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Graziano sag 14

plunger

Aluminum
Joined
Nov 12, 2010
Location
s africa
I want to buy a heavier lathe than what I have at the moment.There is an sag 14 going for $3800.It is about 100 km from me.
To check a lathe like this what should I look out for ?It does not have a face plate or the steadies.

Not knowing how to operate this lathe I feel a bit vulnerable.Does this lathe have a clutch that can be faulty and how do I check it.I believe this runs in gamet bearings fed by a centrifugal pump of sorts. How do I know if this works .He tells me it is under power running off a vfd.
Does this have an enclosed gearbox that can do all the threads metric and imperial without changing any gears. ?
I dont think he has any spare gears and if I cant turn threads this lathe will be useless to me.
If there is any suggestions on what I should check for I would appreciate it as it is hard in darkest Africa to buy a decent lathe.
 
The feedbox is enclosed. Normally you can do pretty much any thread without swapping gears. A "clutch" machine uses a mechanical clutch to start, stop and reverse the spindle. This is a bonus as whatever motor you power it with doesn't need to be reversed.
Check the feed engage disengage lever on the apron. This can be fussy to work properly when the machine gets worn. But the Sag is a lovely machine to operate. Perhaps you could post a picture of it for us to peruse.
 
Also could someone please explain what a clutch lathe means. How would it differ to say my emco v 13?

It means the motor is not directly connected to the spindle with just belts or gears but somewhere in there is a clutch pack that slips a bit when the spindle is engaged reducing the stresses like when you have a heavy chuck and heavy object in that chuck.

Similar to getting a manual transmission car moving from a stop, you slip the clutch until you get full engagement and direct drive.
The lathe does all this by itself IF the clutch pack is properly adjusted and not worn out. There isn't clutch pedal.
 
Also could someone please explain what a clutch lathe means. How would it differ to say my emco v 13?

Start here:

Archive: lathes.co.uk

Then search PM for threads posted by the several others who have them, have repaired or refurbished them. There are quite a few in the USA & Canada.

There's also a European owner/sharer website with postings in several EU languges.

Good place to look for manuals, parts & such. Whether in English or not a table of lubricansts or an adustment procedure with settings in "numbers" isn't hard to follow..
 
There's a sight window about 3/4" (19mm) dia at the top right hand side of the headstock, that should 'pulsate' when the motor is running. Also if you buy the lathe and connect it up and the window doesn't pulsate you need to swap 2 of the motor leads to reverse the motor direction

When the lathe is turned on the motor runs, and the spindle will spin when you engage the clutches using the lever either on the headstock, or on the carriage. Pull up to go forward, push down to go in reverse. When the lathe is cold and in the lower speeds the chuck may spin slowly due to the clutches dragging. Mine does that, not enough to worry about. Once it's warm the chuck doesn't spin while in neutral.

The long axis ways are covered with a sheet metal shield. Run your fingers under the shield and feel the condition of the part of the ways you can't see. I have seen a SAG14 with badly worn ways that couldn't have had any lube. I'd expect the ways to be in excellent condition.

There's a lube pump on the right hand side of the carriage. A couple of pumps will get oil out onto the ways. If you traverse the carriage left to right there should a good layer of oil. This also applies to the cross slide. If you don't feel any resistance when you pump the lever there probably isn't any oil in the resevoir.

The SAG14 is an outstanding lathe, but not especially heavy duty. If it's in decent shape you will not regret buying it
 
One other not really that obvious consideration is that the chip tray is removable only from the rear of the machine. If you mount it next to a wall you can't remove it for cleaning. You can see from the reference link that Graziano changed this with their later and larger machines to one accessible from the front of the lathe; a much more practical design.

And also not commonly known, with the chip tray removed the machine balances nicely just under the spindle nose and so can be easily lifted and moved by a typical automotive floor jack......IF the chip tray is removed!

Lastly it was fairly easy to retrofit my machine with a 240 volt single phase motor using the existing wiring
should you not have access to 3 phase power.

(Edit) The lathe in the ad photo appears to have a home made chip pan that could be removed from the front of the machine.
 
