New old Weiler

All discussion about lathes including but not limited to: South Bend, Hardinge, Logan, Monarch, Clausing and other HSM lathes, including imports

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tomjaksa
Posts: 22
Joined: Thu Mar 30, 2017 12:11 pm

Re: New old Weiler

Post by tomjaksa »

A little a bit about the work for the lathe....
I work from home building commercial grade salt chlorinators.
The lathe is used to make titanium anodes and spacers. The anode is 28mm i machine two flats and drill a 12mm hole in the end.
So i do not really need super precision. The PVC is cut to size to fit the anode then filled with epoxy.
The spacers i part at 9.2 with a .05 tolerance.

At the moment i use an old Colchester Mk1 which is completely shot. I was desperate at the moment and the guy really took me for a ride.
All ways are worn...gears are worn...tailstock barrel sloppy....etc etc.
I have learned to work around the shortcomings of the lathe to get a good enough result.
i recently acquired a job making hinge sleeves for Nissan on the tailgate of the SUV.
All i have to do is part a 10mm od pipe to within .1mm
I am up to 160 parts per hour. If i only had a lever collet with a bar feed it would be better.
I suppose the fact that the lathe cannot run any higher then 315 RPM also does not help any higher and it sounds like it is gonna fall apart.
The gears are so shot i am thinking of ripping the geartrain out and running it with a belt and a VFD.

So the Weiler already looks like a huge leap forward for me.
I opened the Apron box. No rubbish or filings in the bottom. The gears look great. I do have an oil leak on one of the shafts.
Should i just strip that one or should i just redo them all. I will see how difficult it is to dismantle.
Been rather busy at the moment so not much futher work done.
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Harold_V
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Location: Onalaska, WA USA

Re: New old Weiler

Post by Harold_V »

From your description, I expect the machine will serve nicely.

It might help you to understand my posture in this matter. I spent the majority of my machining for the aero-space and defense industries, and had to uphold critical demands. I have a very slanted view of rusty machines as a result. That doesn't mean everyone must share my views, but they can provide guidance for those who may be facing difficult work.

That said, considering the condition of your present machine, I'm having a hard time with the notion that this one won't be an improvement.

Love to hear a report when you put it to work. Mean time, luck with the cleanup! I can't think of a reason why you should remove the headstock. :wink:

Harold
Wise people talk because they have something to say. Fools talk because they have to say something.
spro
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Location: mid atlantic

Re: New old Weiler

Post by spro »

Same here. BTTT !
spro
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Location: mid atlantic

Re: New old Weiler

Post by spro »

Howzit going with the Weiler ? !
pete
Posts: 2518
Joined: Tue Feb 10, 2009 6:04 am

Re: New old Weiler

Post by pete »

Weiler machine tools are really well thought of. Tony at the Lathes UK website probably has the correct manual. It's a bit buyer beware though. Lately I've seen a few posts on other forums and YouTube that more than a few were not to impressed with what they got since for some manuals a few complained about electrical schematics being missing and how high the prices were for some manuals.

Depends on what precision measuring equipment you now have as to how well you can check the lathe bed. Normaly the tailstock end has almost no wear for the area the carriage slides on. Moving the carriage to that end with the tailstock removed then setting up a .0001" or .002 metric reading dial test indicators finger on the lathe ways just in front of the carriage on the headstock side then slowly traveling the carriage towards the headstock can provide some fairly close numbers. That needs to be done for each way surface of course.

Headstock removal? It depends on the alignment method used for that lathe, what precision measuring equipment you have, how confident you are in what your doing, and how much you know. I see people mentioning doing so on numerous forums trying to fix alignment issues that most likely aren't with the headstock being out of alignment other than very rarely. I'd urge you to Google and find the online PDF of what a Dr. Georg Schlesinger wrote about machine tool tests and alignment first. It should be located at Totally Screwed Machine Shop. His name spelling is correct. Read through that a few times until you fully understand what it's explaining. There's a great deal more to it than most think. And it's far easier to make things worse with some machines that don't automaticaly index the headstock to the correct position than some understand. Many have screw adjustable headstocks that can take a whole lot of trial and error to get them correctly re-aligned. I've no idea what Weiler used though.

While the books mostly about machine tool rebuilding and more than boring to read, if you can swing the price the roughly $100 US for the Conelly book Machine Tool Reconditioning could save you a lot of headaches as well. It details how interelated and critical the alignments are as well as a whole lot you really wouldn't need unless you got into a full rebuild.

