# Domino effects of a new SB Heavy 10 – tooling advice welcomed



## LeakyCanoe (Jun 26, 2014)

First off,  I'm pretty new to metalworking and love this site as I always have been _machinist curious_.  Aside from grinders, and drill presses, my first metal machine foray came with the acquisition of an old Atlas TH48…it had the cast legs to go with it but did not have the countershaft assembly or motor or any tooling whatsoever aside from the chuck that was on it.  After some more initial study as to what kind of a slippery slope I was on I then bought a Logan 200 lathe back in the winter, mainly because it came with a bunch of tooling.  It did have some modest issues and  I was just about to embark on that refurb when a SouthBend Heavy 10 presented itself…Again, some tooling was included but more importantly to me it came with a QC gearbox, taper attachment and a base cabinet with chip pan and undermount drive, etc. which was all an upgrade for me on top of the increased capacity (it is serial # 12815RKL16, which my research shows me to be a mid-1960’s large bore model).  That is how I ended up with 3 metal lathes in 8 months time, much to the chagrin of my fair wife who thinks I am bonkers.

Here are a couple of photos of the new SB in the prior owners shop.  It was running at the time but I had to disassemble it into “bite-sized” chunks to fit into my Montana van for the journey home.  You can see wiring up a new switch and changing out the dodgy wiring that exists will be in my future.  I'll save that thread for another day, however...

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As I was taking it apart after consummating the deal, the owner needed to go to work.  He had told me that he and his brother had bought this lathe along with some other shop equipment a year or 2 back from a local estate sale and that the prior owner used it in his shop to mostly make parts for boats.  The brother took most of the stuff for his purposes and he got this lathe but it had just sat in his garage taking up space.  He had never run it himself and knew little about lathes but his boy had played with it for one afternoon after using one in shop class at school.  That boy is now the owner’s 16 year old son who wants to be a mechanic ( that’s his go-kart frame in the background, and there is a 25 year old beat-up Firebird nearby that is also his and he already has his “_piston with flames_” tattoo...so he’s well on his way).   The son was very nice and expanded for me on the lathe’s history as we tore it down.  I found the provenance very interesting and looked up the former owner when I got home…I tried to attach weblinks about him and his early passing for anyone interested in this as an aside but the site couldn't handle them so I will give them here for you to cut + paste if you wish. 

http://www.ingersolltimes.com/2008/07/29/making-waves

http://www.ingersolltimes.com/2009/10/28/drag-boat-racing-was-mclellans-life

http://www.liquidquik.com/News/2010/Ron.html

_Hmm_ - perhaps he was even a member here back in the day ?    Live large and live for today is the message I take from this.  I am of course proud to now have stewardship of his lathe.

Anyway, history aside, back to the intent of my post here today and I apologize now if this will become a bit of a tome.  I think I’ll keep the SB apart for now while I do more research and get set to refurb it.  First priority I need to do is cull the herd so I am going to re-assemble the Atlas as I had earlier gathered the needed parts needed for it to be complete.  I’ll give it a quick clean up before moving it along to a new owner looking for a lathe of that ilk.  Then, the Logan at some point after it. My Brownie points bank will hopefully be in balance by then with my wife.   Although I have many questions for the brain trust gathered here, and will keep a thread ultimately on the restore of the Heavy 10,  I think I will start this all off with an appeal for help on my tooling decisions. 

**  First off, here’s an inventory of what I have;  * 

*Chucks, chucks galore * >  I have no running lathes so now capacity to check on condition or functionality of any of them currently, aside from the fact that this is all fairly new to me anyway…I do understand that these are not all likely to be diamonds in the rough, and that some may be but mere scrap value, but I would hate to give up something that might be useful for my ultimate keeper lathe ( the SB ).  Anyway here goes…both some pix and basic descriptions follow…

1)   *DC Strong “2256”* – 6.5 inch, 3 jaw chuck with back plate to fit the SB lathe - the extra jaws came with the SB so I assume they go with this chuck but have yet to discern this for sure

