1. Lorch Lathes For Sale

I am posting this here, I did post it in the european toolroom lathe section, but I didnt get many replies, so In view of how old it may be, I will post it here again.I have bought a little lorch lathe recently, and have been spending some time and money setting it up and restoring it. It has a 800mm bed, is 100mm centre height, and is in fairly sweet condition.you can check out my restoration progress at an you can see it is coming along niceley.

I have a few questions though.The spindle bearings are a bit of a mess, one of them is a recycled plumbing fitting. I have planned a manganese bronze replacement, and at the moment I'm having the spindle journal ground parallell again.I wonder how fast a plain bearing spindle should run? My little ww watchmakers lathe (my trade) runs ok at 1500 rpm, for short bursts, with a very similar bearing system. Is this too fast for this one?the spindle has been bored out to maximum size unfortunately, where it once held 12.5mm lorch collets. Ill try to fit a sleeve back inside, eventually.the feed screw nuts are both a bit worn.

They are brass, so i guess the best way will just be to make new ones. It also needs new graduated screws, has anyone any experiece with either of these jobs?I am thinking to fit a 500 w DC motor (36v) with an electronic speed control. I wonder if anyone has done this to a lathe like this? The motor I looked at did 2500 RPM full speed, and I would like to keep the flat belt drive. The pulley ratios are 2:1, 1:1, and 1:2.

I wonder how I can hook this up to work up to 1200 rpm, maybe, and what a good range of speeds may be.Also wonder If anyone knows what model lorch this might be?I am in the process of repainting, as you can see from the pictures, and there are a lot of little jobs along the way, but I am hoping I end up with a machine with a reasonable level of precision when its all done.maybe someone has some ideas?.EMMA.southport, QLD AU. Those Lathe pages are really good!

However I couldn't find this particular model, with the 12.5 mm collets and 25mm nose thread. I think its an AII or AIII but I really am not sure.I love the quality of this Lathe, love the scraping marks in the bed and ways, and love the finish on the castings and parts. I dont think I would have been happy with a mini lathe, as much as some of my friends tryed to talk me out of this 'boat anchor' and to decide on a C1 instead.now its starting to look more like a scientific instrument, I'm kinda glad I didnt!.EMMA. Thanks Gerrit. Spent an hour on your site! A thread chasing attachment would be nice, and a. Etc but I will just get the pieces I already have up and running first.

The close up pictures of the indexing pick are very helpful, as that part is missing on mine.the other links are really good, I only had one of them, My German is very bad, but I can work out what most words are!Jim, Thanks for your post again, I am just getting 3-4 thou taken off the parallel journal before I make a new bush, as the old one has been spinning there with no oil, and is a bit worn.I wonder if anyone knows how the brass nut for the crosslide screw can be removed from the iron casting? The thread is very worn, and it should be a simple job to make another, but I have no idea how to remove it!Thankyou everyone too, for your nice comments.EMMA.Last edited by missemmajade; at 03:10 AM. '.I wonder if anyone knows how the brass nut for the crosslide screw can be removed from the iron casting?' I don't have a Lorch, but on a Hardinge, Derbyshire or Marshall slide rest, the cylindrical bronze feed nut in the bottom slide is just a press fit in its hole in the cast iron.

There should be access to press it out from the top of the piece into which it is pressed.New nuts are solid bits of bar stock with no hole. They are drilled and tapped through guide bushings in the feed screw housing with the two parts of the slide assembled (after re-scraping). That way the screw lines up perfectly with the tapped nut.Larry.

If the old nut is in a blind hole, drill a smaller hole from the other side to fit a pin to press out the nut.' .the other thing that worries me is getting a nice tapped hole for the screw. Is there a special procedure to get it nice and tight on the screw?' First determine the thread diameter and pitch and form. Old American feed screws for lathes of that size are usually square or Acme form. I have never seen a big Lorch, so you will have to tell us what thread it has.

Lorch Lathes For Sale

Second, determine whether the screw is worn badly enough to need replacement. Third, see if you can get a tap the right size. If you have to make a new screw, you can make it to closely fit a gage nut made with your tap.One slide rest I have has a nut that is slit half way through the edge and adjustably clamped with a small machine screw through the slit side.Larry. The screw measures o.3125' OD 18tpi.

