Ridge on prism way. What to do? What have you done?

So the 10EE has a ridge on the prism way. Tentative plan ( at the moment ) is to ( at some point ) mill and moglice the saddle for its wear. But what about the prism way on the bed? I would think that it needs to be removed. Many barbaric solutions have come to mind, but it occurs to me that many others have likely dealt with this before I have.

I am not going to rip it down to bare bed and let Cash grind it. I know I likely should, but I am not. Not yet anyway. I will be using this for the immediate future and I am going to do so without going that far.

So... how have you dealt with it or seen it dealt with? My gut tells me that the very top of one side of the prism could very easily be ground off with a hand held grinder, but then I shudder and think better of it...

If you are not going to do it right, do nothing, seriously, hacking it will only make it worse.

you will note every time I see someone ask what to look for in lathe, I reply, nothing with visible bed wear.

There are plenty out there.........

Zahnrad Kopf said:

So the 10EE has a ridge on the prism way. Tentative plan ( at the moment ) is to ( at some point ) mill and moglice the saddle for its wear. But what about the prism way on the bed? I would think that it needs to be removed. Many barbaric solutions have come to mind, but it occurs to me that many others have likely dealt with this before I have.

I am not going to rip it down to bare bed and let Cash grind it. I know I likely should, but I am not. Not yet anyway. I will be using this for the immediate future and I am going to do so without going that far.

So... how have you dealt with it or seen it dealt with? My gut tells me that the very top of one side of the prism could very easily be ground off with a hand held grinder, but then I shudder and think better of it...

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Well if you are not going to send it to Cash, send it to me to grind.

Have a holiday while you wait, should fit OK for carry on luggage.

This topic is addressed intensively within the forum, so a search should turn up lots of good information.

FWIW, I also bought a 10EE with a little wear on the ways. The inside face of the front V-way has a small ridge on it. My approach, which is still in progress, is to get the machine cleaned up, re-assembled, adjusted, lubed and fully operational to the best of my ability. That's Job ONE.

Job TWO is to assess the machine's operation: see how it cuts. Do a geometry survey. Determine if its acceptable to me or not. Only then will I proceed with any possibility of spending more money/time on the machine.

From what I read here, even a worn out 10EE is a fantastic machine that ostensibly will outperform many, if not even all of, its competitors in basic operational terms. So what you have may only really need a good dose of TLC.

Said another way: its best to fully diagnose the patient before offering the cure. Hope it works out well...

gustafson said:

If you are not going to do it right, do nothing, seriously, hacking it will only make it worse.
you will note every time I see someone ask what to look for in lathe, I reply, nothing with visible bed wear.
There are plenty out there.........

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Well, this was not a "planned purchase" so to speak. So, here I am needing to learn my options and what those options entail and result in.

RC99 said:

Well if you are not going to send it to Cash, send it to me to grind.
Have a holiday while you wait, should fit OK for carry on luggage.

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Mate, mate, mate, mate, mate... You've not enough Scotch, Bundy, nor pints to keep me on Holiday long enough.

OK_Bill said:

This topic is addressed intensively within the forum, so a search should turn up lots of good information.
FWIW, I also bought a 10EE with a little wear on the ways. The inside face of the front V-way has a small ridge on it. My approach, which is still in progress, is to get the machine cleaned up, re-assembled, adjusted, lubed and fully operational to the best of my ability. That's Job ONE.
Job TWO is to assess the machine's operation: see how it cuts. Do a geometry survey. Determine if its acceptable to me or not. Only then will I proceed with any possibility of spending more money/time on the machine.
From what I read here, even a worn out 10EE is a fantastic machine that ostensibly will outperform many, if not even all of, its competitors in basic operational terms. So what you have may only really need a good dose of TLC.
Said another way: its best to fully diagnose the patient before offering the cure. Hope it works out well...

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OK_Bill - in all reality, that actually is The Plan™. Cal has been advising me when I ask for it, so I am reminded to keep my wits about me as oft as I need. ( a valuable thing in itself, to be sure ) I am in the process of cleaning and painting, fixing, and replacing as necessary, right now. But I also want to educate myself a bit more than I am at present, and get my proverbial ducks in their marching column. So I am asking questions. If you would indulge me, I'm not coming up with good results from my searches. I am either getting bad results, or ( more often ) too much noise to signal ratio. Any pointers on specific threads you can point me to? Thank you.

