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Once you have used a DRO equipped lathe you'll be amazed how much easier and faster your work will be. I added one to my lathe in 1976 and haven't been without one since. No more mental mathematic gymnastics, counting dial revolutions, worrying about does this lathe cut 1:1 or 2:1. Get the DRO you won't regret it and will wonder how you ever got along without it. My DRO of choice has always been Southwest Industry's TRAK, you owe it to yourself to check it out. Feel free to PM me if you have any further questions, I am a Gunsmith/Toolmaker with 40+ years of experience.

Sharpie marker is the best for threading.

So your carriage is moving towards the headstock and you have a Sharpie mark on the ways? Now as far as the cross slide and compound, I start both at (0).
Please! Somebody tell me how to use the Sharpie to know when to disengage the half nut.

I do it just the opposite. I back my compound out so as to have enough travel to do the thread then set the cross slide to 0. And then bring the compound in until bit touches. That way I just have to come back to zero. Either way works I have thread hundreds of shafts and barrels on my 1945 14 x 7 South Bend this way. Depends on how you where taught.

A DRO just shows you your position in big, red letters to 4 decimal points instead of a tiny hash mark on a dial.

It's the difference between fixed sights and a 10 power scope.

Question though, how do you set both the cross slide and compound to zero, with the tool touching the part? Do you have adjustable dials? Or are you loosening the tool in the toolholder and moving it to the correct position?

My dials are adjustable. I just loosen a set screw and spin the dial to zero- same thing on the tailstock and main screw.

That makes sense then. The dials are not adjustable on my old South Bend, hence the sharpie mark.

Butch, that sounds like a sweet setup on that Monarch lathe. Does yours have capability to instantly reverse the chuck? I saw a neat video of a threading tool on a horizontal pivot, so it could be reversed back through the threads without moving the cross slide, the tool just lifted up to ride on top in reverse. The lathe in the video was set up to instantly reverse at the end of the threads, don't know what it was though.

Found a Clausing Colchester 13x36 early 60's close by. It's been sitting inside mostly unused for over five years.

Dirty and greasy but no rust. It's a 440VAC 3 phase 5hp machine.
Thoughts?

[quote=Spanokopitas]
A smart 6 year old could have figured that out in a second, but it took me until age 51 to figure out how to make a 3 phase motor go into reverse.

Found a Clausing Colchester 13x36 early 60's close by. It's been sitting inside mostly unused for over five years.

Dirty and greasy but no rust. It's a 440VAC 3 phase 5hp machine. Has a full set of collets but no collet chuck, three jaw, four jaw chuck, follow and steady rest, QCTP, etc. I haven't clocked it but did put the scope on it and it sounds like an old Singer.

Haven't got a price on it as the owner is out of pocket until who knows when. I do know he inherited it and has no interest in it. He lives many miles away and wants to sell.

So...I'm thinking this might be a "barn find" and I might pick it for cheap. It has never been advertised.

Thoughts?

I bought 5 Summits 10 years back and they have proven to be unbreakable. Have 10th and 11th graders that can tear up an anvil with a feather using them.

FYI: I have a Grizzly 12x36 that I bought brand new. It is a Model 1001.

My big bitch with it is that it was in some respects like the one that someone pictured. To go from the "high" range of speeds to the "low" range of speeds you had to pull the end cover off, remove a bolt, and turn a gear over about the size of a small dinner plate, and then engage a quadrant gear differently. Too much of a PIA for me. I was very disappointed.
Think: Drill a big hole, drill a little hole. Face something big, and then get it down to 3 inches. A PIA....

My correction to this was to buy a phase converter, a 3 phase motor, and put a different pulley on the input shaft. I can now run it dead slow to thread. Before this it's slowest speed was something like 70 RPM. I hated to do coarse threads on it. I now do wrinkle paint stock jobs at about 4RPMs, and fly rod guides the same way.

My first lathe, was a 12x36 Atlas. I bought it new, and figured out how to set it up myself. I had never run a lathe until I bought it. I taught myself threading, setups, etc., by reading books and figuring things out. If I'd started at 70RPM learning to cut threads rather than 28 I'd still be down there busting things up. I had read books for years, and thought a lot.

My lathe is essentially the cheapest Grizzly Gunsmith's lathe with enhancements. They put a switch on the apron, and lengthened the bed to 40 inches. If you are looking at the cheapest of the Grizzly gunsmithing lathes you might check some of these things out. I got a taper attachment with mine and would want one.

I also wish I presently had a milling attachment. I am getting to the point where old age and poverty is preventing me from doing more work. I chamber through the headstock mostly, and would mount a good floating reamer holder in that. If you had a DRO you could also use it then to move your carriage back-and- forth to add and gauge any chambering depth. You would still want to use your depth mike against your headspace gauges, but it would make things much quicker. You would still have to watch for flex, deflection, work hardening, etc. Experience with YOUR equipment would teach you that if you weren't too dumb to learn from it.

I might have missed something in my thoughts, but I am certain that someone here will square me away. Oh, I also use one of Greg Tannels' muzzle flushers when I chamber through the headstock. I use a Bald Eagle floating holder. I got mine from the guy who invented it, about the time he did so.

Just brainstorming for you. Hope it helps. Hope others pitch in that have experience. If I suffered some type of brain lock forgive me.

I started with books, a few brains, and common sense. I learned a lot along the way.

Bought the Clausing-Colchester 13x36 for $1,200. It is a working machine with the usual accessories and a complete set of collets but the collet chuck is missing. Anyone have one? It was built in 1960. It is filthy and greasy but no rust and the ways seem good.

rather than a glass scale. ..

I have bought, fixed, sold a number of old American lathes for gunsmithing.

I have paid for a number of old American mills for gunsmithing.

The current marketplace of supply and demand makes old lathes for gunsmithing as impractical as everyone using 1950s cars like Cuba.

An old lathe on today's market is a poor investment for gunsmithing.

But the marketplace for used American mills for gunsmithing is like buying 5 year old American cars for commuting.

A used American mill surplused by industry, for gunsmithing is very competitive with buying a new Chinese mill.

This is the kind of thing some people cannot understand.
"But I got a good one!"

"Did you go to Vegas and tripled your money, too? Are you telling everyone to go to Vegas?"

A good piece of equipment when it comes to collets is the collet check manufactured by Bison (Polish), it looks like a lathe check and mounts on the spindle nose of the lathe. Collets are loosened/tightened with a chuck key just like a 3 jaw chuck. Bison brand is reasonably priced and there are knock offs sold by the catalog suppliers, I have seen them on sale for $99.00. You need to purchase a back plate to match the type of spindle nose of your lathe but it is stall a cost effective accessory to give your lathe collet capability.