Thats close enough to 5/16' unc to me. Making a nut wont be very difficult, ill do as you say and remove the old one, turn a new bushing from something, (what sort of brass or bronze would be best?) then assemble it all and make a bush to drill and tap the hole.I think rescraping the bedways will be more of a challenge than I would like to attempt, and besides all that, I think they are all in really good condition, considering the age of it all.(anyone know exactly HOW old it might be?).EM.

Miss Emma,I don't have a Lorch but I have a number of 7' vintage US precision bench lathes. From your pics, the construction and size is very similar. The bearings appear to be the typical dissimilar metal cone bearings as found in watchmaker lathes.

The bearings ride on a film of oil between the metals in the cone. The 'thrust bearing' is the bearing adjustment.

Before I would do any grinding or anything else to those bearings I would first clean them, oil properly and adjust then try them out. You may be pleasantly surprised. They may look scored but function very well. If they still don't turn properly I would try relapping the bearings before you do anything else. Get some 'timesavers' lapping compound (don't use regular lapping compound) and mix with spindle oil.

Be sure to get the timesavers that is compatible with the bearing materials. Put the oil and compound slurry in the bearings. Start turning the lathe and slowly adjusting the bearings tighter. DO NOT USE the drive belt to turn the lathe as you may 'egg' the bearings. I use an electric hand drill with a shaft and universal chucked in a collet to drive the bearing concentric.

Check the bearings and continue the process until the bearings turn true. Clean out the slurry and oil. It really takes a lot of abuse to destroy this type of bearing.Here is the way to adjust the bearings:Spindle speeds for average work - about 1000-1200rpm. For light work you can loosen the bearings and easily go to 1800- 2000rpmJoe. Hi Emma,Good luck on your project.

Of the two bearings, as you know, the rear one is not as critical as the front bearing so you should have good sucess on your restoration.I use the Bench lathes for clockbuilding. I think you will find your larger Lorch much more adaptable to clock and model work than the watchmakers lathe.The Spindle speed recommendation (1000rpm) was from original Stark Lathe lierature.

The biggest deterent to higher speeds is vibration and of course bearing heat. All my motors are mounted on a masonry wall with the countershafts on the ceiling joists.

Only a very light belt tension for the higher speeds.Regards,Joe. Hi Emma,Good luck on your project. Of the two bearings, as you know, the rear one is not as critical as the front bearing so you should have good sucess on your restoration.Thanks Joe. I needed to hear that today in particular. I feel a lot better now A local machiine shop is quoting on a new one, so it might be all together very soon.

I use the little one for poclet watch work, this one will probably just get a few tool making jobs for a start. Love it to be as accurate as my WW.John, Ill look out some bronze for the bush, thanks too.EM. Miss E, I am worried by your report that the slide rest feed screw is 5/16-18 UNC. Is there an index dial with graduations on that screw? There is no way to make 18 TPI work with an index dial.

If your slide rest has an index dial, you can judge from the number of divisions whether the 18 TPI feed screw is a replacement.In your picture , I can see no division marks where the index dials should be. But it looks like there are knurled parts with locking screws in the place where index dials should be. Running a lathe slide rest without an index dial on the feed screw is a very unpleasant task.

My first metal lathe, in 1954, had 24 TPI feed screws with no dials, so I know about this. It was a wonderful thing when I replaced that 'learning lathe' with a real one after my circumstances allowed. If it were mine, I would fit your slide rest with a new feed screw and nut with either 1 mm lead or 20 TPI pitch and make dials with 100 or 50 divisions.It would be normal for the screw on a German lathe to be M8x1 and the index to have 100 divisions, each equal to.01 mm. On an American lathe like the Hardinge Cataract, the screw is 5/16-10 square thread and the index would also have 100 divisions, each equal to.001 inch.

If a 5/16 feed screw had a vee thread, it would probably be 5/16-20 and the index would have 50 divisions, each equal to.001 inch.Larry.