10EE Oil leak

I am new to this discussion board and have read through the Monarch archives with great interest. It contains a wealth of information.

I have recently taken delivery on a 1953 10EE MG / square dial. The lathe is used, caked up with cutting oil, but does not appear to be abused. I will work on establishing accuracy levels shortly. While doing my post delivery check out, I noticed the change gear box was low on oil and the chip tray had some oil in it. At that time I attributed the chip tray oil to the drain down of cutting oil from previous use.I replenished the oil level to the sight glass level and cleaned out the oil in the chip tray but I have now found the oil seeping out in the front area of the lead screw / feed screw. It is not leaking around the shafts where they exit the gear box. Is there a gasket or seal in the gear cover ? I have tightened the visible screws. The manual that came with the machine illustrates shafts / gears etc. but shows no detail of casting, covers or attachment methods of key enclosures. Is there a more detailed manual of the total machine construction available ? Any suggestions as to what may be necessary to correct the leak ? Any help would be appreciated.

Looking at a sectional drawing it looks like there might be a seal - EE-3900 on both the upper and lower shafts. You could give Monarch a call and see what they say, talk to Dave Krinkie.

I have had the garbox apart once a couple of years ago, as far as I remember there is a regular paper gasket under the lid holding the two output shaft bearings. I think you may have to take the complete gearbox out to get at the problem. Use the occation to clean out old goo (mine had 1/2" of sediment) and go over the bearings.

Regards, Ole

My 1956 WiaD square dial machine has several oil leaks also. It leaks around the sight glasses and from the gearbox also. I'd describe the flow as a seepage. Is this worh fixing or am I better off topping up the gear cases periodically?
Thanks for any advice.
Steve

Hi Steve,
<chuckle> What 10EE doesn't leak! Mine has the same problem as yours. And I'm 99% certain (can't remember positively) that if you remove the sight glass there is no gasket behind it. I suspect you could put a little RTV back there or gasket sealant and it would work fine. I just ignore the problem (actually, my 10EE is in storage right now, but that is a different story).

A bigger question is how you remove the accumulated crud inside the sight gage. I'm wondering if an ultrasonic cleaner wouldn't work.... Any tricks people have employed? The sight has small holes in the back, so getting a Q-tip in there isn't possible, and over time the oil has either discolored the platic/glass (permanent) or varnished it... Maybe a solvent is the solution?

Alan

The sight glasses are actually fairly complex - from the front to the back there's the glass/frame, then a cork gasket, then the sight, then another cork gasket. The gaskets are pretty cheap from Monarch, so when I was ordering new wipers I got new gaskets all around.

Cleaning is pretty easy - I use a cleaner called "Oil Eaters". It's an enzyme based cleaner that really does a number on old oil. I'd simply pull the cover (sometimes taking some effort to work out of the body with a couple of pins in the screw holes) then pull the sight using an allen wrench inserted through one of the flow holes. Since I have a spare sight I'd clean out the old gasket with a putty knife and put everything back together after soaking and cleaning the window - at a decent temperature the cleaning took only a couple of seconds.

I'd do one, then clean the sight and repaint it with fuel-proof model paint. I think I did all but the backgear sight in a couple of weeks, and none of them leak a bit. Since rebuilding my backgear and putting new gaskets in there I don't have any problem with the backgear leaking.

At this point the only real oil problem I have is that the front spindle bearing leaks to the main housing, slowing draining over time, and the main housing overflows. One of these days I will have to pull the head off and figure out why the overflow isn't dumping into the bed of the lathe like it should (likely got crimped sometime and just needs to be replaced, I just don't look forward to taking it apart).

On each leadscrew/rod output spigot flange,
there is a oil drain hole. May be painted
over and plugged. The output spigots have a
steel seal for the shafts and a paper one for
flanges. Oil flung from gears to splash on the output bearings work past a worn steel
seal and run out the holes. Kinda designed
to do that, just like the headstock. We
are going to replace those steel seals with
a modern press-in lipped seal. They are a
standard size. The assembly of clean components,correct gaskets and modern sealants,cause no excuse for a leaking EE.