So far it looks like the machine is cleaning up nicely though. Since the machine has apparently been outside at some point, then if it were me? I'd drain every area that has an oil sump, flush those out with diesel until the fuel coming out is spotless, refill the oil sumps to the correct fill level with fresh diesel, then run the machine for a minute or two in each gear. That should flush out any hidden contamination and/or water. Drain that and refill with the correct oil. After getting the machine into operation it might not hurt to do another oil change after a number of hrs. Oil is dirt cheap compared to precision bearings and gears that may or may not be even made today.

Since there's really no way to tell about where and how much water got into any area then pulling it apart as much as your comfortable doing is well worth it in my opinion. That tailstock for example. Even if you find no further water damage cleaning out the years of accumulated swarf and garbage and properly relubing will get a bit better working machine and just maybe a bit more accuracy. Rust is a form of carbide and much harder than most or maybe any lathe parts. Without removal it can score up or embed into softer surfaces that are really hard and expensive to repair. The Practical Machinist forums have a couple of sub forums dedicated to European high end toolroom lathes and mills that would be worth checking out as well. Weiler fits into that lathe forum.
spro
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Re: New old Weiler

Post by spro »

Please read above first-good info. For the record; I never said "remove the head stock" I suggested looking into it, which he has done. I would never remove a large headstock unless absolutely necessary, for it is the key register of the whole bed/lathe. Sure if the bed needs regrinding but there is no evidence it needs that. If one looks very closely, its a peach of a find. I do look forward to our next encounter with tomjaksa.
pete
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Joined: Tue Feb 10, 2009 6:04 am

Re: New old Weiler

Post by pete »

Nope I never thought you did Spro. I was just pointing out doing so can involve a lot more than some might think if he decides to go that far. But it does depend on how Weiler designed the headstock attachment.With that water there's no way to be sure it didn't get under the headstock. Over time and with further rusting because you don't know about it then it wouldn't be impossible for that rust growth to slowly cause the headstock to start to get pushed out of it's alignment. Other than splashed cutting oils etc getting in there there's no real good way to add anything to stop rust between the headstock and lathe bed. Some spray lube might be good insurance though.One of the cheap endoscope USB type cameras might also be well worth buying just to check that lathe in areas that can't be well checked any other way without tearing it completely apart. And I think the same as what you've said. I'm pretty sure I could get any lathes headstock back to it's proper alignment if it didn't need grinding or scraping. I'd still have to think long and hard about doing it without a real good reason and proof it was out enough to need it.These Weilers seem to be a lot better made machine than I knew before I did some checking yesterday. So the extra work the OP is doing is well justified. Just from bits and pieces I've picked up South Africa or anywhere in Africa I guess it seems to be very tough to find anything used that's not on the verge of being scrap. And more than expensive to import a new or used machine. This one seems to be a very lucky find even with the rust.
stephenc
Posts: 311
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Location: youngstown ohio

Re: New old Weiler

Post by stephenc »

I was cruising craigslist the other night and found a weiler for sale that looks identical to yours .
The asking price is $6900 us.
spro
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Re: New old Weiler

Post by spro »

I searched all over Ohio and couldn't locate a Weiler. It may have sold 20 minutes ago and I wouldn't know that. Lots of great machines in Ohio if you have the room. The smaller South Bends and Atlas still ask a larger price(relatively) because they are portable.
stephenc
Posts: 311
Joined: Sat Jul 05, 2014 6:13 pm
Location: youngstown ohio

Re: New old Weiler

Post by stephenc »

I had to go look again myself , couldn't find it again either .
And yes there is a whole bunch of old iron here in the rust belt . The monarchs almost always catch my eye even if I don't have the room for the big iron .

And there's a Harrison 10ee clone for $2500 that keeps catching my eye even if I don't have the funds to buy it , a fella can dream though
spro
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Re: New old Weiler

Post by spro »

stephenc
Posts: 311
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Location: youngstown ohio

Re: New old Weiler

Post by stephenc »

That's it , I think those are rebadged clausing / Cholchester machines . ( spelling? )

In my mind I have my shop planned out , in it I have space allocated for two lathes , one will be a precision lathe like the above Harrison , or a real 10ee , or a hardinge hlv
And something in the 13 x 40 range for general purpose use on longer work .

And my apologies to the op for the thread hijack
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