It pays to talk - proud owner of a Box-ford Model "A" Lathe

[75Plus]

Another method would be to use some "Oil Dry" or what ever it is called at your location. It is used to soak up the oil spots from concrete. Most auto supply shops stock it.

Joe

[Darren]

I use sand for that 


But maybe not for the machines eh .... 

[andyf]

Getting away from powdered remedies, a nailbrush and Swarfega or some other brand of cleaning gel for oily paws is often good for getting the gunge off. Aldi sells a gel in clear plastic pots which are useful for storing nuts, bolts etc. The top is wide enough to get your hand inside to pick the item you want .

Andy

[Darren]

And I've been throwing the empty tubs away .... 

Thanks for the tip 

[raynerd]

I'Ve been using the lathe on and off for 6 months now in the poor state that it came but have now set aside some time to restore and fix it up. I'll post pics later but I've managed to strip it down and some things are full, and I mean full of black swarf ridden gunky greace. Big items like the saddle casting and tiny items. I feel they need a good scrub but don't want to spoil anything!! What is the best way to remove this thick gooey crud? 

[kwackers]

Solvent and a stiff brush. White spirit, paraffin, diesel - anything that's not too aggressive. Petrol may work - but not in your basement (plus it might soften the paint).

Watch out for shims/washers and bits that are glued in place with the crap falling out, an exploded diagram is handy.
Whilst it's in bits check all the bits that run together for wear etc, now's a good time to make replacement bushes etc and fit new grub screws.

[raynerd]

Yea, I heard petrol would work but I`ll go with white spirits. Good idea regarding checking bits that are currently "stuck" in position so I know where they come from if they do fall out. Sadly I can`t find any exploded diagrams but I`m taking pictures for reference!!

[raynerd]

After 6 months now using the Boxford, I`ve decided along with advice of friends that I`m going to stick with this lathe and for that reason I`m investing the next few weeks in refurbishing it to a former glory. I`ve not much money to spend on it but all it should cost me is some paint and the rest is only a case of time and effot, maybe some materials that I`ll already have in stock for re-bushing and such.

Here is the lathe when I first got it and it is pretty much unchanged up to now:


Here is saddle/ carriage removed and full of swarf filled black oil.... aka gunk!


Few more various bits removed as well as change wheels and motor bracket and motor.


Just the headstock left on the bed with the gearbox. It is hard work getting the head off. I`m going to need to make some sort of bent spanner to give me enough lever between the bed! The head has to come off to reveal the screws holding on the gear box.


Old motor is at the top with the newer blue Brook Crompton 3/4hp 3 phase motor that is a perfect replacement! I had a boxford shaper and this 3 phase motor came off it. Luckly I kept it as it is now going to be perfect to install with an inverter to give me variable speed! If you look back at the photos of the headstock you can see the crude on off switch and reverse fitted in a terrible position with bad wiring. This three phase motor will allow me to have vari speed and a neat control box for the unit.


New 3 phase motor detail plate.


So the headstock and gearbox off next once I sort out a suitable spanner!

[sportandmiah]

Very nice find friend!

[raynerd]

Thanks, I`ve just spent a good few hours last night cleaning up the saddle with paraffin. Looks great now.

I`m going to prep it ready for painting and then I`ll move onto the headstock.

Thanks for your comment.

Chris

[raynerd]

Just a quick update. Sadly I`ve no detailed photos of the saddle before I stripped it down but hopefully you can appreciate how dirty it was with 50 years and no clean I expect!

Parts in a bucket after just being cleaned in paraffin.


Rebuilt - just to check I could remember!!


And stripped again for sanding


Then repainted light grey -  does it look too like undercoat ?? Sorry, the pic isn`t too detailed with a little bit too much in the background but they were still wet to move and it was the only place dust free!


Any opinions on colour before I go any further? I`m not sure....does light grey look a little too like an undercoat and unfinished!?

[John Hill]

Light gray is a great colour for machine tools!  It will only look like undercoat if it is matt texture.

