# Monarch 1944 12" CK



## rabler (Feb 27, 2021)

I'm going to try to start a running history on my project lathes.  First project lathe I bought is a 1944 Monarch 12" CK.  It's actual dimensions are 14x30, Monarch has a history of understating the swing.  I found a Craigslist ad for this machine about 2 years ago, in a town 20 miles away.  It ran, included a Shars quick change tool post with two or three insert holders, drill chuck,  3 and 4 jaw chuck, taper attachment, steady rest.  The whole machine weighs somewhere around 3500 lbs.  Cost me (as I recall) $2200.  Hauled it home on my gooseneck. 

Challenge was that my tractor lift has a capacity of about 3200lbs. I had to partially disassemble it on the trailer to lift it into the shop.  Picture below with the 8' mower deck on the tractor as a counterweight.  Second picture is re-assembled in the shop on a set of pallet jack wheels (design idea from Tom Lipton/OxTools).







Edited to add: Note these pictures date from May and June of 2019.


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## rabler (Feb 27, 2021)

Second step was to deal with electrical.  Monarch offered this model with a 3HP or 5HP  3-phase motor.  Not having any other 3 phase equipment, I wanted to run this on a VFD, and decided to replace the old motor as it's bearings were shot.  I could have replaced the bearings, but I'd read enough about VFD's to feel more comfortable with an inverter rated motor.

I had to fab some spacers as the new motor was a smaller frame.  The original motor was a 1200rpm, and this CK had a top spindle speed of 550rpm.  I did enough research to find that Monarch offered these in something like and 800rpm spindle speed just by shipping a 1800rpm motor, and of course a different speed-gearing placard, so I went with an 1800 RPM motor as my replacement.  The VFD is a Techo L510 model, single phase 220V input.  I put a contactor in front of the VFD, a fan in the box, and originally wired it up to a 4 position switch for the VFD speed input, position 1 for future use with a speed potientometer, 2 for 40Hz giving the same speeds as the 1200rpm motor, 3 for 60Hz giving the rated speed of the motor bumping the top spindle RPM to around 800, and 4 for 80Hz giving 2400rpm or about 1100rpm top spindle speed.  Wiring the 4-way switch that way into two inputs on/off inputs on the VFD requires a diode.  The contactor goes on the line side of the VFD (never on the motor side!) associated with the red/green on-off buttons.  I didn't worry about wiring it in a magnetic switch configuration since the VFD is set to not resume after power loss.

The Monarch factory run/stop push bottons were an interesting arangement.  These buttons are on the front lower right of the quick change gear box.  The buttons push on long rods that go to rocker arms in the back of the machine, which is where the original on/off switch to the original contactor lived.  I replaced this switch with a couple of low voltage momentary contact pushbuttons set up to the VFDs run/stop input.  Note that this model Monarch does not have reverse.  The spindle only turns the normal "forward" direction.  There is a feed reverse lever on the apron that allows feeding left or right (or in/out) or allows for right/left threading.  The feed reverse mechanism has stops so the carriage can be set to stop feeding at a specific point for feeding/threading.  I thought about adding reverse (just basically enabling it in the VFD) but the internal design of the headstock has some gear dogs that are rounded on one side to slip in easier.  That means the dogs won't hold well if the spindle is running in reverse.  At least that is what I read, and opted to not enable reverse.



My fan cutout looks horrible.  Should have used a big hole saw instead of trying to use a jigsaw.  I'll cover it with a screen one day.

This gave me a running machine even though I knew more work was needed.  Much more encouraging for me to so little steps and come back to a running machine than to have a shop full of parts leading up to one big rebuild.


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## rabler (Feb 27, 2021)

After getting the motor and VFD done, it was fun to just push a button and watch it spin.  I certainly like taking things in increments that I can see some results.   I decided the next step was to clean and rebuild the taper attachment.  Keith Rucker had a pretty good video on youtube on rebuiding a Monarch K, and with a very similar taper attachment.  I decided that looked like something I could tackle.  Mine was a completely frozen up.  Took it completely apart and repainted the castings.

I picked up a bunch of new bearings from the local bearing supplyhouse.  Total of 16 small roller bearings.  I also got new brass shim washers (.004) for those bearings from McMaster.  Those bearings are all held by offset (camming) studs, so on reassembly they can all be adjusted to run without gap on the taper slide.



I picked out this paint color online right at the begining of the pandemic.  Sherman Williams was doing curb-service only.  I was shooting for something a little more grey but it came out more blue than I really liked.  I actually sprayed these, but have since gone to prettymuch brush painting everything.