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One other not really that obvious consideration is that the chip tray is removable only from the rear of the machine. If you mount it next to a wall you can't remove it for cleaning. You can see from the reference link that Graziano changed this with their later and larger machines to one accessible from the front of the lathe; a much more practical design.

And also not commonly known, with the chip tray removed the machine balances nicely just under the spindle nose and so can be easily lifted and moved by a typical automotive floor jack......IF the chip tray is removed!

Lastly it was fairly easy to retrofit my machine with a 240 volt single phase motor using the existing wiring
should you not have access to 3 phase power.

Thats a bit of a bummer.The tray that is.
 
I want to buy a heavier lathe than what I have at the moment.There is an sag 14 going for $3800.It is about 100 km from me.
To check a lathe like this what should I look out for ?It does not have a face plate or the steadies.

Not knowing how to operate this lathe I feel a bit vulnerable.Does this lathe have a clutch that can be faulty and how do I check it.I believe this runs in gamet bearings fed by a centrifugal pump of sorts. How do I know if this works .He tells me it is under power running off a vfd.
Does this have an enclosed gearbox that can do all the threads metric and imperial without changing any gears. ?
I dont think he has any spare gears and if I cant turn threads this lathe will be useless to me.
If there is any suggestions on what I should check for I would appreciate it as it is hard in darkest Africa to buy a decent lathe.

you can check if the pump is working by putting your finger on the oil window on the front of the headstock.( T406 beat me to it since I wrote this!) you should feel a pulse there. as to "all the threads metric and imperial".. well that is a tall order (lol). while it will do a good selection of metric and imperial threads without swapping gears, no it won't do "ALL" threads.

conspicuously and surprisingly, missing .8 MM (and maybe not so surprisingly, as they are pretty small for a lathe this size,.7, .6 MM)from the gearbox, a hack for that is to use 32 TPI for the .8, and 36 TPI for the .7 (that results in an error of .00625 and .0055 if my math is correct.

If you have a maximat V13, a lightweight 13, going to a medium weight 14 is a step up, but you will have to decide if that is worth the money. there are a lot of factors to consider, such as the condition of the Graziano, how much tooling is included, the logistics of the move. if it expands your capabilities in a useful way, it may be well worth it, but not a huge step up.

on lifting it with a jack, yea, figured that out, WITH the pan in by putting a chunk of tree stump between the pan and the underside of the bed.
 
Lathes UK was where I discovered the Graziano as being the one (for me) to obtain. I did finally find one nearby that appeared to be in relatively good condition. I have to admit that I was suckered in by the nice paint job and that there were zero tooling or accessories in the package. The seller had removed the thread chasing dial during his "restoration" but was able to find it at my insistence. It did include a very nice North America phase converter in the final deal.

The seller had done several things that you should be aware of especially since replacement parts are non existent and I have as of yet not seen a SAG of any type being parted out. The lack of tooling and / or steady's, face plates etc. are really not a concern. There are tons of these parts available that can be directly adapted to this lathe. D1-5 main spindle devices are simple to get and steady rests can be adapted to fit the ways.
I found a really nice steady on Ebay and milled it down a bit to fit. What is a concern is my seller pressure washed this machine prior to applying
the attractive makeup that hooked me. This had consequences as water had entered the apron oil reservoir and the friction clutch that controls
the power shaft to the carriage. So first thing is check all three oil reservoirs for water contamination. I was able to discover this quickly and dodge a huge rust issue.

One part or accessory that is really important is the spindle arbor adapter. The Graziano spindle arbor taper is unique to the machine and was
originally supplied with a MT #4 interior taper. Mine did not come with this but I was able to make one due in part to several PM members in this forum especially Peter from Holland ( thanks again Peter! ) . This is not a non starter though as one can be made.

The true strength of this particular machine is the covered ways. What a great feature! You can simply check wear on these machine with your thumb nail as a strong indicator that the afore mentioned carriage lubrication pump was employed. If you do buy this lathe do get the manual that is available online and do visit Tony's Lathes UK web site. Another couple of instructional sites is Tom Lipton's and Adam Booth's YouTube
videos regarding leveling and spindle to tail stock alignment.

