My 36" Pre War Myford Lathe

I bought this lathe many years ago, as a rusting heap of cast iron and cardboard boxes, containing all sorts of bits and pieces. I spent many happy hours cleaning and painting and scraping and all those other dirty and pleasurable things you do do with old and trusty equipment.This lathe has served me well, and will continue to do so, I just have to keep tweaking and adding and repairing.

 Myford Lathe Picture Set on Flickr

I have added a variable speed 3 phase Tesla motor, to the set up, which gives excellent speed control, without losing power. This allows a very flexible speed range, especially when the belt drives are taken into account. It really is so useful to be able to just tweak the knob to increase or decrease speed when taking a cut.

Being able to reverse the chuck with a flick of the switch is great as well.

Safety is improved with this set-up, as the Tesla Unit has a EMERGENCY STOP switch built in.

Tesla Speed Controllers link

I have also added a speed controlled, drive motor for the Lead Screw which allows for easy adjustment when cutting and the ability to flick a switch to reverse the feed screw.The gear option for the Lead Screw is still available for screw cutting etc, but I seldom use the lead screw for this, so having the flexibility of an independently driven Lead Screw is great.

A MINI Mill

My Mini mill, works a treat, has both chuck and collets.

The collets give much more rigid support to the cutting tools.

The drawback is that you have to have imperial and metric collets, so when I can't get a match, I resort to the chuck.

These Mini mills are very effective, and it is surprising the work that can be achieved, and the accuracy that can be obtained, if they are set-up accurately.

The speed controller is good and the power is good at low speed. When I got the mill first, the speed controller failed, but a quick phone call, got me a new board which was easily fitted, and since then it has been fine.

Some people have stripped the gears, there are various solutions for this on the web, apart from just replacing the gears.

Touch wood! my gears are OK at the moment.

Metal Cutting Band Saw

Another invaluable piece of kit, this is the cheapest of the currently available range, but still amazingly good both for price and what it can cut.The original blades didn't last too long, so now I use a multiple tooth pitch blade which enhances the cutting speed and smoothness.

A source for good blades:

Ian John Supplier of Band saw Blades: http://www.tuffsaws.co.uk/

Be careful about the measurements of the blade you require.

Bench Grinder

A bench grinder, no workshop would be complete without one of these versatile machines, go for anything over 500 Watts, anything smaller tends to be a bit underpowered, You need to watch the bearings, and replace them when they get noisy or rough. Bearing replacement is normally quite easy and cheap on these machines. I have a drill sharpening attachment mounted on the bench at the side of the grinder, although I must admit that I often grind my drills by hand. Hand grinding can be surprisingly effective, if done carefully and with a bit of practice.

Bench Drill and Two Linishers

A Bench drill is useful as a drill, or a polishing machine (with a polishing mop in the chuck) or a wire brush.

I've also used the drill as a vertical lathe for wood turning, you need to make a running center plate for that, but it does work.

The perfectionists will throw up their hands in horror, but I've even used a drill as a mill, worked surprisingly well. Probably not good for the bearings, but they are cheap and easy to replace, mine are still fine for the jobs it gets asked to do.

A Large linisher/sander

Great for removing metal, roughing down, and to a certain extent finishing, it all depends on the belts used, it pays to have a selection.

Don't use the fine belts for trying to shift lots of metal, you just wear them out, so the next time you want a small fine job done, your belt is knackered.

A Small Linisher

These are a wonderful tool for shaping those small parts, deburing and general fettling.

On both machines I tend to use the belt more than the Side Disc.

Do take the time to make sure that the side disc Tables are square and secure, so when you do need them, you get an accurate job.

A WORD OF WARNING

If you make or find a HOLE or a TEAR in your Emery belt: SCRAP IT STRAIGHT AWAY - DO NOT USE IT - CUT IN HALF.

If you ignore the above warning you could damage yourself in all sorts of unexpected ways, including losing body parts.

Mini Mill With DRO (Digital Read Out)

DRO (Digital Read out) There are several DROs around in the market at the moment which are fairly easy to fit to a mini mill.

Why would anyone need a DRO? Well no one needs DRO but they can make a lot of milling and drilling functions much easier.

DROs enable you to set out your drilling and your milling to a high degree of accuracy, enable you to drill holes in a square or circular pattern with ease.

There are some in the Model Engineering world that dismiss DROs totally, that is their choice and if they want to do everything the hard way, that is how they enjoy their hobby and good luck to them :-)

I prefer the ease of the DROs and the biggest problem I have is when I use my DROs to do a simple drilling/milling job I still tend to do the job to a higher accuracy than the job requires.