Edited to add: Note these pictures came from May and June of 2020.


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## rabler (Feb 27, 2021)

Next step was to take the apron and carriage off.  Monarchs use an oil pump in the apron that is activated by turning moving the carriage position crank, either manually or by power feed.  That pump uses a felt filter, and a distribution system through a bunch of copper oil lines.  Both the filter and the oil lines are prone to getting plugged up, especially if the system is run dry.    Since that lubricates all of the bearings in the apron as well as the carriage over the bed, and the cross-slide over the ways it is critical that this system be cleaned out.  This was my first "complex" disassembly, where it wasn't clear even looking at the exploded parts diagrams, exactly how things came apart.  I used my cell phone and took pictures of EVERY steps.  Literally hundreds of them.  The really critical pictures were ones where I lined up all the parts on a given shaft to show the order of the bearings, washers, bushings, gears, etc

First picture is the oil pump in the side of the apron




The other useful pictures where ones from literally as many angles as I could get of what everythign looked like before disassembly.  I have seen a suggestion of using a video camera while doing this and that sounds useful, but I wouldn't want to count on it.




Figuring out how to best clean things was a major challenge.  Ultimately the biggest tool in this seems to be elbow grease.  I tried brake cleaner (nasty) "goop" hand cleaner (OK but nothing magic).  I have an ultrasonic cleaner and tried that for smaller parts, they're not very effective for anything other than a fine film.  I got a large parts washer, which is useful if you can heat it.  I bought a livestock bucket heater (jeffers.com), that will heat my parts washer up to above body temp.  These old machines with heavy gunk can load up a parts washer pretty quick, and mine sits in an unheated shed.  Best thing I've found is to use the bucket heater in a 5 gallon pail, let the water get as hot as the heater will go (maybe 110), and use chemical gloves, gel dishwasher soap, a scrub brush, and rags, lots of rinse and repeat.  Many folks recommend acetone or mineral spirits as a final wipe before painting.  Rustoleum spray cans have in the past few years gone from recommending mineral spirits to soap and water.  I've found 99% isopropyl alcohol works quite well, cuts oil easily and drys quickly and I since that's just rubbing alcohol I'm less worried about toxicity, my understanding is acetone is not something you want to get large skin exposure due to organ toxicity(?).

Edited to add: Note these pictures came from late June, 2020.


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## rabler (Feb 27, 2021)

After getting the apron fully disassembled, cleaned, painted and reassembled, I proceeded to do the same with the rest of the carriage.  For the carriage I carefully cleaned out all of the oil passageways which lubricate the ways as well as the cross slide.  Those don't provide lubrication to the compound's ways or to the the compound base where it rotates, so I drilled 1/8" holes for those and installed ball oiler caps to provide lubrication to those areas.  I replaced the thrust bearings on the cross slide leadscrew.  Unfortunately those size thrust bearings are not available, so I made up some small bushings to adapt a close fitting bushing.  No good pictures here unfortunately, as none of those mechanisms where complex enough to need a photo guide for re-assembly.  

When I put the carriage and apron back together and ran the lathe, it was pretty clear that the quick change gear box was making some obnoxious noises  So that was next on the clean and disassemble list.  I'd already taken the cover and face plate off once as part of removing the apron, getting the lead screw reverse rod out is a complex process.  

One thing to say in all of this is that Monarch loves to put things together with taper pins.  These are industry standard (you can get them through McMaster).  Taper means 1/4" per foot.  That taper is hard to detect across a 2" pin when it is driven through a bushing, and a little mushrooming from previously being hammered in/out can total obscure which is the larger end.  Several place Monarch uses both a set screw and taper pins.  This appears to be in places where the set screw was probably used to get the alignment correct before hand drilling the taper pin holes.  Since the taper pin holes are hand drilled, they are NOT interchangeable.  So the spindle speed levers (which need to come out to get the QCGB off) have both setscrews and taper pins, and these levers are not interchangeable even though they look identical otherwise.  It's possible to rearrange things until you get a fit, but a few discrete marks with a carbide scriber are helpful.  Also, Monarch is fond of using a locking set screw on top of a set screw.  When digging through greasy parts these things can be easy to miss and more than once I was baffled why something wouldn't come apart until realizing this.





The quick change gear box was a real challenge is dissassemble.  I relied heavily on posts on some other forums, and several youtube series, Keith Rucker & Machining360 in particular have some good series on older Monarchs.  They are fairly similar in design across the different models in the 40's and 50's, so it isn't critical to find an exact match.  The CKs, CKKs, CYs, CW's, K's, and early series 60's even use many of the same parts diagrams, at least the diagrams I received from Monarch.

