Some thoughts on my visit today. Do more testing and less talking! Lol! This is definitely my fault as I have the gift for the gab. Make sure you fully understand how to operate the machine that you are looking at. All of the feeds, speed selections. Engagement of thread cutting lead and or turning lead. Last of all, make sure you can take some test cuts with it! In the future this will be a requirement of I'm going to dedicate the time to look at something. Don't assume the seller fully understand how to operate the machine. If this had been a 10ee, the story would have been different.
This lathe looked pretty good on the outside, but it was lacking any sort of tool holder that we could use to turn some metal. I actually brought some 1+" 300 and 400 series SS round stock. Could test that as the qctp had the incorrect t nut. The belts were so loose that it was very difficult to get the lathe up to speed. Also, the optical dial thingy for helping you to move the speed levers into the correct position would not budge. Feed engagement handles on the apron for the longitudinal and cross feed would work and there wasn't a holding detent or whatever. No noticable fluid in the head stock. Apron fluid looked ok, but not sure what the normal color is supposed to be. Lathe did not have the micrometer ball stop whatever for the cross slide. This is important to me and probably only came in the tool maker model, but I'm no expert. Everything (carriage/tailstock/compound/cross slide) moved smoothly and the bed ways looked good. Didn't happen to note the backlash. I'm sure it was acceptable. Now I'm sure someone that was familiar with this lathe probably could have handled all of these issues, but I don't have time for another project as this lathe needs to hit the ground running when it gets to the shop. This is by no means a knock to the seller as he had a lot on his plate moving things out of the building to another place since he sold the house and shop. I'm sure he could could easily sell it if he fixed all of the potentially minor problems and could demonstrate it could remove metal. Nothing like a short video of chips flying.
Despite all of that, it was a real pleasure to meet and talk to Dan. I need to get out more and mingle with guys that have been doing this for a while. It's motivational and insightful. Not to mention, it's good experience for checking equipment out and making sure I do my homework, ask all the right questions on the front end and come prepared.
I would love to meet up with someone in the central VA area that has a Lodge & Shipley Powerturn, American or Monarch just so I can familiarize myself with their operation, differences, nuances, etc. If there is anyone out there that has any of these great lathes please PM me as I would love to meet you. Thanks to everyone that weighed in on this thread. I really appreciate it!
Justin
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