South Bend lathe oil

I have a machine shop near by that uses only 20 weight non detergent oil in their lathes. They will sell me a quart for my 1936 15inch South Bend lathe. Can I use that oil in all of my lathe, spindle, apron, ways, everywhere. Or are there places I should not use it.? Thank you very much for the help. Fred

May be a little heavy for the spindle , and a little light for the ways , but better than nothing til you get the right stuff .
There's a sticky up above with oiling recommendations .

Link : http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/south-bend-lathes/south-bend-recommended-lubricants-238033/

Hi Fred, I'm not sure what S.B. recommended for those spindles so I won't comment on it, my SB's are '55-'57 vintage with wick oilers. I use Mobil Velocite or aws32 (10w hydraulic) For the "ways" you need a lube with tacky, high surface tension,and EP (extreme pressure) qualities. Use the Mobil Vactra Way oil. 20W won't do the job here. I use to use TRC(texas refinery corp) 140 EP on my ways because I had it and bought it by the keg for hypoid gear use.It worked excellent but was a smelly alternative.
For the screws (lead,crossfeed and compound) and gears 20W non-D is fine. I use aws-68 hydraulic which is a 20w non-D non-foaming oil that works excellent. Again, I use it because I have it in a drum for other use. They don't sell it by the quart. You can buy quarts 20W non-Detergent at most bigger auto parts stores, especially in rural areas. Here's another tip for the gear tooth faces..I use a couple drops of 50Wsynthetic Roadranger lube, it sticks to the gear teeth and doesn't fly off like 20W. A Singer sewing machine makes more noise than my lathes,and their friction surfaces are well protected.The Roadranger lube(it doesn't have to be Roadranger brand,Shell and Chevron are excellent) you'll have to try and buy at a truck dealership or repair shop.
I'm sure some of the SB die hards will chime in. I,personally, can say "this is what works" ! There have been great advances in lubrication since 1936. You can't/shouldn't always go by the SB manual (they haven't built a real lathe in a long time). PB

O.k. guys. That is just the information I was looking for. Thank you very much. Fred

Most auto part stores will stock some straight weight non-detergent (ND) motor oils. Tractor supply will stock 40W ND, the only in place in town that I could find it. NAPA has 30W ND in stock normally.

I am sure it is not the right kind for my lathe, milling machine, or power hacksaw but they are old and half clapped out. They leak the oil everywhere so I just use one of those two oils in everything. If the 30W comes out a little bit to fast I put in the 40W. It is cheap and available locally. It has worked well for years on a hobby level use. I am sure if the machines were new and had tighter tolerances this thick oil would not get to where it needed to, but for the old machine with everything loose it seems to flow everywhere.

I bought an oil pack of A,B,C, and Way oil for my 9" SBL from here:

Mick Finch
bluechipmachineshop.com

Good communication and fast shipping. Found him on this site.

RGalyon said:

I bought an oil pack of A,B,C, and Way oil for my 9" SBL from here:

Mick Finch
bluechipmachineshop.com

Good communication and fast shipping. Found him on this site.

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I just ordered those the other day. All of the oiling charts only show three kinds of oil and "C" is used on the ways, so what is in that fourth bottle. I didn't buy the "A, B, C Way oil" pack from him before, I bought the double pack of the "A and C" oils but it didn't come with a type "B". One pack he sells doesn't have all of the oils and one pack has too many. I brought that up to him last time and he refunded my money and told me to keep the oil. He's really the only person to get smaller quantities from. I think it would be great to get a CO-OP together and just buy 3 big barrels of it straight from Mobil.

The oiling chart for my heavy 10 shows 4 oils, A, B, C, Way. Velocite 10 for spindle and apron, B (ISO 32) for gear box, C (ISO 68) for about everything else except the way oil for the ways. One gallon containers can be had from Enco.
Bobby

BobbyBailey said:

The oiling chart for my heavy 10 shows 4 oils, A, B, C, Way. Velocite 10 for spindle and apron, B (ISO 32) for gear box, C (ISO 68) for about everything else except the way oil for the ways. One gallon containers can be had from Enco.
Bobby

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Ditto! You'd be surprised how fast you can go through a gallon of way, A, B, or C type oils. Well worth getting the gallons.

-Ron

Well, I'm looking at Chart 6503 printed by South Bend and it only has 3 types of oils listed as well as the teflon grease for the back gears. It says that the bed ways get oiled with type "C" daily. According to the chart, the 3 types of oils are:
"A" Velocite oil 10
"B" Vactra oil light
"C" Vactra oil heavy medium

There are many combinations / recipes that work just fine if you cannot easily get the factory specified lubricants. Many people have their own concoctions that they have been using since the beginning of time with no problems. (myself included) And some folks on here think it is total heiresy if you don't use EXACTLY what the factory called for.

