South Bend Lathe by Grizzly

Are the SBL of any quality whatsoever since Grizzly has been importing them? Personal experiences in a money making environment.

Ist clue would be "Import"
Probably rebadged like many other machines.

We've both been here on this board for a while, and there has been one, maybe two owners commenting on South Bend - Grizzly lathes.

I'm thinking... If Grizzly can't publish testimonials of satisfied customers of these lathes, perhaps there aren't satisfief customers.

Harsh? Yes, that's harsh. Grizzly could give one away each year, in these intervening years, and created a satisfied customer.

In their defense, perhaps the ownet is too busy making money, or repairs.

Honestly I'd love to hear what folks with real work experience think of the 13" and up swing lathes and their mills. But for now lets back up a bit and get the story right. South Bend Lathe Co sells machines made in China and Taiwan to their spec. No news there everyone is doing it. Even Hardinge doesn't make the Bridgeport mill anymore they buy them from Asia. Get over it. South Bend Lathe Co's exclusive distributor (import agent) in the USA and Canada is Woodstock International Inc (known for their Shop Fox brand equipment). Grizzly is a reseller for Woodstock. Lastly SBL, Woodstock, and Grizzly (along with several other companies) are all owned by Shiraz Balolia. Now why is this important? Well Mr Balolia who now has more than 30 years of experience in dealing with manufacturers and selling machines to the public to the extent of having no less than two brands names in the channel went out and purchased SBL. Why? Well this is my answer not his but I think he was looking for an opportunity to sell a higher quality product at a higher price point. Which brings us back to my original question. What is the real world experience with their equipment? I suspect there are some users here but based on the responses on the board it doesn't surprise my they aren't volunteering any information.

Possibly better than 30 years ago. Over priced though. Grizzly's non-South Bend lathes of similar capacity are a better buy and not that much different in quality.

The usual caveats apply: shop wisely

I'm curious why you would consider one of these lathes over a super quality used lathe? With the kind of money these things cost, you could find a used late model Monarch, L&S or LeBlond in superb condition with tooling. Jus saying...................

Old U.S. iron is not metric, may have a non-standard or obsolete motor"frame" and/or electrics, may be worn-out, etc.

Also in a purchasing situation like we are and cannot buy Used equipment.

New, quality lathes are Crazy $$$$

We have one of the SB (grizzly) lathes, Don't expect much....

Rstewart, what model are you referring to? what are you disappointed with?


FWIW- spec wise is don't see any Grizzy badged 14" coming near this one-
14" x 4" Turn-X Gearhead Lathe | Grizzly Industrial

And the spec sheet-
http://cdn1.grizzly.com/specsheets/sb1053_ds.pdf

seems like a heck of a good deal for 10 grand....

QT: Rstewart [We have one of the SB (grizzly) lathes, Don't expect much....]

How long have you had the SB and what faults have you found?
Running it most every day for hours or just not that much?
quality issues, break downs , other ?

As near as I can tell the lathes SB/Grizzly are now selling are sourced from the same Mfr. in Taiwan that the old, real SB marketed before going belly up. I think the ESOP was a way for the prior owners to get far more money than the company was worth.
AFAIK these were/are serviceable lathes. If you Google the old model numbers I think you'll find tons of info.

No idea about the 'standard' bear lathes, but the 'gunsmithing' model I used for a short time, which was brand new, was not disappointing. Mostly did barrel work. Occasionally some sound suppressor parts. Some threading. Had no issues. It doesn't have a whole lot of balls to be able to make suppressor baffles out of exotic stainless steel bar stock, but I eventually got some done. Eventually... heh. The CNC turning centers were a lot better for suppressor parts back in the day. Not my bag anymore, though.

But the barrel work I did was good, and the end users were pretty happy. Did a couple long range rifle shooters' barrels that they wanted turned and threaded for the Surefire adapter that worked with their bigass cans. That was one of the first jobs I did on that lathe and I worked it to within a tenth, diameter, and runout, of where I wanted to be.

Working on a brand new lathe is nice, though, and speaks nothing to how it'll last. But gunsmithing work doesn't really require all that much horsepower (most of the time) and probably isn't all that abusive on the machine, compared to most other lines of work.