Hey Zahnrad... sure. Where it all started for me was when some of the professionals on the forum chimed in on my "return to service" thread. Starting at about post#9, I became aware of the bigger picture (that we both share) and then proceeded to delve more deeply into the EE's accuracy -vs- wear issues. Interestingly, that's when I moved past the eye-catching beauty of this machine and began to appreciate the design from a longevity standpoint ... how it can perform at such a high level after Fifty or more years of abuse. A couple weeks worth of reading/searching uncovered a wealth of information; both quantitative and qualitative about how and WHY the Monarch 10EE garners the degree of appreciation it does from professionals with many decades of experience across a wide range of fields.

Here's a short list of what I found:

DaveE907 comments on wear as it related to a purchase decision

"Why the 10EE is so lusted after" ... one of my all-time favorite threads here. This is serious reading from some highly accomplished machinists. Notably, "Thermite" Bill delivers some of the best of his style and substance - its fun and informative to hear!

What's the "fascination" with the 10EE another great read wherein there's a nay-sayer in the room throwing rocks at the EE because its not CNC. This catalyst evokes some of the best thought, most critical and most relative content as to why this Monarch lathe still gets an A-Grade among those who know it.

Thermite and Cal discuss wear on another purchase decision. Listen to how they evaluate mechanical accuracy, financial risk "Risk-wise, the big bucks are in the spindle bearings": Thermite, and a wealth of other factors,

Well, I'm running out of beer here. Its been fun. There's LOTS more to be found... happy hunting.

Oh, and I'd be remiss to omit Daryl's emotional reflection after completing his magnificent restoration of a 1957 ex-Navy 10EE (partial quote from "preaching to the choir"):

This lathe is indeed in another class all by itself. The smooth power, with a simple twist of the knob and the silky smoothness of the cross slide make for a memorable experience. The dead nuts accuracy and incredible finish leave little to the imagination, this is machine sex to the highest order. Newbies, take note, this is a machine to be lusted after, Schaublin be damned, long live the EE.

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That pretty much sums it up. Great stuff!! Carry on!

edit. Post Script: the reason I replied to your question the way I did is because what we have here are lathes that quite simply will stand the Test of Time. So my message to you at this point is just not to worry too much about the ridge on the front V-way. Get her together and see.. you have a Master Class lathe in hand.

Zahnrad, what I would do is this:

1. evaluate the tailstock ways for straightness (wear) and parallel to the lathe axis and correct minor problems. The object being to see if you have a good reference surface for checking and repairing the carriage V way and flat way. Details on how to do this will be skipped for now.
2. if the tailstock ways clean up acceptably, scrape the tailstock bottom casting so that there is no rock (i.e. you have good simultaneous contact at all four corners), and the top surface is parallel with the ways.
3. map the high spots on the V way using an indicator mounted on the tailstock base casting and a felt tip pen. See Harry's thread on the wreck.

Now that you know how bad the bed is, you have several options:

A) find a replacement bed from a mfg. lathe that is in better shape, and fit your headstock to it.
B) scrape the bed by hand, as Harry did.
C) fabricate a mount for a precision grinder, using the tailstock base casting, and restore the bed yourself. A small XY table that can be angled appropriately would be a good start.
D) send the bed to a reputable grinder

I elected to do A), but the prospect of doing C) has always intrigued me. Note that the work in steps 1 & 2 are necessary anyway, assuming your tailstock is like most 10EE tailstocks and in need of refitting. You could also do the tailstock base casting using moglice if your preference is not to end up shimming to correct the height of the tailstock center. I like having iron on the bottom of the tailstock, and fabricating a shim to go between the lower and upper casting is the way I would go, but each to their own.

-Dave

The wear is most likely the worst at the headstock end of the bed if you moglice the saddle without grinding the bed you will run into problems. The moglice forms a exact duplicate of the worn bed on the saddle then when you move the saddle to a less worn area it will bind at a minimum or worse. Bob

OK_Bill - Thank you for those links. I appreciate it and will be reading more and more.