If you buy one in decent shape you will not regret it.

Regards,

Chuck
 
What adapter is this that you are talking about. ?Is it similer to the emco morse taper five if you wanted to turn between centers ?Is it an odd ball size taper that will allow a morse taper 4

This would be a step up on my Emco v13 because my emco has a permanent gap which makes the lathe lose an immense amount of rigidity. Its almost hard to believe emco could have got it so wrong. If I machine within 40mm of the chuck I have to wind the longer than normal top slide out so it overhangs by about 60mm.

Either that or the carriage extends over the gap by about 60mm. This is a terrible idea because every time you wind over the gap swarf gets dragged back over the ways and under the inverted vees.

I solved this by making a 60mm spacer on my chinese 3 jaw. It means my 3 jaw rohm is useless because I cant put a spacer on it as the d1 4 is built into the chuck.
This is the lathe in question.
Graziano SAG14 center lathe | Pietermaritzburg | Gumtree Classifieds South Africa | 674193477
 
Thats a bit of a bummer.The tray that is.

I have never found it a problem. I can't see the point of removing the tray anyway, although sliding it out a bit might be useful. I can clean swarf out from the front no problem. Make up a hook from say 6 or 8mm steel and drag the clumps out, scrape out the small stuff with a piece of cardboard.

BTW, the tray is sloped to the rear and has a collector tank for coolant, then a hose into the main coolant tank. So the tray can't be simply pulled out without disconnecting the drain hose.
 
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Yes, the arbor for between centers that fits in the spindle bore is a very good find in these lathes. BTW, in picture 4 or 5 I noticed that the thread chasing dial is not present :(
 
Having a good look I was under the impression the tray was not accessible from the front. I dont even move my emco tray. So it can at least be changed.The tray looks home made.
With regards to the thread chaser,is like any other lathe,if you keep the half nuts closed you are okay.I wonder what the leadscrew is, metric or imperial.
Whats it like single pointing on this lathe,is it a pleasure,does the clutch make it easier or does the clutch have no bearing on it at all.
 
If you use the thread chasing dial, single pointing is no different than with any other lathe. One advantage though, is that you can ease up to a shoulder by lowering the spindle rpm with the clutch. If you just leave the half nut engaged, you can simply reverse the spindle as you approach the thread relief and wind the carriage back to the start of the thread. (Yes you still have to wind the cross slide out to clear the thread while doing this).
 
I want to buy a heavier lathe than what I have at the moment.There is an sag 14 going for $3800.It is about 100 km from me.
To check a lathe like this what should I look out for ?It does not have a face plate or the steadies.

Not knowing how to operate this lathe I feel a bit vulnerable.Does this lathe have a clutch that can be faulty and how do I check it.I believe this runs in gamet bearings fed by a centrifugal pump of sorts. How do I know if this works .He tells me it is under power running off a vfd.
Does this have an enclosed gearbox that can do all the threads metric and imperial without changing any gears. ?
I dont think he has any spare gears and if I cant turn threads this lathe will be useless to me.
If there is any suggestions on what I should check for I would appreciate it as it is hard in darkest Africa to buy a decent lathe.


Plunger,

I have a Sag 14, and have had a look at the photos and will try and answer your questions. Apologies for repeating some points already made by others.

-The mechanical multi-plate clutch is an excellent feature, but the reverse clutch can wear as it is often used to slow the spindle (no brake on these lathes). The clutch is adjustable however. One or two PM members have found broken springs in their clutches.

As a rough guide, lift the clutch lever up for normal rotation, the spindle should pick up speed smartly. At a guess, 2-3 seconds to reach 400 rpm? The same with reverse (clutch lever down).

To check the oil pump, there is a sight/flow glass but it is probably too dirty to see the oil flow. I can't see anything in mine. You could lift the headstock cover I suppose. Take your metric Allen keys, it is easy to lift. There are squirt holes in the pipes directing oil onto certain areas.

