Harrison 17" Gap Bed Lathe

[nobrakese28]

Hi, does anyone have any information on these lathes? Not much out there other than what is on lathes.uk website. I have been looking for something that is "compact" but has a large spindle bore (bigger than 2") and I found this 17" Harrison (63" between centers) accidentally at a local machinery dealer. Its technically not for sale, but the owner agreed to sell it to me, he wants $5500, but will take $4,000 and my large wood pattern lathe on trade. So its a win-win.... As I need to ditch my wood lathe.

The ways are in excellent shape and the machine seems quite rigid, my only concern is a noise in the headstock at the lower speeds. Almost sounds like a poker card in a bicycle spoke. He said I am welcome to pop the cover off and inspect it. It gets almost no use, and I suspect it hasn't been run in months.

Curious if anyone has ever ran this model or had any experience servicing them.

Thanks,

Marco

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

Looks to be a decent lathe going off the two photos. Almost certainly still in its original paint. Can you run it ? Is there oil in the sight glasses ? It has the later re-design of the cross slide and compound slide. No sign of any provision for coolant or a work light. “ Harrison “ were roughly in the same ball park as “ Colchester “ quality wise.

Regards Tyrone

 

[AlfaGTA]

Funny setup. Generally on a gap bed machine the long feed hand wheel (Z) is placed to the right side on the apron to give clearance when large dia. parts are being turned.
Nice looking machine. Personally i would say that Harrison (in this era) was a jump ahead of Colchester as to quality and build condition.
Cheers Ross

 

[john.k]

The noise you mention is likely two gears slightly interfering.......It would be likley fixed by a slight realignment of one of the shift forks ,but something that would need to be seen to.

 

[nobrakese28]

Thanks guys. I am hoping to stop buy this weekend and make sure all the feeds and speeds work. Interesting note about the hand wheel, a bit of an oops on their part.

I'll check the oil. I could also see a poorly aligned oil dripper rubbing against a gear.

-Marco

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

Thanks guys. I am hoping to stop buy this weekend and make sure all the feeds and speeds work. Interesting note about the hand wheel, a bit of an oops on their part.

I'll check the oil. I could also see a poorly aligned oil dripper rubbing against a gear.

-Marco

I re-built a big slotter ( vertical shaper ) a few years ago. It was really hard work, it was all big, heavy, lumps. Most of the time I was working off step ladders and ladders. Plus it was red hot in the shop. I breathed a real sigh of relief when it was all back together again. When we started it running again I could hear an ominous clicking sound. I thought “ Oh, bollocks what now ? “ Anyway I put the ladder back up and climbed to the top to have a look Inside. Eventually I noticed one of the oil pipes was touching one of the gears. I just moved the pipe out of the way and all was well again.

Regards Tyrone

 

[nobrakese28]

Went to visit the lathe, the owner was okay with me popping the top and inspecting the internals. Overall the gears look good, nothing crazy. The headstock was very low on oil, but the lathe never really runs. I added almost 5 gallons of oil.

I think the noise is two separate issues:

1. clutch pack
2. shifter selector shaft

The lathe has three selector shafts, the far left seems to have an issue with a detent. Should be a simple fix.

The other noise seems to be coming from the clutch pack, but its hard to tell with all the noise in the shop. The noise is most noticeable at low speeds, at high speed its much less noticeable.

I think I am going to take a chance, for several reasons.

1. He will take my 13ft wood lathe on trade (credit) (wood lathe +4k). Mori Seike's in my area are going for 10-15k
2. Condition of the ways, they have zero wear.
3. Aside from the headstock noise, everything works. Threading, feed, etc
4. Tooling: 6-jaw, 4-jaw, steady rest, large Italian tool post which looks to be well made
5. D1-6 spindle, I really dislike A1 bolted style like brothers Mori Seiki
6. 3-1/8" spindle bore! Usually in an Ameircan or lathe a spindle that big usually means the boar weighs more than my forklift, truck, and trailer

I purchased the manual online; it supposedly has the parts break down. Ill check back in when the girl is moved in, looking like 06/17/2023 is the day...Early father's day gift to me.

Here are some photos of the gears and oil system.

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

Nice bit of pipe strangling there. Much better class of work than the headstock lube set up on most “ Colchesters “. It looks like the machine has “ Matrix “ clutches. They were all over the place in UK machine tool building back in the day. Loads of companies used them. Very reliable. You should still be able to get get spares for those if you need to but like most things, they won’t be cheap. Good luck with it.

Regards Tyrone