Rimcanyon - Thank you, too. It is helpful to see it all listed out like that. ( more on those points shortly )

Vettebob - Yes, you are correct, Sir. Thanks for pointing it out. I had not thought it out fully.


Update -

Cash and MCritchley came by the shop this morning in effort to help me interrogate this old girl more accurately than this old toolbreaker's "Look!Shiny!" condition would allow. After some careful measurements and interrogations, we/I now have a much better and quantitative assessment of what's what, and where.

A King Way Kit, 3 foot straight edge, and various metrology devices were utilized to perform the interrogations.

The Good™ - The rear flat way has juuuuuuust under .001" difference along the complete length of its span, being thinner at the head stock end. ( obviously )

The Really Good™ - The tail's ways are close to perfect, still.

The Bad™ - The front vee is worn .005", with the wear in the obvious direction. The ridge is not that bad.

The Ugly™ - The saddle has taken some beatings. Blueing reveals that it has worn or is twisted to the point that the rear tail-side wing is not even touching the ways, being up in the air .005". The rest have various amounts of contact.

The Plan™ ( New & Improved! ) - Finish up my recon, repair, restoration, & reassembly duties up to but not including the saddle. Cash will be taking the saddle and fitting it to the bed ways as they exist now with the theory being that the result of which would be a slightly worn condition lathe that had worn better than this one had as it exists now. While there, the cross slide ways will be reground because they are worn very badly. The cross slide and gib will be fitted to that and the lathe.

We did discuss the possibility of using the good ways inside to make and utilize a sled and riding grinder to dress the inside vee surface in, but this won't happen for now. For now, we are heading this proposed direction and seeing just exactly how the lathe performs after that. If it is shown to be necessary, we will revisit the concept. To be honest though, at that point I would just as much consider pulling the bed and letting Cash grind that as a whole.

Thoughts? Input? Admonitions?

I had my bed reground then I mogliced the saddle and scraped in the crosslide and compound. I had 5 thou wear in the front as well on mine. Interestingly when they went to regrind they also found a 4 thou twist diagonally across the ways. When I mogliced the saddle I restored the proper height relationship to the rack and gears. If interested You can read about it in my thread new to me 10ee

Z - well done. Very informative post. Why would the entire saddle assembly appear to be warped? Is this possibly an artifact of how it accumulated wear? I've been told the saddle was designed to wear, relative to the ways. Makes me want to at least blue my saddle surfaces to have a look at contact area....

vettebob said:

I had my bed reground then I mogliced the saddle and scraped in the crosslide and compound. I had 5 thou wear in the front as well on mine. Interestingly when they went to regrind they also found a 4 thou twist diagonally across the ways. When I mogliced the saddle I restored the proper height relationship to the rack and gears. If interested You can read about it in my thread new to me 10ee

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Thanks Vettebob.

OK_Bill said:

Z - well done. Very informative post. Why would the entire saddle assembly appear to be warped? Is this possibly an artifact of how it accumulated wear? I've been told the saddle was designed to wear, relative to the ways. Makes me want to at least blue my saddle surfaces to have a look at contact area....

Click to expand...

Thank you, OK_Bill, but all of the credit goes to Cash and MCritchley on this. I am just this side of ignorant with this stuff. It is actually a point of consternation for me because I would like to think that I am a mildly intelligent person and partially skilled craftsman, but when it comes to this stuff, I am in the dark and left wanting.

They were so gracious and generous with their time, their knowledge, and their tools and materials, making the efforts to assist me from just a single phone call to each of them, that were I an insecure person I would have been left feeling quite inadequate. As it was, I was simply trying to keep up with the knowledge that they were pouring out.

As for the wear, I honestly do not know. Cash seems to be surprised to the extant that the saddle seems sprung in that corner. He in fact made the comment that he wished it were the inverse of what it is because it would be so much easier to remedy.

Zahnrad Kopf said:

As for the wear, I honestly do not know. Cash seems to be surprised to the extant that the saddle seems sprung in that corner. He in fact made the comment that he wished it were the inverse of what it is because it would be so much easier to remedy.

