Newb intro and a couple of machines

Howdy from Texas guys,

I am glad I found this forum, it looks chock full of good info. I am looking forward to learning and chatting with y'all. I am a hobby machinist, my trade is engine building so the machining came a bit out of necessity. My familiarities are more towards automotive machining equipment but have done some manual lathe and mill work in the past. Here are a couple of photos of some old machines I have picked up over the years.

The one on the right is a Southbend lathe that appears to be out of the 30's as best I can tell. It was stamped by the War Production Board so it seems it went through WWII at the very least. It has auto-feed and seems to work well enough. It rides on bushings that I oil every now and then.

The one on the left is a Kwik-Way valve grinding machine/tool and die cutter from 1928/29. It came with a lot of attachments, most of which I do not know how to use. I was fortunate to download the last known manual from Kwik-Way's website. It seems to work equally good. I ground some valves on it the other day and the finish was quite nice. I like the old leather belts, it sounds a bit like a sowing machine.


Cheers!

Hello gollygosh,
And welcome.
You state your lathe has 'War Production Board' emblem and so since the WPB did not start until 1942 - then your estimate of age (around 1930's) may be a little early...a WPB emblem dates your lathe pretty specifically into 3-4 years towards end of WW2. Those emblems were put on lathes out of the factory (not pre-WW2 existing lathes). You can more specifically date your lathe with serial number (found at tailstock end of bed on top front way) at this site below (text may hide that it IS a link): SBL Serial Number File

Excellent, thank you!