2)   *Belco, UK *– 7.5 inch, 3 jaw chuck with back plate to fit the SB lathe

3)   *Skinner # 306 *– 7.75 inch, 3 jaw chuck with no back plate at all

4)   Appears engraved as “*J.M.M*.” – 5 inch, 3 jaw chuck with a back plate that contains  a threaded bore size of 1 and 7/8 inches…this will not fit any of my lathes as is but back plate is detachable 

5)   *Pratt , UK *– 6 inch, 3 jaw chuck with back plate to fit either the Atlas or Logan

6)   *Westco Chuck Co. “ 996” *– 6.5 inch, 3 jaw with back plate to fit either the Atlas or Logan

7)   *Belco, UK *– 4.5 inch, 4 jaw chuck…this fits either the Atlas or Logan and does not appear to be readily adaptable to be switched out to any other size spindle...too bad because it looks like a real nice chuck to me

8)   *The Burhead, UK  *- “863” on jaws – 3 inch, 3 jaw chuck… this fits either the Atlas or Logan and does not appear to be readily adaptable to be switched out to any other size spindle..too bad because again it looks like a nice small chuck to me









** I would welcome all commentary as to what to look at keeping and what to pair up with the Atlas and Logan for those sales ultimately.
*
Next is the *collet decision*…I have a drawtube and a nice assortment of 3A and 3C collets that came with my Logan.  I’d consider keeping all except for several redundant ones if there is a reasonable way to get them to work with my SB Heavy 10, which has the  large threaded spindle  ( 2.25 inches ) but did not come with a drawtube or any collets.  I do understand that this new lathe takes the 5C collets….is there any way of adapting what I have so that they will work or do I need to start off at the beginning in sourcing both a large bore drawtube for this  lathe + all new 5C collets ?  Or, in the alternative is there an adaptor sleeve that will insert into the proper drawtube for my SB lathe and still allow me to use my smaller collets ?




Next is the *cutting tool decision*…across all sources I have a decent selection of tool holders, etc. that are grouped into several sizes, as you can see in the photos below.  There are even a couple of what I believe to be 3M type holders.  I’m sure the SB can run any of them decently enough.  Is there a reason to keep one size over another ?  If I have redundancy and have the same functionality in a tool holder but in different sizes would there be a reason to have both sizes on hand ?  Is it just because the cutter bits come in different stock sizes or is there other matters to consider also ?







Ahead of me lies decisions as to *tool post holders* also, but that can hopefully be pushed off.  I have 3 lantern posts ( including one massive one that doesn’t even seem to fit my SB but came with it…) + a couple of indexing turret style posts as you an see in the photo.  My initial thinking is to just keep what will work best with the SB for now and then make an upgrade down the road as finances allow and my hands-on time with the machine starts to merit this.







My overall thought is to pair up a decent amount of non-useful-to-me-any-longer tooling with both the Atlas and the Logan lathes at the time of re-sale of those machines…I realize I can part all of this out individually piece-by-piece online but I really don’t have the inclination to do that.  On the other hand, if anyone has Heavy 10 tooling or accessories they would be interested in trading or selling, then by all mean please shoot me a private message.  I am based in SW Ontario, Canada but travel frequently to upstate NY and maintain a UPS box in Buffalo that could facilitate the S+H of parts without border hassles.  I’d best keep any new purchases requiring additional outlay modest until I get my tool coffers built up again upon the sale of at least one lathe.

_*      Your collective wisdom on these initial decision matrices would be most welcome*_.  _*Many thanks in advance...*_


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## mattthemuppet2 (Jun 26, 2014)

Cool story, although it's sad to hear about the original owner. 

For chucks, find a piece of round stock and chuck it up in each chuck. Pick the largest chuck that will fit that grips it along the whole of the jaws length. I'd go with the first one, especially as it seems to have the outside jaws too. Stick one decent one on the rest of you're lathes and sell any spares.

Tool holders and posts. Put a set together for your other lathes, make the rest into sets and stick then on eBay. You'll get around $50 a set if it's a complete set, more for rare stuff (knurler, threading tool etc). Sell all the tool posts.