I'm certainly glad I went through that gearbox, it was a mess and many of the bearings were in bad shape, as well as several bronze bushings.  Here's what the backside of the gearbox looks like after coming off the lathe:




Lots to be learned about how these lathes work while doing all this.  For one thing, while they look from the outside like they are fairly closed up, both the apron and the gearbox are not sealed and have fairly large areas where chips can get into the works (especially with the help of an air gun).  For the gear box, the only oil comes from the two cups on top of the gearbox, which really do need to be filled with a shot of oil every day the lathe is going to be used.  Also, the tumbler (handle on front of the gearbox under the feed/threading selection chart) needs to be in the leftmost position when oil is put into those cups, or it will not get oiled.  

The quick change gear box was quite challenging to get apart, and contains a lot of bearings.  Between the taper attachment, apron, gearbox, and end gears I probably have $1000 in bearings, as well as a lot of shop-made bronze bushings.  I probably could have gotten away with not replacing some of the bearings but as complicated as these things are to disassemble and reassemble it was not something I wanted to redo.


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## Janderso (Feb 27, 2021)

Looks like you are doing a bang up job.
Please continue to share your progress.


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## rabler (Feb 28, 2021)

Janderso said:


> Looks like you are doing a bang up job.
> Please continue to share your progress.


Thanks!  The encouragement helps keep the posts coming.


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## rabler (Feb 28, 2021)

After getting the gearbox rebuilt, it was time to make the lathe look somewhat nicer.  I spent quite a bit of time cleaning and painting.  While I started out using a compressor and paint gun, I soon decided that a brush was going to give me a finish that was good enough for my standards.  In part that was due to size, things I could disassemble were easy enough to take outside for spraying, but a small densely packed shop was not conducive to spraying. 

I used Sherwin Williams industrial alkyd enamel, which is only available here through one of their commercial/industrial stores.  Many of the earlier smaller parts I stripped completely using various paint strippers.  The later parts I settled for cleaning extensively and then using a wire wheel on anything that looked like loose or flaky paint or exposed casting.  After the wire wheel treatment I hit anything glossy with 120 grit sandpaper, just hand sanding lightly, to scuff the surface for a good bond.

After the first coat of paint, I put a little glazing putty in any areas that looked severely mottled, like where the original paint had been chipped, and sanded that smooth.

Industrial enamel dries slowly, especially the darker colors. I found that two days in cooler weather (shop heated to 60 plus an infrared lamp) is needed to dry to the point of being handleable.  And really several weeks before you want to expose it to solvents or oil (including cutting oil or water soluble coolant oil).

In this process I cleaned the flushed the headstock. The first challenge was getting the cover off as it had been sealed down with RTV. I used a bunch of utility knife blades, driven under the cover, as wedges to get it loose.  I’m really hoping to avoid having to disassemble the headstock.  In many ways it shouldn’t be more complicated than the qcgb, just a bigger scale. It did need a good flush inside.  ‘Unfortunately it is difficult to clean in there as it is fairly compact. Later,  In working on my 10EE, I discovered a very useful approach.  A 1 gallon garden sprayer filled with diesel fuel can be pumped up and used to flush things.  Basically a super-sized version of spraying everything with wd-40.  First thought might be that the diesel would soon ruin these cheap sprayers but I’ve left one partially full of diesel for months and still works.


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## rabler (Feb 28, 2021)

Here is a picture of the CK in the paint process.  This was as of July 6, 2020.
:


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## rabler (Mar 1, 2021)

To paint the bottom casting and chip pan, I got my gantry over the thing and lifted the headstock and bed off the support casting that holds the motor.  While it was off I also put some gaskets around the bolts that hold that together through the chip pan, as that was leaking oil.

Hosting the lathe, after manhandling the headstock casting off, and using the crane to hoist the carriage and apron off and on got me thinking about adding a backsplash, jib crane, etc.  I decide that setting the lathe on top of a frame of steel 2x2 square tube, with that frame extending a bit out the back of the lathe, would make a good base for the jib crane, and give a place to secure a backsplash.   So I built that up.  I got carried away and actually used taper bearings in the pivot for the jib mast.  The vertical is 3" round x 3/16" DOM tube, with another piece of 2x2 square tube as the horizontal.  The center through the pivot is 1.25" OD x .75" ID 4130 tube, threaded top and bottom so it comes apart.  While the electric hoist is rated at 440 lbs, I wouldn't want to put more than about 200lbs load on this, that was just the smallest hoist I found.  The hoist is on rollers to it can run in/out on the jib.