Not sure if this is info you're looking for but I have a Grizzly G4003G 12x36 "gunsmithing" lathe. With the little experience I have, I'm quite pleased with it. It has done everything I wanted it to and I've taken some pretty heavy cuts in steel and aluminum considering the horsepower of the motor, nothing exotic. I wish it was faster and slower. The iron seems good but took a little tweaking to get everything square. The lathe will out work me as far as accuracy goes. I don't think I'll be replacing it anytime soon.

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Larry on Lake Superior said:

As near as I can tell the lathes SB/Grizzly are now selling are sourced from the same Mfr. in Taiwan that the old, real SB marketed before going belly up. I think the ESOP was a way for the prior owners to get far more money than the company was worth.
AFAIK these were/are serviceable lathes. If you Google the old model numbers I think you'll find tons of info.

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First off, the ESOP was dissolved in 1992 during the chapter 11 bankruptcy. The Taiwan lathes that were sold after 1993 were from the same company that the new South Bend Lathe gets some of the lathes it sells (they are not bad).
The story of South Bend Lathe is a long one (and sad ),
so the statement when the "real" South Bend ended depends on your view point.
Ted

I just bought the EVS version of the lathe linked above. SB1012. You cannot beat the current sale price. Its the same lathe sold by Kent and all of the other Taiwanese lathe companies. So far its been pretty decent. It cuts straight, is nice and smooth, and the ways are beefy for its size. Spindle runout is good, and its pretty quiet for a gearhead. Its 220v 3p and it runs off of my rpc like a champ. All of the electronics seem very high quality.
Now, there are a few annoyances...but like I said its the same pattern as everyone else is using...Kent, PM, Republic, any 1440 with"RML" in the name.
1. The manual calls for a 12ga. 4-wire cord. The strain releif on the back of the cabinet is only big enough for a regular 14ga. extension cord. Opened the hole up from 1/2 to 3/4 conduit size with a varibit and installed a proper strain relief.
2. The compound is a bit disappointing. The handle they put on there feels kinda cheapy. It mounts on a taper, and the dial does not rotate on ball bearings like the cross slide (and my older taiwanese Lagun Turnmaster)so it has play in it because theres nothing to hold it in place. I have a fix in the works for this using a ring of delrin that will sandwich in there.
3. Compound revisited. This is my biggest complaint. On most lathes Ive used, the graduaions for setting the angle are on the top slide, and the witness mark on the base of the compound. Well some idiot designed the new breed of Taiwanese lathe, because they are all as follows:
The graduations are on the base of the compound, and the witness mark on the top of the cross slide. Because of this arrangement, there is only space to put graduations up to 45 degrees to either side of zero, and "zero" is when the compound is parallel with the spindlr. YOU CANNOT SET THE COMPOUND TO 60 FOR THREADING without an indicator, angle blocks, math, whatever. It even states in the manual "its recommended that the first time you thread something you mark the compound position so its easier next time" or something along those lines. My solution is to scribe a witness mark perpendicular to the original of course to do it right i have to disassemble the whole cross slide and put it on the mill.
4. I HATE gap beds. I dont know why these manufacturers think we want them; I surely dont. Give me the option Please!

Ok so I know it seems like I had more bad than good to say about this lathe but it really is a solid machine. Grizzlys original price for these was way out of the ballpark, but this sale price is outstanding. A comparable lathe from one of the other Taiwanese importers runs $14-16k. This one was around $10.5k, marked down from $19k or somewhere around there. All in all, Im happy with it so far.

I also became a new SB owner today. Well they still have to deliver it. Model SB1038. I'm a home gamer who's getting into gunsmithing and looking forward to seeing how this lathe handles the job. I also just joined the site finally after years of perusing off and on. Thanks for letting me on board...

Piddling Piddler said:

I'm a home gamer who's getting into gunsmithing and looking forward to seeing how this lathe handles the job.

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I have no idea what a "home gamer" is.
Please elaborate.

aka "hobbyist", not doing machine work professionally.

