Thread: Where are South Bend lathes made today?

Title says it all really.

I looked on their website and their contact address is in Bellingham, WA. So, where are they really, and where are the lathes made?

The lathes you see on the SB web site are built by Turret Mfg. in Taiwan. Same company that builds the Lagun Turmaster and there Republic lathes. These are the same people that built the very nice lathes that SB sold under the Turnado brand name in the nineties. I have four Turret Mfg. built lathes in my business. Two TWS 14 by 40 one that was sold under there factory name of Turret and one new Lagun Republic electronic variable speed lathe with Constant surface controls for the cross slide. This is the same lathe that SB sold the US government in the nineties. Turret also built the 13 by 30 that was sold to the US military in the eighties. These were exceptionally fine machines. Again Lagun Republic won the contract for these machine and in doing so beat out the Clausing Colchester 13 inch tool room lathes that the military specifications actually were written for.

Turk

Taiwan...Bob

Are their milling machines made by Turret Mfg. also ?

The wuality is good also ?

Ron

I am not sure were Shiraz is getting the mills made but I would guess Taiwan also. I only use Chevalier for my conventional mills at my business. All but one has a Proto Trax control on it though. The only manual one I had left I hauled to my home hobby shop.

Turk

I was hoping to hear something about the new SB lathes by now.

Ron

Ronlyke,
Bingo. The new owner really jumped the gun on the marketing of these. I doubt we'll even see the 10k until 2011.

As big as grizzly is, i thought they would already have a heavy 10 and 12 inch south bend for sale

Originally Posted by Arthur.Marks

Ronlyke,
Bingo. The new owner really jumped the gun on the marketing of these. I doubt we'll even see the 10k until 2011.

So let me see if I've got this right. They're under new ownership, the lathes are currently made in Taiwan, and they're in the middle of model changes?

I got tired of waiting and bought a very nice Nardini lathe and an alliant mill.

As a point of reference:
South Bend has not built a lathe in the US in at least 20 years. They did rebuilds but thats it.

Originally Posted by mcruff

As a point of reference:
South Bend has not built a lathe in the US in at least 20 years. They did rebuilds but thats it.

That is not true

Many machines were made in South Bend up untill about 2005. Sure, there were some imports and rebuilds, but that statement is totally wrong.
Ted

Originally Posted by SBLatheman

That is not true

Many machines were made in South Bend up untill about 2005. Sure, there were some imports and rebuilds, but that statement is totally wrong.
Ted

Out of curiosity what lathe's were built? Was the foundry still open? My understanding was they rebuilt machines there but they hadn't run a foundry and were buying most of the parts from suppliers and doing nothing but rebuild to existing machines much like Leblond does now. The only model they had on there website was made overseas somewhere, the 10" that supposedly replaced the heavy 10. If they made other models they wern't on there website. I'm not trying to argue this I'm really interested in this as the last brochures I saw had none of the more common machines in them and the ones that were in them were not South Bend designs.

Hi Ted

Can you shed any light on the supposed collaboration between SB and Lagun Republic when SB imported the three V way Turret built lathes in the 90's. That were supposedly built to fill government contracts. I have acquaintances that work for Lagun and this is the story that was told to me.

The understanding that I have is that the government wonted a better lathe than the Heavy ten or 13 inch and compiled a new set of specifications. One of which was the lathe had to have three V ways and I was told that is why we have a line of lathes sold by Grizzly and also Lagun that have the three V ways. I have one of these machines and its a marvel to run. One first class machine that my guys just love. These by now means are a cheap machine and are rather expensive. The one I got was 22K and has the E spindle with constant surface control.

In the eighties there was a military contract let out for bid that basically specified a Clousing Colchester variable speed tool room lathe that was to be a 13 by 30 and a 13 by 40. Lagun won this contract and Turret built the lathes. I picked up one of these a few years ago for a friend and after going through the job of cleaning it up and my friend put a new paint job on it the lathe has turned out to be one helluva machine. By the contract rules the lathe had to have all American made electrics and motors as this one does. The new Republic lathe I have at my business is also a Turret built lathe but there are no Asian electrics or motors on it. This lathe is all Baldor Alan Bradley and Cutler Hammer equipped.

Turk

Originally Posted by mcruff

Out of curiosity what lathe's were built? Was the foundry still open? My understanding was they rebuilt machines there but they hadn't run a foundry and were buying most of the parts from suppliers and doing nothing but rebuild to existing machines much like Leblond does now. The only model they had on there website was made overseas somewhere, the 10" that supposedly replaced the heavy 10. If they made other models they wern't on there website. I'm not trying to argue this I'm really interested in this as the last brochures I saw had none of the more common machines in them and the ones that were in them were not South Bend designs.