Keep in mind that in a pinch, ANYTHING beats the hell out of nothing at all! !

For the spindle, QC box, and apron gears I use 5W-20, synthetic if available.
For the ways, leadscrew, half nuts, and open gears (banjo gears) I use a mix of 75% 90W gear oil and 25% + STP.

I use these concoctions because they get the job done, I've been using them somewhere close to forever, and I can get the ingredients at the local auto parts store 1/2 mile away.

I'll probably get flamed for this post, but what the hay...............

Come on, JR, rip me a new one......................

Frank

kd0afk, I too am looking at SB chart #6503, dated 10/67. On it there is a chart in the upper rt. corner like you said, but in print below it there is listed SB Way oil and a part number. Also at the middle bottom of the lathe pic showing the oiling points, there is a note about Way oil pointed at the lathe ways.
It's possible you have a different dated chart.
Bobby

Here's the lubrication chart I use:

http://www.wswells.com/partslist/lubrication_chart_6503.pdf

The section on the left of page two shows:

Here is the chart I use. It's for 9" lathes.
I guess they feel that the 10" and up lathes require a different type of oil for the bed ways but for the 9", type "C" oil is used on the bed ways.

kd0afk said:

Here is the chart I use. It's for 9" lathes.
I guess they feel that the 10" and up lathes require a different type of oil for the bed ways but for the 9", type "C" oil is used on the bed ways.
View attachment 80624

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That chart says it is a "recreation" of a SB chart, and it has been changed to more accurately reflect the lathe.

Wonder what else they changed?

I don't know. I guess I will use the way oil for the bed ways and dovetails and the rest according to the chart.

the recommended oils, and their placement was not changed.

What was changed:

1: Some gearboxes only came with one oil cup, an extra oil cup was added to the gearbox for the newer models.

2: some lathes came with oil holes drilled in the apron gear shafts. these holes were added to the apron.

3: the original only had 1 oil hole for the half-nuts, on some models the location of that whole was moved. I added a whole to depict that change.

4: On the original the upper right-hand picture was of a different lathe. I change this picture to one that closer resembles the lathe in question.

5: on the original the lower right-hand picture did not show both oil/grease points. I selected a picture that showed the back gear oiling point and placed a screw where the cone pulley oiling point should be.

the original document only showed three oils " A, B and C ", along with one type of Greece. Type " C " was used as the way oil. preferably way oil should be used instead, but that's not how the original document read, Or at least none of the documents that I have found.

all oiling points and the respective oil type should be correct according to South Bend documents.

if you find the problem with the chart please let me know and I will correct it.


PS, the disclaimer at the bottom of the chart was meant to tell people that this was not a South Bend lathe document. and as such I hold all rights to its distribution. I posted it on Steve Wells site for all to use for their own purposes for free. However no one has the right to sell it on eBay or anywhere else. I have found it being sold on eBay one time, and after notification the seller remove the item quickly. if I had wanted someone to make money off of it, that someone would be me. the document is unique enough that I can tell if I made it are not, even if you remove the disclaimer which he did.

If you wish to create your own version of this document, please feel free to do so. spend the time looking through all the documents collect all the information you need along with all the pictures, like I did. It took several months to find the information and all the pictures that are used. Just make it so unique that I can tell that it is not my work.

Stay safe and have fun.
Joe.

Joe, The SB document I have and referenced is an original for a 10L and is dated 10/67. It shows A, B, C, Way, and the teflon grease. if you would like a copy I could scan and email.
Bobby

BobbyBailey said:

Joe, The SB document I have and referenced is an original for a 10L and is dated 10/67. It shows A, B, C, Way, and the teflon grease. if you would like a copy I could scan and email.
Bobby

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The document in question was for the 9 Model A. If you had read the previous post you would know that.
I probably have the document that you refer to as well Along with any other document that I could get my hands on that might tell me what South Bend recommended. I collected them when I was doing research to make the Oil charts. Unfortunately most of the information was barely readable and it took me a long time to find a readable document that I could reference from. When I started I still had a 9C, and wanted it just for my own use. but it turned out so well I decided to make it available to the group and any other South Bend lathe owner that wanted it. nowadays there are several good readable documents available on the web. And it would not be difficult to find the information.

if you can scan the document with a good quality resolution, offer it to Steve Wells to post on his site. That is as long as it is in the public domain.

stay safe and have fun.
Joe.

promacjoe said:

The document in question was for the 9 Model A. If you had read the previous post you would know that.
stay safe and have fun.
Joe.

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Actually the document in question was SB # 6503. Like you said, read the previous post. This is not to take away from any work you have done. It was stated that # 6503 did not list certain oils, I simply said I have an original that does.
Bobby