been made in for fifteen years or so- before the Original South Bend, located in South Bend, went bankrupt, they had been importing Taiwan made lathes for quite a few years.
When the owner of Grizzly bought the remains of South Bend, he did, indeed, re-engineer the smaller machines, which are "new". But he continued to import the same old Taiwan bigger machines, like the 16", that the old company did.
I dunno about the 13"- there were a variety of "real" south bend 13" lathes over the years, not sure what the last one was.
By the end, the original company was down to the Heavy ten, in the early 2000's
 
If buying new, manual, and under 20k I would give Matt at Quality Machine Tools a call, he offers some items which aren't offered on his site and are nicer than what is on there. Come up with what options are important to you, there are quite a few options on the market, but I think most are from the same plant just different names on it.

If you want a 40" centers machine, you'll find lots of those around in stock new, a 60-70" unit will be harder to locate in stock and you'll probably have to wait a few months.
 
Andy, You might want to read the "stickies" about forum rules.

Generally speaking, inexpensive Chinese/Taiwanese lathes are banned from discussion. The size and cost machine you're talking about may or may not get a pass. If not, it might be more open to discussion in the South Bend forum.

Ries and rbent have given good advice. You can get essentially the same lathe cheaper, minus the South Bend logo. You might also want to search the archives. 10-15K should buy a higher quality used lathe, in excellent operating condition (SAG, Mori, Graziano, Harrison, etc.)
 
I have a 16 X 40 Grizzly... not bad for the price, but it is exactly what I would expect. It runs pretty smooth. I did a write up on it in the gunsmithing section a couple years ago... still going strong.
HOWEVER, this is not a machine I am using to make money. If I were, I'm not sure I would make the same choice again. Fit and finish is OK. but if you are trying to deal in tenths I'm not sure this is your best choice. If you are dealing with +/- .005 then you will be fine. It is all a matter of what you need.

last time I checked the catalog, some of the "South Bend" machines were almost identical to the grizzly sister machine. I would not pay $20k for my machine. $8k, yes.... but not $20k!
I would love to believe that the new South Bend was a high quality machine... but I would need to be convinced of that in person.
 
Andy, You might want to read the "stickies" about forum rules.

Generally speaking, inexpensive Chinese/Taiwanese lathes are banned from discussion. The size and cost machine you're talking about may or may not get a pass. If not, it might be more open to discussion in the South Bend forum.

Ries and rbent have given good advice. You can get essentially the same lathe cheaper, minus the South Bend logo. You might also want to search the archives. 10-15K should buy a higher quality used lathe, in excellent operating condition (SAG, Mori, Graziano, Harrison, etc.)

PeteM: He is talking about a $20K machine, not a $300.00 piece of red paint from Horrible

Fright. That's a bit of difference .

JH
 
Get one of those kingston HJ lathes, SND has one, he likes it. They have 17" swing and come in either 40" or 60" I ran the HDs and they are pretty good machines. I'd buy the HJ if I needed a smaller manual.
 
Boy, I'd sure be looking hard at a 17" Whacheon if I was sourcing a lathe of that size for $20k+. They are Mori clones, Korean made, and still sold new.
 
Generally speaking, inexpensive Chinese/Taiwanese lathes are banned from discussion.

That's one of the things I really appreciate about PM. It seems like everywhere you go on the net these days the topic of discussion is the latest greatest shiny piece of crap from chiwan. How about a LeBlond or are they made in china too?

David
 
PeteM: He is talking about a $20K machine, not a $300.00 piece of red paint from Horrible

Fright. That's a bit of difference .

JH

Agreed (and sort of what I noted). However, I've seen threads locked where a $14,000 Jet gear head lathe of the same size was under discussion. A more descriptive title than "taiwan lathe" would also be a help for folks doing either a Google search or an internal PM search; perhaps something like "Best new 13-16" toolroom lathe for $20K?"
 
"Taiwan" appears in the subject line therefore I expect Milacron to scupper this thread which is too bad. The merits of the more capable lower end import machine tools need to be discussed at times for the sake of people desiring to transition from their home shops to starting a business. D, I hope you let this run for a day or two.

The South Bend 16 sold now by Grizzly is at the same time an import, Asian, old school, expensive, and highly regarded. It's merits and deficiencies need to be addressed.

I think about 30% of the price of a South Bend lathe is the legend. I think they could be better designed and I think they are feature poor for the price

South Bend was a proud name for 70 years. You'd find them in small shops and vocational schools. I think it's fair to say they were never intended to be a durable, accurate production machine. Perhaps South Bend machine tools are held in high regard because imany people started their training on one. I started on a South Bend myself and frankly I can't account for the mystique.

