Introductory Post: My New to me South Bend Heavy 10

xplodee · Oct 15, 2013

I'd like to introduce myself: I was directed here from a friend, Dan Wyatt. You may recall his beautifully restored giant South Bend lathe.

I found a Heavy 10 on craigslist and picked it up yesterday. It is missing a motor, but I'm ok with that because I plan to add a three phase motor with a VFD. I paid $750 and came home with the following parts, the machine is an earlier single tumbler Heavy 10 with 48" bed and stand and was originally a war effort machine from the USAF, I'm assuming its an early '40's model.

Images below:

Untitled by Tim Marks, on Flickr

xplodee · Oct 15, 2013

My big question for everyone is what to do about the ways. The front way has about 0.011" of wear on the rearward facing side and the rear way has about 0.007" of wear on the rearward facing side. The top surface of the ways are also marred from years of abuse.

I purchased this lathe to restore and use in my home restoration shop and intend to do a lot with it, DRO, VFD, etc. Considering I plan to own this machine for a long time and do a full show-quality restoration, would it make sense for me to re-grind the ways as part of my restoration? If so, can someone point me to a shop within driving distance of the PA/Philly/NYC area?

Untitled by Tim Marks, on Flickr

Ken-Bergen · Oct 15, 2013

Welcome to the forum Tim.

First I have to say WOW what a find, the chucks alone are worth more than you paid.

On the bed wear. I recently saw the math posted here or maybe elsewhere "Isn't C.R.A.F.T. great?" and unless you're turning small diameter long pieces the error is almost not measurable.

In my opinion the cost of grinding the ways and the time to scrape the saddle to fit for very little improvement in accuracy is not worth it unless you're trying to make a museum piece.

Ken from Canada.

Dan Wyatt · Oct 15, 2013

Hi Tim,

Welcome aboard........and like I mentioned I am so busy that I don't post much on this forum, but some will remember me by my old bailin wired up 16/24 South Bend with the unusual "A" leg as seen in my avatar.

I sent you a bunch of information via email and we will see what others have to say about your purchase that I kinda sorta coached you into.

Take care my friend.

Old Man Dan

South Bend Jeff · Oct 16, 2013

Welcome. I too am sorta new as well. So is that what bed wear is? My 18/60" lathe has that same kind of dings in it as well. The saddle, however, is consistent in movement from the headstock to the tail stock, which I think means that either the bed has very little wear or is worn evenly all down the ways. Like mine, the inner way is the one that's dinged the most(probably due to chuck or other stuff dropping a bunch of times). That isn't too critical as the saddle rides on the outer two ways. Does the saddle move very freely near where the headstock is and get stiffer the closer it gets to the tail stock?

packardbill · Oct 16, 2013

Congrats, you did well for the price you paid. The tooling,i.e 3-jaw chuck, drill chucks tool holders,indicator,center rest,etc. are worth what you paid. As said above, if you're going to turn short (6"-8") work, you won't have any accuracy trouble. If you want to turn a 20" piece you will lose accuracy but if you get to know your machine and have a steady hand, you'll be able to compensate for the wear. I would carefully stone the nicks out of the ways, and restore and use it as is.. If you really want a lathe close to 100%, you should have started with a better machine...a later model with "hardened" ways.
If the ways have .011" of wear, the saddle will have as much, if not more, wear. If you have the ways ground, your apron will hang lower, giving you leadscrew fit trouble and the pinion and rack gear fit will be sloppy,etc. You will be spending more time and money on the machine than it will ever be worth.
Restore it, align the headstock, tailstock, etc. and use it the way it is. It is a usable machine the way it is, with some limitation due to the wear. Good luck and have fun.PB

xplodee · Oct 16, 2013

Packard Bill-

Thanks for the feedback, I really appreciate it. Nearly everything I will machine is two-four inches long or shorter. At most I'd say maybe six inches? Typically I just manufacture screws and bearings, I'm not a gun man so rarely need to turn anything long.

How much of a taper can I expect to see over a distance of 12" on a lathe with this type of wear? A few thou? 10 thou or more?

Any tricks to stoning out the nicks? I will do some searching on the forum as well.

Thank you again,

T

jonesturf · Oct 17, 2013

Tim,

I'm local, only up in Lehighton. Just finishing mine up now. I have a similar model, 49 with a STGB. I had mine reground at a place over in New Jersey. Shoot me a PM. I can point you in the right direction. Nice find by the way.

Jeremy

jonesturf · Oct 17, 2013

This might help you decide what to do as well. Its a post I started when deciding what to do with mine. You can see the damage I had, similar to yours. For short stuff, probably not a big issue like PB said. I am a gun guy so for me it made sense.

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/south-bend-lathes/regrinding-ways-saddle-repair-257431/

xplodee · Oct 19, 2013

Hi All-

Could someone recommend a book that is a good guide for the rebuild process? Are the older rebuild guides worth it? If so, any particular version to purchase?

T

xplodee · Dec 29, 2013

Hi All-

Bumping up my old thread to chime in with new progress: there is none. However, I've decided that I will have the ways re-ground and the carriage raised. I've found this company which is only 60 miles from me:

American Machine Tool Repair and Rebuilding Co
American Machine Tool Repair & Rebuilding CO. Inc.

Does anyone have any experience with this company or know of another one in the PA/NJ area that they would recommend? I absolutely want to chose a place that will match-grind and raise the saddle as part of the process because I have no interest in dealing with the repercussions of not doing so.