[raynerd]

Nice one..thanks for that vote of confidence. I know what you mean about it matt and no this is gloss - just me being paranoid!

[raynerd]

As you can see, I`ve stripped off the old single phase motor and all that nasty painted buttons and bell wire hooking up the motor  . Rather than rewire it, I`m going to replace it with a 3 phase motor and inverter to give me variable speed control and a fresh wiring for the lathe which needed doing anyway! Luckly I had a 3 phase motor from a Boxford shaper which is a direct replacement.

Much of the info I put on wiring up this motor has been in this thread: http://madmodder.net/index.php?topic=3420.0

Considering this is now going back onto the Boxford, I`ve reverted back to here...maybe I should have kept it all in here?! 

Anyway, I wired the motor to Delta and when the inverter arrived from Gavin off homeworkshop, I was chuffed with the condition of it but shocked when I found the pendant was just parts and you needed to put them together yourself. OK OK, maybe I`m being greedy but I was kind of expecting it to be built and although a simple circuit, I can imagine some could be a little confused by the build, let alone having the equipment. Anyway, enough on that. I connected it all up which took several hours...I know I know ...I didn`t want to blow it up!  Oh and of course I had to go to maplin to get a nice green start button 

Why the hell I choose to video this I don`t know...I think we have all seen a variable speed motor running but here you go! For your viewing pleasure, in HD and in 3D!! With extra loud volume!

The only thing I dislike is when you change from rev to fwd, when you make that selection the motor starts. You can then stop and start using the correct button but again when you stop the motor and go to change direction, it kicks the motor back up in the new direction.

Next I`m better get it installed on the lathe!

 

[John Swift]

Hi Craynerd ,
                   I have had a look at the jaguar vxs info , after watching  your video ,( had been redirected from your 3 phase motor thread )

  
if you change the existing toggle swich with a three position swich wired to select both forward and reverse in the centre possition
would the motor still run when you change direction  ???

I could not find the maximum current available from the controller
if you needed some extra control logic

[raynerd]

Hi John

Yes, I thought about this and I think your correct. The current wiring of the control is shown below:




I think that i I take the Brown P24 wire through one of the switches to give on/off and  take the wire from this switch to the centre of a 3 way switch and connect the white(Fwd) and the orange (Rev) to the other two terminals. This will then apparently give me a separate on/off and fwd/rev control.
That is the advice I`ve been given, but I`m not 100% clear how to do this and what it means!?!?

[John Swift]

Hi Creynerd
                you added your reply while i was adding another simpler mod  ,I hope it helps
edit - just added an alternative jog circuit
edit 2  - one more circuit with some component values this time

[raynerd]

Fitting Thrust Bearings to the Boxford
The current state of the cross slide and compound slide:



Cross slide:


The gap/play in the cross slide. This closes if you pull it back but of course the play is there.


The first two pictures show the lead screw of the cross slide removed, and notice the gap. The whole section slides back and forth and as you can see, when you slide it the other way the gap appears on the other side - pics 1 and 2.




The graduated dial has a huge screw and locks directly onto the leadscrew, there is no collar that fits under the graduate dial - so this isn`t a friction type. The little collar you can see  locks and holds everything (i.e whats in picture 1 and 2) in place. It is the position of this collar which is giving me this play as it this collar which is allowing the section shown in the 2 pictures above to move left and right (left towards the lead screw and then right, it gets stopped by the collar) 

But you can`t push the collar up any further against the back of the graduated dial (left in the picture) to remove the slack. Infact, looking at the picture, you can see the shoulder on the back of the grad dial and the grub screw sticking up, you can`t get in there to tighten the grub screw with the collar upto that section. It must be right how it is as a wider collar wouldn`t allow the grad dial front and back to close on itself




After posting on the Boxford Yahoo groups I found that my lathe is likely to be an original first version Model A which never had provisions for thrust bearings. If I`m going to go to the trouble of getting rid of this play, I may as well fit the bearings.