I suggest you do a feature for freature comparison with Grizzly's other offerings disregarding brand name, paint, and price.

Don't be misled by "toolroom". There were certainly many machine tools developed with special accuracy and features intended for more critical toolroom work but mostly the toolroon designation meant the machine was more completely outfitted with attachments and optional feeatures. A production lathe was furnished bare and the purchaser selected only the chucks, steady rests, tool post etc required for the machine to perform its intended workload. A toolroom lathe would furnished with, for example, a three jaw, four jaw, collet attachnment and collets, taper attachment, two steadys and a follow rest, extra gears for the index train, a more comprehensive quick change, and so on; all in a package costing half again as much as a basic production lathe. It may have been selected from a line of basic lathes based on better than usual test sheet results.
 
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"Taiwan" appears in the subject line therefore I expect Milacron to scupper this thread which is too bad. The merits of the more capable lower end import machine tools need to be discussed at times for the sake of people desiring to transition from their home shops to starting a business. D, I hope you let this run for a day or two

+1. I have a little home shop and plan to turn it into a full-time business in the near future.
 
That's one of the things I really appreciate about PM. It seems like everywhere you go on the net these days the topic of discussion is the latest greatest shiny piece of crap from chiwan. How about a LeBlond or are they made in china too?

David

Pretty sure the new LeBlond lathes are Taiwan as well considering it is a 20k$ price tag on them.

If you want a new manual lathe in the 16-20in range, or can really only buy new due to purchasing restrictions you don't have a choice but buy a import if your budget is under the 30k number. I'm not even sure who makes a US made manual lathe except Monarch? You've got the Mori clones, from Webb they are a ~18k machine without chucks on them, don't know about the prices on the Wacheons. The 20k range really does open up options though, you can get a quality (I hope) lathe with DRO, and a few other options shipped to you for under the 20 number.
 
For $ 20,000, I'd suggest looking for a good used US lathe. At that kind of price, even a trip through a local tool rebuilder to fix whatever is wrong would still worth it.

Darn near any of the well known brands would probably be a good choice - I've seen VFD / DRO equipped 10EE's going for about $ 12,000, and it would be hard to wind up with a better lathe.

Look at any of the US lathes, preferably more than probably 15 years old - Chinese tool importing wasn't too common until fairly recently

I have a Standard-Modern, and Standard used to be built in Canada, but recently moved to PA. A used machine tool dealer I buy from told me that he always buys Standards when they come up at a sale because they are a decent machine that sells quickly - I checked his web site, and he shows 4 of them on his web listings right now.

Good machines are out there - all it takes is money.
 
For $ 20,000, I'd suggest looking for a good used US lathe. At that kind of price, even a trip through a local tool rebuilder to fix whatever is wrong would still worth it.
Good machines are out there - all it takes is money.

Have you ever bought one of these and done this? Or are you just spitting the same chew as most of the other members here? The rest of this si nto directed at you but just in general.

I took this advice and ended up buying an old southbend 10L. The lathe holds tollerances, but it's a dog, just not a good piece of equipment if you want any production done. And over priced is not the start of these things, you go to buy one and everyone wants a mint, try to sell one here and the old goats beat you into the ground!

I honestly don't understand why Taiwanese has such a stigma here yet the southbends can be talked about all day. This is not good advice for someone looking to make a good product now. Maybe for an old goat who just piddles its good, but not for anyone trying to make a living.

If ti were my cash for 20K I would take out a loan and buy a haas tool room lathe! you can sit there and use the conversational programming and get a hell of a machine that would knock the socks off nearly any old manual. Yeah it may not have the balls of like a 40HP turret lathe however, the fact that it will run a program for you and you don't have to sit there and use it is worth the time savings alone!
 
Andy, You might want to read the "stickies" about forum rules.
I did lock his previous thread as he wasn't specific so I figured most likely he wanted to discuss the smallest cheapest Taiwanese lathes. But this one is sort of gray area between home and job shop use so I'm letting it stand. Plus I appreciate that the OP was willing to give it another go with more specific info as usually in the prior situation the OP goes out in a huff, slamming the door and we never hear from them again.
 
Thanks for letting this continue. I have read the rules now and I should have done that to begin with.

Now that I have more time to explain. What I am/will be doing will be more of a job shop with a small amount of production. Production will be ongoing but, with most of my time spent torwards individual customers/jobs. For what I am/will be doing I need and want a good quality lathe capable of tool room precision.

I'm sure eventually I will be using cnc lathes and mills, At least I hope I will grow into that. A manual lathe will a l ways be needed though.
 








 
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