What's new
What's new

Heavier Toolroom Lathes: Monarch vs Lodge & Shipley vs American vs ...

rpseguin

Stainless
Joined
Jun 28, 2006
Location
Napa, CA
I’m missing and regretting selling my Lodge & Shipley lathe when we moved and wish I could get it back!
I’ve been occasionally browsing looking for a medium swing up to 25”, up to 60”between centers, heavy duty toolroom lathe.

I’m looking for lathe recommendations in this medium size range and what features make it stand out to you.
Things that I would or might like to have:
-power traverse
-2 speed tailstock quill feed
-taper attachment
-preferably at least 2” spindle bore
-inch and metric threading
-replaceable hardened ways
-good oiler setup
-super durable
-good user feel/interface

The ones that immediately come to mind are Monarch series 60, Lodge & Shipley, American Pacemaker, Axelson (I’ve never run an Axelson).
 
I have a Monarch Series 61, so my answer is a Monarch Series 61 :D. Mine is a toolroom lathe, taper attachment, lead screw reverse. Just a very elegant lathe. One feature I like over the others mentioned is the enclosed qcgb, no dirt or debris getting in.

Top spindle speed on mine 1000 rpm though, but enough for me. I like Monarch is still in business too. D1-6 spindle nose a little bit easy to mount chucks than L0's type. 16 & 20" will have a 1 9/16" through hole with mt4 taper inside.

99.jpg

It can have rapid traverse, mine does not. For Monarch's 61's, 612's etc the levers on apron will have a side shift feature if it does:

100.jpg

Monarch 612's push 1500 or so on top spindle speeds.

Pacemakers can have rapid traverse, but not all do. A rapid lead screw on back side of lathe if so. I believe some have replaceable ways.

Axelson's and Pacemakers have truly massive headstocks. Not sure their weight, but my 61 headstock weighs in the area of 2000 lbs, and is smaller than those two.
 
I have a Monarch Series 61, so my answer is a Monarch Series 61 :D. Mine is a toolroom lathe, taper attachment, lead screw reverse. Just a very elegant lathe. One feature I like over the others mentioned is the enclosed qcgb, no dirt or debris getting in.

Top spindle speed on mine 1000 rpm though, but enough for me. I like Monarch is still in business too. D1-6 spindle nose a little bit easy to mount chucks than L0's type. 16 & 20" will have a 1 9/16" through hole with mt4 taper inside.

View attachment 320920

It can have rapid traverse, mine does not. For Monarch's 61's, 612's etc the levers on apron will have a side shift feature if it does:

View attachment 320921

Monarch 612's push 1500 or so on top spindle speeds.

Pacemakers can have rapid traverse, but not all do. A rapid lead screw on back side of lathe if so. I believe some have replaceable ways.

Axelson's and Pacemakers have truly massive headstocks. Not sure their weight, but my 61 headstock weighs in the area of 2000 lbs, and is smaller than those two.

Yeah!
I’ve been drooling over the Monarch series 61. I’ve seen lots of examples of really clean, nice ones.
I forgot to include D1 spindle nose to my list.
Also forgot to add collet closer setup(s). I have 5C and 16C collets.
 
Pictures?
I really liked my L&S!
Selling it was a big mistake on my part!

Keeping in mind that.. "Powerturn" was the baby-bear - smallest of three classes in the Large & Shapely lineup? You might find an Omniturn your shop can stand the mass of. The bigger bruder Superturn was basically "oil field" spindle bore goods and "overkill" as a daily-driver.

Another option might be an "AVS". Both the DC motor & DC drive and later AC motor + inverter were potentially expensve w/r the electicals "back in the day".

No longer a problem at all, either one.

The early DC model there are plenty of modern solid-state DC drives around, pretty much "wire and forget" drop-in replacements.

The later AC model only needs any of what are NOW dirt-common and much cheaper VFD, also "wire-and-forget" drop-in replacements.

The motors are happier, either generations. Both pf DC drives and VFD's are just that much better as well as cheaper than the old OEM ones, back when electric variable speed was still "bleeding edge". Now it is dirt-common.

Then off you go with same lathe, lots of RPM choices, and only about one-third as many gears - it still has "some" - to worry about, but.... "that's a feature, not a bug" for better use of power than pure VFD or DC drive and NO mechanical ratios.

Monarch lathe is - or was - also the surviving go-to for Lodge & Shipley parts.

I've NO idea how much coverage they still have, but you could contact them by phone or email and ask?


