Imperial brand lathe Italian made?

Klamath · Apr 2, 2012

I searched the archives and see that over the years, two other people asked about this brand of lathe and pretty much got zero responses.
I have a chance to buy a metric lathe in about the 14x40 size for about a $1,000. It runs smooth and it is a geared head lathe that looks to be '50 vintage. I have searched the net for any info on this brand almost zero info returned.
Anybody have any leads on this brand?
Thanks.

atomarc · Apr 2, 2012

Sorry, I have no leads for you but I do have a question! Your location is CA and your handle is Klamath. Does this mean the town or the Glen or somewhere up river?

Stuart

Klamath · Apr 2, 2012

atomarc said:
Sorry, I have no leads for you but I do have a question! Your location is CA and your handle is Klamath. Does this mean the town or the Glen or somewhere up river?

Stuart

I'm up near Weaverville.

johnoder · Apr 3, 2012

I still wonder what the Imperial refers to on this big Nebel sliding bed extension gap Jackson Holland owns.

https://picasaweb.google.com/pulsenpal/NEBELLATHE#

Klamath · Apr 3, 2012

johnoder said:
I still wonder what the Imperial refers to on this big Nebel sliding bed extension gap Jackson Holland owns.

https://picasaweb.google.com/pulsenpal/NEBELLATHE#

That is not it but those are some sad pictures. :bawling:

John Garner · Apr 3, 2012

Klamath --

This'll be a long shot, but in the 1950s International Machine and Tool (IMT) of Warwick, Rhode Island imported very high grade rotary tables from Germany that IMT had badged with the Imperial name. IMT is still in business, and still owned by the Elsdorfer (sp?) family, and I'd guess that they could tell you if they ever imported Imperial-branded lathes from Italy.

John

Klamath · Apr 3, 2012

John Garner said:
Klamath --

This'll be a long shot, but in the 1950s International Machine and Tool (IMT) of Warwick, Rhode Island imported very high grade rotary tables from Germany that IMT had badged with the Imperial name. IMT is still in business, and still owned by the Elsdorfer (sp?) family, and I'd guess that they could tell you if they ever imported Imperial-branded lathes from Italy.

John

John,
Thanks for the information. I will follow that lead. I just remembered it had what I thought was a dealer tag that was something like "machine tool engraving company".
My brother works at times at the shop that it is located in and he spent a bit of time cleaning it up. He said he could not detect any preceptable wear on the ways near the chuck. His impression was that it was very high quality as the gears were barely audible when running. I am looking to replace my smithy 3inl machine with a good quality lathe. I have been looking a while for something in the 14x40 range and getting anything much under 2500 -3 grand is rare.

Joel
AkA klamath

Klamath · Apr 5, 2012

OK John I followed that lead and unfortunately they did not sell Imperial branded italian made lathes. They are only an engineering firm now.
Thanks again for the lead though.
Joel

John Garner said:
Klamath --

This'll be a long shot, but in the 1950s International Machine and Tool (IMT) of Warwick, Rhode Island imported very high grade rotary tables from Germany that IMT had badged with the Imperial name. IMT is still in business, and still owned by the Elsdorfer (sp?) family, and I'd guess that they could tell you if they ever imported Imperial-branded lathes from Italy.

John

Klamath · Apr 30, 2012

Well I went ahead and bought the lathe for $900. I still have very little documentation on it but for the price I figured I couldn't go too wrong plus it was local and didn't need long distant transport.
It realy is a 15x60 gap bed lathe. It has withworth thread pitch gears installed and imperial crossfeed units, with a taper attachment. It has seen some use and I haven't cut a test bar with it to see how bad. It appears to have about a .004 to .007 (by eyeball) crown in the vee bed. There is .070 backlash in the crossfeed and there was one bent shaft in the apron that I straightened. All the gears have all their teeth. It was really dirty and my brother and I broke it all down and cleaned it. It appears that everything is original equipment. Anyhow here are some pictures.

Klamath · May 4, 2012

I am really starting to think that this imperial branded lathe was built by Alfeo. Seems to have a lot of the same pedigree. The tailstock, swarf pan, compound tool post, bed casting, heavy cast louver panals on the pedestals, head shape and the threading gear housing all are very close. This is smaller than most of the Alfeos I can find but no other lathe brand comes close to the look.
Anybody else have any thoughts on this. One of these days someone else is going to be looking for infomation on the imperial lathe so hopefully this thread will help them.
Alfeo lathes. Page Title

Klamath · Jun 4, 2012

Just an update on the lathe after some time working on it. Cast a new lead screw nut out of bronze and brought the back lash from .070" to .005 at the worn part of the lead screw. Did quite a bit of work on it now and if anyone comes across one of these Imperial italian made lathes and are thinking about buying it barring being totally trashed, don't hold back, they are good lathes. One problem is it is so quiet that at times I forget it is running. Really smooth running machine and very well built.

strantor · Nov 21, 2012

I just got one of these imperial brand lathes. Your post here is the only thing that comes up in searches. Cannot find anything at all about it. If you've found any information on imperial brand lathes since you've owned yours, please share. Thanks.

Klamath · Nov 21, 2012

strantor said:
I just got one of these imperial brand lathes. Your post here is the only thing that comes up in searches. Cannot find anything at all about it. If you've found any information on imperial brand lathes since you've owned yours, please share. Thanks.