T

jonesturf · Dec 29, 2013

Got your PM. I used American Machine when I did mine. They ground the ways and raised my saddle with turcite for $900. They ways are fantastic. Mine holds about +/- .0002" through my whole saddle's travel.

SteveM · Dec 29, 2013

The USAF was formed in 1947. The machine may be older than that, but the tag is 1947 or later.

You can check the serial number against the serial number with the numbers on Steve Wells's web site:
The SBL Workshop

You got a heck of a deal there. Good luck with it and keep us up to date with the rebuild.

Get yourself a copy of Machine Tool Rebuilding by Connelly:
Machine Tool Reconditioning: and Applications of Hand Scraping: edward connelly: 9789996967085: Amazon.com: Books

Expect to pay $60-$90 for it. Worth every penny.

Also, our own Steve Brooks has a nice book on rebuilding the 10"-16" South Bend Lathes and he also sells kits which include all the replacement gaskets and wicks you will need. You can contact him here or find him on ebay.

Steve

Ducati900ss · Dec 30, 2013

Wow, nice find. As an owner of a heavy 10 that is in need of more repair then yours I am jealous..
I think you have to many chucks, I will be up to get one or two

xplodee · Dec 30, 2013

jonesturf-

Thank you for your info! I'm really excited that you have experience with this shop because it's so close to me. I'll be taking my parts there for sure. Did you have the cross slide re-ground or anything else done?

Thanks all for the replies, I'm looking forward to beginning to work on this lathe within the next month or so.

T

jonesturf · Dec 30, 2013

No I plan on doing them myself. I just purchased Connelly's book (got it for XMAS actually) and I can say that it is an amazing resource. I've never seen such a complete and detailed reference on ANY subject I have purchased books for before. Usually you have to buy multiple copies with a lot of the same stuff but this book has pretty much everything.

Just make sure you have them email you a written quote and ask as many details up front so you know what you are getting. Write everything down before you call I must have called them four times in a 15 minute period.

When I took mine in I took all kinds of parts with me and the guys in the shop were asking for the compound and the tailstock and headstock, etc. I thought wow maybe they are going to do the whole machine but it turns out they didn't know exactly what I was doing since they usually do full rebuilds. I spoke directly with the owner to set the job up and it seemed kind of informal since big grind shops don't see many of us little guys in for business. Like I said I'm very pleased and the owner, Alex, was easy to work with.

Here is a link to my thread with lots of good info:
http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/south-bend-lathes/regrinding-ways-saddle-repair-257431/

Good luck and if you get stuck I'm only 20 mins away and the new moderator of this forum (Brad Jacob) lives in Easton so you have plenty of help if you need it.

bradjacob · Jan 2, 2014

Hey Tim -

Just saw this post. So - greetings from Easton! I too (had) a Heavy-10, 4-foot bed with the same USAF tag

Like Jeremy just said, we're real close. He and I are friends and do machining together. Belated "welcome to the forum" and best of luck with the new machine. Looking forward to seeing it come together.

Ducati900ss · Jan 2, 2014

I spoke to Alex at American Machine Tool Repair & Rebuilding CO. Inc. and I have decided to take my Heavy 10 there to get it redone. He said about $1200 to do the ways and the saddle so that is cheaper then a new lathe..
Thanks for the contact.

Does anyone have any experience with this company or know of another one in the PA/NJ area that they would recommend? I absolutely want to chose a place that will match-grind and raise the saddle as part of the process because I have no interest in dealing with the repercussions of not doing so.

T[/QUOTE]

michiganbuck · Jan 2, 2014

""My big question for everyone is what to do about the ways. The front way has about 0.011" of wear on the rearward facing side and the rear way has about 0.007" of wear on the rearward facing side. The top surface of the ways are also marred from years of abuse. "'

If soft ways .011 is small beans to scrape. The shop that will make it good for $1200 or so seems a bargain.
For what you paid you can spend a few bucks and still be way in a a bargain zone.
Don't worry about nicks and bangs not much you can do. Should take a fine flat file to knock off the top and then hone to witness the bed flat.

Oh, with sending it out (good move) to American Machine Tool Repair you are going to have a very good(fun) lathe.

Buck

xplodee · Mar 1, 2015

Well it's been over a year since I last updated anyone as to the progress of my lathe! To say it succinctly, progress has been slow. However it has been steady. All of the different sub-assemblies have been completely disassembled and degreased, everything has been ground down, some have been primed and a few parts even painted.

I've grouped all of the cast iron parts that have polished handles on them and will be taking them to work to sand down on my functioning lathe. Then back home to be polished. The saddle is ready to be ground, as is the cross slide and tail stock base. The bed is waiting on sand blasting from an outside-firm because I don't have the ability to blast it at home. The same is true of the stand. Once the bed is blasted then I'll be sending it and the other parts out to be ground down and scraped in by American Machine Tool Repair.

I am on the lookout for the following parts:

1) Large dial assemblies for cross slide and compound, as well as a new screw and nut for the cross slide.
2) Lever style clutch assembly to replace my star assembly.
3) Heat stock bearing spacer shims.
4) Felt kit
5) New compound pivot as mine is too chewed up.
6) New half-nuts.

Please find some pictures attached. I do a lot of painting for my hobby (restoring antiques) so this lathe is no exception. It is painted in Sherwin Williams Dimension single stage urethane paint in a blue-grey color. It's a labor of love. The hardware will be zinc-plated with a blue-chromate which will produce a very bright finish. That way everything matches to the blue-grey and polished look.

Introductory Post: My New to me South Bend Heavy 10

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