I bought a SB 1049F 13x30 lathe and a SB 1042 9 x 42 VS mill this spring when they were more than half off. I picked the mill up at the Springfield store in April and the lathe in May. The mill was a floor model from Grizzly's Pennsylvania store that they closed and got a great discount. The lathe was new in the crate and again less one half their pre sale pricing. So far they have both been trouble free and a big step up from my previous machines. The fit and finish is significantly better than comparable Chinese machines, its easy to see in the showroom where you can make direct comparison. The first thing that was obvious when I drilled into the castings to mount the DRO on the mill was that the castings are denser and finer grained than the Chinese machines I had. I suspect that is why the finish on the ways and table look almost polished and the ways are much harder than my previous machines.

The most surprising part with the lathe was the supplied 3jaw and 4 jaw chucks were very nicely made and seem too be as near as good as the Bison 3 jaw I have. The 3 jaw had been indexed and marked to the spindle for the least runout. With 1" and 2" ground drill rod in the chuck I measured .00014 TIR for the 1" and .00018 TIR on the 2" rod 4" from the chuck. The controls work smoothly, the gears are easy to change and surprisingly quiet. The metric graduations on the cross slide and compound dial are not easy to follow in that one revolution of the cross is 5.08mm and the compound is 2.64mm As mentioned in another thread about the Grizzly SB lathes the degree indicator for the compound is on the circular portion of the compound not on the top of the cross slide and on my lathe the legend stops at 45 degrees but the graduations go to 90 degrees each side of O.

My previous lathes were a Taiwanese ENCO 12 X 36, and 11" VS Rockwell and a 12 X 36 Grizzly G4003 and the SB is better in all respects than the others. I bought the lathe with the intention of adding a VFD and 3ph motor to give more flexible speed ranges.

Old US Iron, or British for that matter, some of the Japan manual Lathes are the way to go, in my opinion. That said, its nice to get a pretty paint job on a new lathe and the imports are going to be here for a long time. The way I see it, the old school American, British made had their own, I belive Foundries, where they could control a lot. The trick is to find a good one, and getting rare. I bought a American Pacemaker 18", (1943), for 10s, shipping out here to the left coast was a couple grand, been painted with new electrics, gone through, not completely rebuilt but...just amazed at the accuracy of a 70plus old machine, and... a beefy and I said solid taper attachment which is nice and rare on the imports. Just setting up a 1943 K & T 2HL, and if this is the smaller one, I can only imagine what the large ones were capable of... in any case, bought for 500, have put about 12,000 into it, but...the as built automatic, feeds, the rapids, such a joy, ok, maybe 70 years old, but I would take it over any import I have ever seen...

howieranger said:

I bought a SB 1049F 13x30 lathe and a SB 1042 9 x 42 VS mill this spring when they were more than half off. I picked the mill up at the Springfield store in April and the lathe in May. The mill was a floor model from Grizzly's Pennsylvania store that they closed and got a great discount. The lathe was new in the crate and again less one half their pre sale pricing. So far they have both been trouble free and a big step up from my previous machines. The fit and finish is significantly better than comparable Chinese machines, its easy to see in the showroom where you can make direct comparison. The first thing that was obvious when I drilled into the castings to mount the DRO on the mill was that the castings are denser and finer grained than the Chinese machines I had. I suspect that is why the finish on the ways and table look almost polished and the ways are much harder than my previous machines.

The most surprising part with the lathe was the supplied 3jaw and 4 jaw chucks were very nicely made and seem too be as near as good as the Bison 3 jaw I have. The 3 jaw had been indexed and marked to the spindle for the least runout. With 1" and 2" ground drill rod in the chuck I measured .00014 TIR for the 1" and .00018 TIR on the 2" rod 4" from the chuck. The controls work smoothly, the gears are easy to change and surprisingly quiet. The metric graduations on the cross slide and compound dial are not easy to follow in that one revolution of the cross is 5.08mm and the compound is 2.64mm As mentioned in another thread about the Grizzly SB lathes the degree indicator for the compound is on the circular portion of the compound not on the top of the cross slide and on my lathe the legend stops at 45 degrees but the graduations go to 90 degrees each side of O.

My previous lathes were a Taiwanese ENCO 12 X 36, and 11" VS Rockwell and a 12 X 36 Grizzly G4003 and the SB is better in all respects than the others. I bought the lathe with the intention of adding a VFD and 3ph motor to give more flexible speed ranges.

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