Pretty much zero info out there. I have pretty much just had to wing it. I really think it was made by Alfeo, because if you look at Alfeo pictures there is a whole lot of the design that looks the same.
Does your lathe appear to be the same model as mine? If so I might be able to give you some pointers if you run into problems. It is a great lathe. I went with a VFD drive and it gets the job done even though I think it is a 440 volt motor as the power seems low. The tag off the motor was gone so I am only assuming. Are you going to break it down and clean it up?

strantor · Nov 23, 2012

Hi, sorry for the delay. I was out of town. My lathe is not the same model as yours. I'm not sure as I can't see them side-by-side but I think mine is a little bigger. I eyeballed from the center of the chuck to the way with a ruler and read 8.5" so I guess that would make it a 17" swing, and its about 9' long. I won't get around to working on it for a few months; so far all I've done is successfully get it into the garage. There is no model number on it that I can find. apart from the lever tags, the only text on it says "Imperial" and "Made in Italy." Here is a pic:

Came with a 4-jaw and a 3-jaw chuck, and the carriage has a taper attachment built into it. It's missing a gear, the motor windings are burnt up, and has a lot of surface rust on the machined surfaces. Needs a complete overhaul. The tailstock that came with it is not the correct tailstock; it is backwards and 1/2" too short. I will need to make an adaptor plate.

Do you think these Imperial lathes could be worth some money, being as rare as they seem to be?

strantor · Nov 24, 2012

strantor said:
I'm not sure as I can't see them side-by-side but I think mine is a little bigger. I eyeballed from the center of the chuck to the way with a ruler and read 8.5" so I guess that would make it a 17" swing, and its about 9' long.

I measured wrong. it's 16" X 80"

Klamath · Nov 25, 2012

strantor said:
Hi, sorry for the delay. I was out of town. My lathe is not the same model as yours. I'm not sure as I can't see them side-by-side but I think mine is a little bigger. I eyeballed from the center of the chuck to the way with a ruler and read 8.5" so I guess that would make it a 17" swing, and its about 9' long. I won't get around to working on it for a few months; so far all I've done is successfully get it into the garage. There is no model number on it that I can find. apart from the lever tags, the only text on it says "Imperial" and "Made in Italy." Here is a pic:

Came with a 4-jaw and a 3-jaw chuck, and the carriage has a taper attachment built into it. It's missing a gear, the motor windings are burnt up, and has a lot of surface rust on the machined surfaces. Needs a complete overhaul. The tailstock that came with it is not the correct tailstock; it is backwards and 1/2" too short. I will need to make an adaptor plate.

Do you think these Imperial lathes could be worth some money, being as rare as they seem to be?

Yes yours looks like the next size up from mine. Mine is about a 15x80 but I am sure that is really a metric size. Mine didn't have any model number on it either. Have you looked at the ways next to the chuck? If there is a lot of wear you will see a crown on the V way near the chuck and none at the tailstock end. What I did to determine the wear was to set a dial indicator on the carriage and the feeler on the flat way for the tail stock as it will not have a lot of wear on it. Run the carriage from one end to the other and the change in the indicator should be the approximate wear near the chuck.
I think the lathes value is mainly for your own use. From what I have seen it is the well known lathe makes that command the higher prices because parts and information are readily available for people rebuilding these old lathes.
I was looking at a heavy Southbend 13 yesterday and I can say without a doubt these italian lathes are better, heavier built lathes but like we have found out there is no information and they are so rare that finding parts would be very near imposible.
Southbends command good prices and are popular.

strantor · Feb 25, 2013

FYI I found out that the Imperial brand was manufactured by SAFOP. I contacted them about getting some documentation on the Imperials and this is what they said:

Dear Mr. Staton,

Unfortunately we have not the possibility to help you, as we are talking about IMPERIAL and regarding our “old” lathes (everything before 1967) all documentations were destroyed by us during our transfer to our new factory in 2007.

So we are not able to give you any support.

Best regards

Roberto Esposito
Service & Spares Sales Manager
SAFOP S.p.A.
Via Castelfranco Veneto, 65 - Z.I. Comina - 33170 Pordenone, Italy
Tax I.D. and Companies' Register of Pordenone No. 00066280934
VAT code No. IT 00066280934
Phone +39-0434-378.900
Direct +39-0434-378907 – Mobil: +39-338-5904463 - Fax +39-0434-378850
E-mail: [email protected] Website: SAFOP - Macchine Utensili

So unless someone has old papers laying around, finds them, scans them, and uploads them, there is no hope of ever getting any info on these lathes.

Klamath · Feb 25, 2013

strantor said:
FYI I found out that the Imperial brand was manufactured by SAFOP. I contacted them about getting some documentation on the Imperials and this is what they said:

So unless someone has old papers laying around, finds them, scans them, and uploads them, there is no hope of ever getting any info on these lathes.

Thanks for posting this. At least we know who made the Imperial lathe. We can tie the names together to get better search results in information quests. Just curious how did you find out it was SAFOP?

strantor · Feb 25, 2013

Klamath said:
Thanks for posting this. At least we know who made the Imperial lathe. We can tie the names together to get better search results in information quests. Just curious how did you find out it was SAFOP?

I was searching once again for info, and came across an old thread on hobby machinist that I had seen before, but someone had come along and posted pictures of their Imperial and it the SAFOP badge on it. Googled that, and found an Italian machine tool manufacturer and figured that had to be it. They only make giant machine tools these days.

Turbobrat930 · Dec 7, 2018

Strantor,

Do you still have this lathe?? I have the exact same one, and have a few questions.

Imperial brand lathe Italian made?

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