Yes, an excellent screw cutting/feed box. The left hand side of the chart shows you all the pitches and TPI you can cut with the standard gears (also shown on the chart). The gears you need are 20T-40T-80T.

I don't really understand what the right side of the chart does (Dia. pitch etc). It shows a different set of gears.

The lathe in the photos looks to be a metric lathe (i.e. metric dials on the cross feed dial etc.) but as far as I know, all Sag 14's have an imperial (3/8"?) leadscrew. So for cutting metric threads you would leave the half-nuts engaged and reverse the lathe. I do this for any thread cutting usually.

As to condition...it looks pretty rough.

Here are a few things I noticed:

-Has been re-painted.
-The carriage handwheel looks incorrect, normally it has a little screw needed to lock/unlock the graduated dial. A useful feature.
When I see replaced parts on the front of a lathe, I wonder if it has been tipped over. Check the apron for cracks as it is an aluminium casting.
-Several levers on the headstock are missing/damaged. No big deal, but why? (Fallen over?)
-Cross slide hand wheel handle has been replaced - see above.
-The compound hand wheel is a huge replacement. Looks a bit odd, maybe it has been used a lot to turn tapers (crowning) on conveyor drums, like the one in the photo?
-The feed/screw cutting chart has been ruined, just like mine. Not a good place to hang the chuck key.
-The three jaw chuck looks quite small, not a bad thing I suppose, but you could also use one a lot larger (expensive). I have a 300mm 3 jaw chuck, which is great, though a bit difficult to slow down.
-The electrical cabinet might have been removed? Normally it is hinged off the rear of the headstock, and sticks up above the headstock.

Missing:
-steadies?
-faceplate
-extra gears?
-spindle sleeve? (not standard, but I have a drawing of it).
-threading dial? Maybe not a big deal if the reverse clutch works well.
-there should be a swarf guard on the carriage hand wheel.

-Coolant pump OK?

This ignores the other important things, e.g.

-Condition of ways. Lube system on these lathes is via a pump on the carriage, the reservoir is not that big and it can fill up with coolant or just left empty... The copper pipes can get damaged and one broken pipe means no oil gets to the other points. This system oils the main ways and the cross slide ways.

-Check tailstock taper for damage/scoring. Try something in the taper if possible.

-Run the lathe through the spindle gears, feed gears etc. You can change feeds while it is running.

-As others have noted, the feed control on the carriage can be a bit dodgy. Up for longitudinal feed, down for cross feed.

It is unlikely you can get any parts, so take care.

In summary: the Graziano Sag 14 is a very good lathe, but if possible, wait for one that has had better care and is not missing so many parts.
 
Here are photos showing most of the Sag 14 accessories.

You can see the spindle adapter that has been mentioned. Personally, I have never used it. When turning between centres, I put a piece of round material in the chuck and turn a centre on it.

BTW, in my previous post, I said the South African lathe looked rough. I should mention that my Sag 14 also looks pretty tired e.g. a lot of missing paint, saddle lube not working, reverse clutch not working, tailstock centre height worn down badly - yet it still works well. However, I knew the lathe well before buying it, it had all the bits, and it was priced to suit (approx. US$500).

These lathes seem to be indestructible, and if you have to work on them, very nicely made. The spindle gear change has been designed by a genius, a single dial which selects 12 speeds and shows you what speed you have selected.

Sag 14 accessories 01.jpg Sag 14 accessories 02.jpg
 
I prefer a couple of honest scratches and dents on a lathe .I prefer a bad original paint job than a new paint job trying to hide things.
What does concern me and which I didnt notice is the compound handle. I actually thought it was a flange or job lying on the ways .It looks like a real botch repair.The tray also doesnt look original and as you pointed out the handle on the gear selection.I havent had a chance to go up as its quite far and Im busy at the moment.

But R55000 is alot of money so I wonder if there is a" universal "fair price guidance for lathes.?I know it depends on area but it may need to be cut down alot.
It also has a 4kw vfd.Would this overide the clever speed selector changewheel or would one set the vfd to 50hz and still use the selector.

On my emco I use both vfd and speed selection for a sweet spot.
 








 
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