South Bend Lathe never had a foundry, unless you count the one in Korea. Castings were purchased form various foundrys all over the country, and after about 1980, Korea.
They made the Heavy 10 untill about 2003, then replaced for a short time by the special Hercus. The rubber roll grinder was made untill the end, about 2007.
Twenty years! Twenty years ago,almost all size machines were still made here. The 10K was made in Korea by then, but almost all sizes were still in production and so was Deka Drill, Johnson Press, and Dyna Blast. All made in South Bend. In 1993, just the Heavy 10, some 16", and 17", and the rubber roll grinder were still being made along with the Deka Drill and Johnson Press.
When it was sold in about 1998, the Heavy 10 was the only lathe, and the rubber roll grinder and Johnson Press were still being produced.
After the bank took them over and sold it again, just the Heavy 10 and roll grinder were produced.
Imports that were "Americanized" were sold all during those years.
Ted

Originally Posted by Dennis Turk

Hi Ted

Can you shed any light on the supposed collaboration between SB and Lagun Republic when SB imported the three V way Turret built lathes in the 90's. That were supposedly built to fill government contracts. I have acquaintances that work for Lagun and this is the story that was told to me.

The understanding that I have is that the government wonted a better lathe than the Heavy ten or 13 inch and compiled a new set of specifications. One of which was the lathe had to have three V ways and I was told that is why we have a line of lathes sold by Grizzly and also Lagun that have the three V ways. I have one of these machines and its a marvel to run. One first class machine that my guys just love. These by now means are a cheap machine and are rather expensive. The one I got was 22K and has the E spindle with constant surface control.

In the eighties there was a military contract let out for bid that basically specified a Clousing Colchester variable speed tool room lathe that was to be a 13 by 30 and a 13 by 40. Lagun won this contract and Turret built the lathes. I picked up one of these a few years ago for a friend and after going through the job of cleaning it up and my friend put a new paint job on it the lathe has turned out to be one helluva machine. By the contract rules the lathe had to have all American made electrics and motors as this one does. The new Republic lathe I have at my business is also a Turret built lathe but there are no Asian electrics or motors on it. This lathe is all Baldor Alan Bradley and Cutler Hammer equipped.

Turk

Dennis,
The same guy that owns Republic Lagun bought SBL out of bankrupcy in 1993. He imported the lathes from Turret and mills from Spain and changed them a little from the Lagun machines and put South Bends name on them. South Bend had a good name with the Government and it was his "in".
To sell machines to "Uncle Sam", they had to have at least 51% USA content(or Canadian)
Ted

I have often wondered how a percentage of domestic content is calculated .
Would it be measured by weight or volume , number of parts , cost of individual components , origin of raw materials ....?

At the risk of threadjacking, I really need to know my S-B linage and this thread has me questioning my place in life. Kinda like the kid that looks nothing like his father but is a dead ringer for his uncle, I never asked where my S-B’s were made, scared and suspecting they were not made here. Below is a 2003 ad from GFS showing the same lathe I use at work with a little flag and “Made in the USA” on it. We got this lathe (Procter and Gamble, Ivorydale, Cincinnati) about 1995 from LaBlond and believed it was made in Batavia, Ohio. I always knew it wasn’t but there are no back badges stating country of origin. As I understand it, the lathe was made by a company named Turret from Tiawan and sold through the Spainish company LaGun? We also have a S-B mill bought at the same time, with a Baldor VFD. I was so impressed with this mill that I picked up a 1993 model (Magtech-Yakasawa VFD) for my small home gun shop.
Is this (my at work machine) a Tiawan/LaGun?

This is an ad from 2003 General Factory supply
My personal garage toy. Is this also a Turret/LaGun? (ChipMaster II)

Yes it is as I have the same lathe I purchased two years ago from Lagun Republic. This is the lathe Ted and I were taking about that was a collaboration between lagun and SB. There are three features on this lathe that I destined into the original TWS line of lathes built by Turret back in the late seventies and early eighties. One is the transposing gear in the saddle that changes the direction of the cross feed. Originally these lathes built by Turret (as all Asian lathes did) longitudinally fed to the left and when you shifted to cross feed they faced in. I changed that by adding a gear between the main drive gear out of the apron gear box and the lead screw gear. I also shortened the lead screw gear so the drive gear did not contact it. If you were to pull the front cross slide hand wheel assembly off the saddle you will see the pin just to the left and a little below center were this pin is pressed into the saddle and you can look through the hole into the saddle and see the little gear I added.

There is also the direction of feed change by push pull knob on the front of the apron that I also designed into the originals Turret lathes built back in the early days.

In the late seventies none of the lathes coming from Taiwan had more than 45 degrees of graduation on the compound. In a meeting with five plant owners and there engineers from Taiwan I setup a lathe and showed them why we wonted at least 60 degrees of graduations so we could set the compound for cutting threads. It my amazement none of these guys had ever seen threads cut by advancing the tool from the compound only the cross slide. I will say it was a fun time back then.

Turk

bigearl67,
Dennis has answered your question on the lathe(with a few other tid bits that I didn't know).
The mill is the early version(circa 1993) of the same mill that Lagun imported from Spain. I don't remember the name of the company(started with a V or S ???)
Ted

BTW: Do you need a steady rest or follower rest for your machine?