Collets are tricky. If it were me, I'd keep a complete set with the Logan, as this will help it's resale value. Sell the spares. Then make an ER32 or 40 chuck as your first large project 

With all the cash you have you can the buy a quick change to post and holders, a 7-8 in 4 jaw and a set of collets

BTW, the first pictures didn't show


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## LeakyCanoe (Jun 26, 2014)

thanks - that's an interesting approach that I'll need to digest.

Yeah, not sure what happened to the SB Heavy 10 shots the first go round...here they are hopefully.


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## mattthemuppet2 (Jun 27, 2014)

crikey, that's a solid lathe!

I guess you need to figure out a couple of things - what you need to use your new lathe and what you need to include with your other lathes to get a good price without a lot of hassle. Everything else is just taking up space if it isn't going to get used  I've no beef with the old style Armstrong holders - if that works for you and you like the period look, go for it. Otherwise a QCTP and a bunch of holders is going to make life that little easier. Same for the collets. No reason why you can't adapt them to the SB, but it'll be a cludge and you'll most likely be limited by the max collet size (which was dictated by the smaller bore of the Logan) plus you'll need to use a drawbar which will reduce the pass through diameter even more. A 5C collet set and chuck or drawbar would be the way to go to get the most out of your lathe.

Besides, I thought it was an unwritten rule that anyone buying an old lathe had to spend at least a couple of years making tooling for the lathe?!


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## LeakyCanoe (Jun 27, 2014)

Thanks again MTM for the weigh-in.  All advice is most welcomed.  :thinking:

One thing I do know is that I hate buying junk...I'd rather have the pain just once and help save the planet in the process.  I'll need to research QCTP's down the road but I know the good stuff ( Aloris for eg. ) is at a steep entry price for hobbyists...I also know that I'll be p.o.'d something fierce at myself if I go cheap on tooling and am not happy with it. Same goes with collets, chucks, etc., etc. - If I stick with the vintage domestic or UK brand stuff I know I won't be let down on quality.  That's kinda how I ended up with the lathes I have now instead of just going into a new machine tool shop & buying something Chiwanese. 

I hear ya on the possibility of trying to cobble my existing collets to work and the limitations of that...I've done a bit more reading and see that 5C collets are reasonably plentiful and so I'll likely look to dispose of my smaller ones and start afresh.  I might just keep a set of toolholders ( still struggling with the _same tool but different size_ issue..more research can likely help me get my head around that though ) and match-up the functional tool posts with their lathes and move forward, deferring the QCTP choice until another day.  As for chuck choices, I thought your advice yesterday was reasonable.  I will likely face listing some of this stuff anyway ( unless a trade opportunity presents itself - _anyone_ ? ) so parting out 10 pieces / lots isn't that different in the PITA department than doing it with 5. 

The worst thing for me would be to sit frozen in the headlights and delay moving out the Atlas and/or Logan longer than needed...after all I hear that I need to get the SB up & running so I can get on with my _old lathe buyers penance_ ( 2 years of making home-made tooling ).  Oops, perhaps that's a bad choice of words because that implies having to do something in exchange for having done something wrong...I now own a SB Heavy 10 - where's the sin in that ?  :whistle:


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## Thoro (Jun 28, 2014)

Keep in mind, which you may already know, don't rush too fast to get rid of ALL of your working lathes.  The beauty of already owning a working lathe, while you go through the process of fixing up a new/old lathe is that in many cases it takes a working lathe to fix a broken lathe!

Very nice lathe you have there.  I'm sure all the tooling questions you have will make themselves apparent soon enough.  You certainly have what you need to get started.

If you find the need for any parts, let me know, I have an entire heavy 10 parts lathe I am going to be parting out soon.  (need the room!)


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## mattthemuppet2 (Jun 28, 2014)

that's a good point Thoro, I hadn't thought of that.

Leaky, good points and I can see where you're coming from not wanting to buy twice. Phase II posts are supposed to be pretty good for less than an Aloris, plus you can pick up used high quality posts off eBay for not too much. It's not like you have to get one straight away anyway. I'd be careful about buying vintage chucks though. Chucks almost count as a consumable, so the older it is the more likely it is to be worn out. A new mid-range chuck (Bison?) might be worth looking in to if you need one.


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