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My '56 was worm quite a bit more on the front left of the saddle than the right, and all the 10EEs I've seen are worn in that way. I suspect that it's from tool pressure, but who knows - it might even be from the operator leaning on that part of the saddle.

As mentioned the only real solution is to live with it and see how it affects accuracy and if/when you decide that you want more/better accuracy to have the bed ground and refit the saddle. I finally went the latter route and wrote up my end of the process - it's in this link:

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/monarch-lathes/all-milled-up-ready-moglice-98625/

I liked the Moglice route because I could tweak things continuously until I was happy with the endpoint then nail it in place with the Moglice. The bed wear since then has been minimal, just some polishing of the ways touching the high points left by the grinding process.

vettebob said:

I had my bed reground then I mogliced the saddle and scraped in the crosslide and compound. I had 5 thou wear in the front as well on mine. Interestingly when they went to regrind they also found a 4 thou twist diagonally across the ways. When I mogliced the saddle I restored the proper height relationship to the rack and gears. If interested You can read about it in my thread new to me 10ee

Click to expand...

rke[pler said:

My '56 was worm quite a bit more on the front left of the saddle than the right, and all the 10EEs I've seen are worn in that way. I suspect that it's from tool pressure, but who knows - it might even be from the operator leaning on that part of the saddle.
As mentioned the only real solution is to live with it and see how it affects accuracy and if/when you decide that you want more/better accuracy to have the bed ground and refit the saddle. I finally went the latter route and wrote up my end of the process - it's in this link:
http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/monarch-lathes/all-milled-up-ready-moglice-98625/
I liked the Moglice route because I could tweak things continuously until I was happy with the endpoint then nail it in place with the Moglice. The bed wear since then has been minimal, just some polishing of the ways touching the high points left by the grinding process.

Click to expand...

VetteBob and Russ -

I have actually read both of your threads a number of times over the last month. Important things that seem to elude me are -

How do you find the original height of the saddle?

How do you set your saddle to that height when applying the Moglice? ( I am aware of the outriggers trick, but how do you actually set this height? )

Assuming that you do not do this accurately, how does one compensate the apron for the height difference?


Let's play The Hypothetical Game™ for a moment -

Let's say one grinds the bed. Can one then apply Moglice to restore the bed height? And then having done that, apply Moglice to the saddle as well? Thinking on it, that seems like asking for problems, but I don't know. So I ask.

Thanks boys.

Too difficult to recover the way geometry unless you reground after Moglice. Also, it would be too vulnerable to damage. When used under a saddle it's protected from impact, chipping, and (for the most part) getting debris embedded in it.

Zahnrad Kopf said:

How do you find the original height of the saddle?

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Using the leadscrew as a reference. You can reference the leadscrew to the bed if you need to, all the saddle has to be is the proper height so that the leadscrew and drive rod goes through the appropriate point that the matching points in the apron will be. As I recall it's some exact number + fraction in Imperial dims and you can just invert a 6" height gage and clamp it to the bottom of the saddle.

Harry Bloom gave me that trick. Gonna miss him.

rke[pler said:

Using the leadscrew as a reference. You can reference the leadscrew to the bed if you need to, all the saddle has to be is the proper height so that the leadscrew and drive rod goes through the appropriate point that the matching points in the apron will be. As I recall it's some exact number + fraction in Imperial dims and you can just invert a 6" height gage and clamp it to the bottom of the saddle. Harry Bloom gave me that trick. Gonna miss him.

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Ah, yes. Now I recall reading that. Thank you. Yes, I have arrived late to the party, but his knowledge and helpfulness were very evident and appreciated, even by myself. I have been reading and re-reading his threads and posts over and over the last number of weeks. His name and Monarch themed contributions even came up a few times this morning while Cash, MCritchley, and I were discussing and measuring my own lathe. It certainly appears that the world is a poorer place, now.

If I remember right I set the apron height by measuring the height to the bottom of the way I also made sure the feed rod and lead screw were centered in their respective holes and I checked the apron rack and gear for play. As far as moglicing the saddle I leveled the lathe then leveled the saddle using the freshly scraped ways while checking the cross slide for parallelism to a master square set against the way.