The Home Machinist!

I purchased this old style Chinese-built lathe a few years back and have only now built a bench and started to look at cleaning it up and getting it running. From the name plate it's a model C0630 and was built in 1977. It appears to be of solid construction and quite nicely engineered (unlike the modern stuff), and similar to one I used 35 odd years ago when I was a young fellow. This and the attractive price were why I bought it.

It's got a few issues though and I would be pleased if I could find someone with knowledge of this particular unit that could advise me as to how I can deal with them.

Firstly, its missing the cover that goes over the gear train so I'd like to make a replacement but can't find any pictures whatsoever on google to act as a guide. Secondly, I'd like to repaint it but it there are bubbles on the main gearbox housing that I suspect are caused by oil seeping out through porosity in the casting. What's more, there appears to be a fairly thick filler coat under the paint and, whilst I can touch this up elsewhere, if it's oil that's caused the bubbling then it will need stripping back and sealing.

Lastly (at this stage anyway), there's damage to various parts including the hand-wheels (I think the one on the cross carriage is non-original) from being dragged out of the factory where it was originally located. I'd like to know how I should go about straightening these, or alternatively, where I might source suitable replacement parts.

I've attached some photo's which hopefully might prompt some feedback.

Cheers
Gavin
New Zealand

Its a SinoMech C0630 bench lathe, rebadged under several names. 300x550mm or roughly 11.5"x20". Looks to have a built in gearbox oil pressure lubricator, which is nice. The headstock looks to have changed slightly in 40-some years, but still seems to be made today (yours looks to be the original, not newer B version). Unfortunately, there is another C0630 Chinese lathe of different manufacture as well... just to confuse things. I don;t immediately see a manual for it, but its probably out there somewhere.

The leaking could be porosity, or cracks, or hidden screw holes from production, or just spots where coolant/oil was left for a while and got behind the paint. No doubt, after casting it was covered with a bondo-like material and sanded smooth, somewhere between paper-thin (a good casting) and gobs of the stuff (bad). The paint is over the top of that. The gear train cover looks to just be a basic rectangular sheetmetal box. If you can find a manual you could probably derive basic dimensions from the drawings.

http://www.sinomech.com.sg/machinery_eq ... 002_45.htm
http://olx.com.pk/item/used-lathe-machi ... STCV3.html
http://sj-mc.com/en/Product-93.html

Yes I found the SinoMech info, and assumed it was just a local importer badge engineering the product for sale in Singapore. Unfortunately that was all I could find other than the unrelated item you mention. Thanks for your comments. Hopefully there is someone out there who has first hand experience of the older version like mine.

Gave up on Google and tried some other search engines. Bing brought up a few images, but found some really good ones via AOL at http://bbs.5imx.com/bbs/forum.php?mod=v ... tid=607789

Hi Gavin, I tried but found the C0630 is not the same in local forum as the picture shows, maybe you can visit http://www.diychina.com to get more information.

Such nice levers and knobs, on a Chinese lathe.

sam_canton wrote:Hi Gavin, I tried but found the C0630 is not the same in local forum as the picture shows, maybe you can visit http://www.diychina.com to get more information.

Hi Sam. Thanks for the reference, but that site doesn't seem to be operational at present. Did you have a look at the photos at the other link I added? Using translator it looks like that machine has been refurbished at a technical institute?? I would be really keen to know if I can get parts for my machine - the main one being the cover under the gearbox levers that includes a label showing settings. I can make a new cover, but not the label.

Cheers
Gavin

Hi Gavin. You can try the link http://www.diychina.org, the servicer is in TW. I will try to more pictures later, the lathe is quite popular in the forum. Good luck.

I really got some pictures including major parts list and a repairing process as below,
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... orid=10356
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... light=0630
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... light=0630
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... light=0630
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... light=0630
http://www.diychina.org/forum.php?mod=v ... light=0630

The only one issue is that if you can find anybody can translate Chinese for you, maybe you can use Google translate...

Thank you Sam, you have been most helpful. I will take a look at these tonight. Chrome has a very good translate system, but if I get confused I might ask for your help to clarify.

GOOD DAY
CAN ANYONE HELP ME WITH A PHOTO OF THE THREAD CHARTS ON A SINOTECH CO 630 CHINESE LATHE
THANKS
DEREK
SOUTH AFRICA

Don't ask me why I think it was made in Taiwan.