So the two thrust surfaces will be here between the grad dials:




And here, between the fixed column and the lead screw :


I was talking to Rob who had made his own thrust bearings and while trawling the internet, I came across these on ebay:


10mm bore, 18mm OD and 5mm Width, £5 for 4 – they seemed perfect!

I put one directly onto the lead screw where it butts up with the column but needed to take the 5mm off the column for the lead screw to still align with the cross power feed gearings.





I then slid one between the column and the moving face of the graduated dial. I got rid of the retaining ring/collar and machined the grad dial so there was a tiny gap between the two faces of the grad dial when the thrust bearings were between. I then machined a little off the end of the leadscrew and also added a washer so that the handle now locks everything tight on the leadscrew. The front grad dial can still move because of the slick motion of the thrust bearings so the collar is not needed.

Works a treat, super slick and very little play/movement, just the play in the nut (almost nothing) and I`m now 100% happy with the setup. I have two spare Thurst bearings but the compound slide feels just fine without and little play so I`m inclined to leave that axis for now unless I get time or feel inclined to do it in the future – it was only the cross slide that was annoying me and now fixed!.

[rleete]

Looking good.  I like the color - looks "industrial".

Now get some lube on those parts before you get any rust!  I use white lithium, but I'm sure someone will chime in with other suggestions.

[No1_sonuk]

Nice.

Having re-read much of the thread, I thought I'd answer one of your questions from the very beginning - the end mills:

I regularly make a part that requires an internal hole with a shoulder.  I drill as far as I can with an ordinary drill bit, then rather than using a boring bar, I use an end mill of the correct size in a tail stock collet holder to finish-drill the flat-bottomed hole.

[John Stevenson]

I think I need a manual, what else is on here that I don`t know about??  

Chris

Have you joined the Yahoo Boxford Forum ?
loads of help in the files section.

John s.

[RichardShute]

Chris,
Have you sorted or resolved your inverter issues?

I've recently been messing with inverters quite a lot and from what you described above, it might be much simpler to change the green start switch to a momentary type, add a momentary Off button (preferably red and needs to be N/C contacts) and re-configure the inverter for what they describe as '3 wire control' (change just one parameter in the software) - it's presently set to '2 wire control'. Can't remember off hand which the parameter is, but it's in the I/O section.

That way, any Off signal will be treated as the equivalent of a no-volt release and the motor will not start again until the inverter gets another start signal (either For or Rev) and the machine will behave like a 'normal' machine. If you were to do that, you would not need any diodes or other additional electonics or logic gates etc.

Richard

[raynerd]

Richard - thanks for the advice but yes I have!

I had an issue tonight and was hoping someone could help. I had my lathe running for about 5 minutes and randomly touched the pully shaft bushes, the hole area around where the pully shaft was mounted was really hot - too hot to touch. Is this right?? I can`t say that I`ve ever felt it before so I wouldn`t know. I wonder perhaps if the pully from the motor to the speed pully is a little too tight. It is at the end of the motor screw bolts so I`d have to drill new holes to release some of the tension....could this be the reason or is it OK being hot?

Chris

[kwackers]

Shouldn't be that hot. Presumably you've checked they're not binding and have greased them? I'd imagine the belts would have to be pretty tight to get it to run that hot!

Presumably there are two belts? If so the tension should be 'balanced' between them, don't know about this case but usually you can slacken off the pulley and it'll 'sort itself out' before re-tightening it.

[raynerd]

Thanks for the reply Kwackers. They are moving freely and are not binding - if I remove the belts completely then they turn just fine. I have greased them but noticed last night the greace also went black very quickly. Yes - two belts and that is interesting what you said, I wouldn`t say they are balanced, the belt between the motor shaft and change pully is tighter than the one between the change pully and the lathe. The motor is bolted down as close to the change pully as possible which is making the belt very tight. I`ll put it off tonight and re-drill it so I can slacken off the belt and see how that runs. It is the only reason I can think of, but I wouldn`t have considered it overly tight.

Chris