(At least) one OTHER candidate is still a going concern.

As we type, I have shipment being arranged of just under USD$ 2,000 worth of 1970's Cazeneuve HBX-360-BC brand-new parts ex factory in France.

That model, now "Optica", has gone-over to servo driven spindle drive instead of power shifted varidrive, and grown itself Siemens "Teach in" hybrid manual/CNC controls.

But so have BOTH of its larger brothers, the 5XX and 7XX series.

Nice to be able to still get parts ...and from the original maker.

"Free" I didn't expect. Even so, the prices weren't all that bad considering the EU's massive social & tax burden on bizness in general.

Fair warning:

With two generations of Henri Bruet with genius-level IQ's doing the designing, and several dozen patents?

Cazeneuve's are more than just "a little bit" weird.

But it's good sort of weird, not squirrelly-weird, so once you get your head around the features they built-in, perhaps the best-ever manual (and later, CNC as well) inch/metric single-point threading high on the list, they are really, really sweet to operate.

Just don't take overly long lunch breaks .. or you may need to sit a refresher training course on return!

DAMHIKT!

Well you DID want something more "interesting" than an over-grown SB 9 on steroids, yah?

:D
 
Yeah!
I’ve been drooling over the Monarch series 61. I’ve seen lots of examples of really clean, nice ones.
I forgot to include D1 spindle nose to my list.
Also forgot to add collet closer setup(s). I have 5C and 16C collets.

Collet closers may or may not be trickier to get. But speed chucks and the sort are out there rather plentiful for collets without needing a left end closer handle.
 
Collet closers may or may not be trickier to get. But speed chucks and the sort are out there rather plentiful for collets without needing a left end closer handle.

Yeah.
And these larger lathes usually they have lower spindle speeds.
I already have a very nice 5C setup on my Hardinge, but I wouldn’t say no to a 5C, 16C or 3J
 
Keeping in mind that.. "Powerturn" was the baby-bear - smallest of three classes in the Large & Shapely lineup? You might find an Omniturn your shop can stand the mass of. The bigger bruder Superturn was basically "oil field" spindle bore goods and "overkill" as a daily-driver.

Another option might be an "AVS". Both the DC motor & DC drive and later AC motor + inverter were potentially expensve w/r the electicals "back in the day".

Yeah.
I had and should have kept a small Lodge & Shipley AVS 1408 (the smallest they made?) with a VFD. We moved and thought we couldn’t bring it. :_(



Well you DID want something more "interesting" than an over-grown SB 9 on steroids, yah?
:D

I have tried and failed to convince people to NOT BUY tiny Atlas lathes and similar ilk.
What boggles my mind is the money people drop on those when for similar or slightly more money they could get so much better of a lathe
 
I have a Monarch Series 61, so my answer is a Monarch Series 61 :D. Mine is a toolroom lathe, taper attachment, lead screw reverse. Just a very elegant lathe. One feature I like over the others mentioned is the enclosed qcgb, no dirt or debris getting in.

I’ve been peeking at ebay from time to time.
I see some, but they often have tracer setups on them.
I guess a tracer could be cool, but I have no experience using one and I see myself mostly using it as a manual lathe.
I have pretty limited space, so the footprint cost of hydraulic reservoir/pump and tracer attachment isn’t ideal.
 
Yeah.
I had and should have kept a small Lodge & Shipley AVS 1408 (the smallest they made?) with a VFD. We moved and thought we couldn’t bring it. :_(





I have tried and failed to convince people to NOT BUY tiny Atlas lathes and similar ilk.
What boggles my mind is the money people drop on those when for similar or slightly more money they could get so much better of a lathe

Yah well.. As a Combat Engineer on teaching staff at the Engineer Center & School, had not only aced the "rigging" course, I had gone on to teach it. Dad the same before me and HIS Dad 44 years B&O railroad as well as farming on the mountainsides, so...

.. a personal "single hand" go-fetch for machine tools in the 4,000 to over 5,000 lb Avoir class is very low sweat and very high "nostalgia" for the pride in it, done safely and well.

BFD.

Not a lot of "hobbysts" as harbour a dozen of so machinery skates in several different makes and types, but THERE is your most common double-barrier:

"If only it was closer..."

"I don't know if I can handle a heavy lathe of 1,000 lbs or more..."

I paid the late Johnny Booth but $500 for the 5205 lb avoir Quartet combo mill fetched a thousand miles-plus by road from Abom79's old shop in Pensacola, Florida to Sterling/Dulles, VA.

Cost of one-way air flight down, tools and timber bought locally to fab two special pallets on-site, transport home a very HIGH multiple of purchase price.

Much the same an $800 4400 lb Avoir Alzmetall AB5/S. I had over $3,000 into it before I rang tire, checked air, fired up Penske's Cornbinder Diesel to depart Louisville for a run up the mountain.

That sort of go-fetch is part of the FUN for me!

Zombie hoards, idiot-bore'eds and their puppet whored's or mastered-baiters congregate in downtown Big Shiddies.

Good folks, open plains, mountain ranges, open roads, small farms, cattle grazing, and fall foliage are still America the Beautiful.. just as it was meant to be.

Endangered species?

Don't EVER bet agin' the "smallholder"! SELF reliance runs bone-deep!

Watching an "OTHER People's Money" big city-shiddy rot right down to broken glass, burnt-outs, winos, druggies, weeds and vacant lots is a sore ugly thing.

Also a certainty. Read the funny-papers lately?

Guys? You can too "do this s**t". Just study-up on, make a plan, then JFDI.

If your damned groceries travel 2,000 miles and more every day of the week?

Why is Old Iron once in 10 or 20 years so HARD?

COVID? Read the fine print.

District of Corruption was as avoidable as sane folk ALWAYS do.
Maryland allowed transit from Virginia. Delaware the same. And off I went to drag home a pair of electrically-clutched reduction gearboxes, far Eastern Shore. In the Jaguar XJ8-L, even. They just weren't all that heavy nor grubby.

Of COURSE I turned it into the long way around for a nice "day out" sightseeing and some right decent seafood as well!

:D
 
Gotta throw my $.02 in for the Pacemaker ... have run both, Monarch is nice, but the speed shifting on a Pacemaker is quicker and simpler .... unless you get a Strip-Shift :)

But a 17" Mori-Seiki is actually a better lathe than either one for most work. The Clausing Colchester probably fits that bracket as well ... not necessarily "better" but the massive metal-removers are not as nimble. Most small-shop work these days doesn't require removing 8" off the diameter of a 12" part ....
 
Gotta throw my $.02 in for the Pacemaker ... have run both, Monarch is nice, but the speed shifting on a Pacemaker is quicker and simpler .... unless you get a Strip-Shift :)

But a 17" Mori-Seiki is actually a better lathe than either one for most work. The Clausing Colchester probably fits that bracket as well ... not necessarily "better" but the massive metal-removers are not as nimble. Most small-shop work these days doesn't require removing 8" off the diameter of a 12" part ....

By most metrics, the all-manual Mori became the South Korean Whacheon, and yes, for all around general-purpose and not break the bank at periodic intervals they JFW.

The "Taiwanese generics" that look alike? Some are. Yam ain't bad.

Otherwise be wary as all Hell for skin-deep cosmetics and no genuine guts, not limited to mainland PRC.

Who CAN build decent goods. But generally CNC. And they put them to work in their OWN factories, thanks!
 
I forgot to mention that I have 2 sheets of 3/4” CDX plywood and a couple of 2x4s that I could trade for whatever lathe comes up, but obviously the lathe will have to be minty, like new, still has cosmoline on it! :-)
 
Here is my no frills short bed 1610 I'm working on getting cleaned up and put into service. Almost have her all back together. Then she needs leveled and tailstock taper reamed/repaired. I would love to someday own longer bed toolroom version of this, an American or a Monarch with all of the nice accessories. I feel like this was a good first step into the medium size lathes.
8c875e564d9cf6fb56c70c05551afd7d.jpg


Sent from my Pixel 4 XL using Tapatalk
 
I forgot to mention that I have 2 sheets of 3/4” CDX plywood and a couple of 2x4s that I could trade for whatever lathe comes up, but obviously the lathe will have to be minty, like new, still has cosmoline on it! :-)

So long as you don't have Superman's "X-Ray Vision", I gues we can deal, then!

I think I have enough freakin' cosmoline put by from before I gave it up as a losing battle and bought an all almuminum motorcar instead of trying to protect Iron Oxide motorcars from becoming ever-more Oxygen than Iron.

.. I'll be dead of Old Age, and ten years cremated ... before you get enough of that s**t off to discover the "lathe" under it is a chainsaw-carved stack of Liquid nails and sheets of ignorant gypsum plasterer's "rock lath".

You'd have to know "Cosmoline"?

:D
 








 
Back
Top