You can see in this picture that it's getting close to being back together.  The apron rod support on the tailstock end is missing.  Tailstock needs work.  Etc. 

When I powered it up after this to test it, and made a few cuts, I decided I to add a few things.  Once was a control panel above the headstock wired back to the VFD.  The other was a good DRO (DRO Pros).  Test running also decided I needed to do a little work on the clutch (replace some small springs basically), and replace the bearings under the end-gear banjo.  After replacing those bearings I still didn't like the noises from that end.  A little experimenting with touching the gear hubs while it was running led me to realize I hadn't properly set the backlash on the end-gear banjo after re-assembling the headstock, it was too tight and the gears were rattling.  The bearings had definitely needed replacing, but getting the backlash set right made for a really nice smooth running lathe. 



The top left yellow light just indicates the power is on through the main contactor to the VFD.   The buttons along the bottom are e-stop, stop, and run.  E-stop and stop are both NO switches wired in parrallel to the VFD, I just prefer not to have to turn the e-stop reset after pushing stop.  The LCD in the middle is a cheap voltmeter I got off Amazon, measures DC volts from ~3v to 24V in 1/10 volt increments.  It is powered by the voltage it is measuring, so the display dims out and dies just under 3V.  I wired this to the VFD analog output and programmed that output for percent max power.  The way it is configured, 7.5 on the display means rated HP (3HP) load on the motor, 10 would be 4HP.  10.0V is the max output on the VFD analog scale.  Not critical but it gives me an idea of how much load I'm putting on the motor and VFD.

The dial is a potentiometer connected to the VFDs speed input.  To use that potentiometer, I have to set the dial on the back control box to the #1 setting.  Instead I have been leaving it set to 3 for 60Hz, and shifting gears.  I'm not pushing the VFD/motor combination for a large speed range, 40 - 80 Hz, whether I use the rotary knob in back or the potentiometer.

At some point I'd like to add a hall effect RPM sensor, will just have to cut another hole in this panel.


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## mattthemuppet2 (Mar 1, 2021)

that jib crane is really sweet, that'll make your life so much easier. Keep up with the rebuild updates - I love reading them and they give me inspiration to keep plugging away about my South Bend.


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## rabler (Mar 2, 2021)

I cleaned and painted the steady rest, and have cleaned and painted but not completely reassembled the tailstock.  The quill and bore on the tailstock are in pretty rough shape.  I'm going to put it back together for now, and just use it, but it really needs to fixed.  I'm thinking about boring out the tailstock and then lapping it smooth, and turning a new slightly oversize quill.   That will be an undertaking that I'm not ready to dive into.  I also need to address the wear in the carriage slides.  The bed looks to be in pretty good shape but the carriage has quite a bit of slop in it, so cutting while traveling left cuts significantly deeper than while cutting with the carriage traveling to the right.   That makes sense if you think about the rack for the carriage being on the apron.  I'm planning on using moglice on the carriage, which will be a new experience for me. To do that I need to mill out the carriage V grooves by somewhere around .050, as moglice is not suppose to be thinner than about .030 and the oil grooves need to be cut into it.



I have made new felt wipers for the carriage, but it is missing one of the metal wiper holders.  And the large wiper holder on the tailstock needs to be made for the headstock face of the tailstock.   You can see a little bit of brass in the chuck here.  I just made a few brass plugs for the oil ports in the tailstock.

The older machines are probably going to be a bit oily.  The gearbox, for example, has an open bottom so oil drips into the bearings from the oil cups on top, and then out into oil pan.    I also have a gasket on the headstock end that is leaking pretty badly.  You can see the kitty litter absorbant on the floor at the left front corner of the lathe.  I'll need to drain the headstock again to deal with that.   The headstock drain is on the back side of the headstock, behind my electrical panel for the VFD.  For this reason I put an elbow, ball valve, and barbed hose connector on there.  Seemed like overkill when I was cleaning the headstock initially, but now I'm glad I did that.

I also need to re-level the lathe.  But I'm at a point with it that I'm now using it regularly and am ready to set aside (i.e., make more room in the shop) the little 10x22 Grizzly I started turning with a few years ago.


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## rabler (Mar 2, 2021)

mattthemuppet2 said:


> that jib crane is really sweet, that'll make your life so much easier. Keep up with the rebuild updates - I love reading them and they give me inspiration to keep plugging away about my South Bend.


For me, rebuilding the machines is a great way to appreciate how they work, the limitations, and how to get the best use out of them.  Once I've gone through everything like this, using it becomes a lot more intuitive.  And more fun, because I take a lot of satisfaction out of knowing I contributed to fixing it up.   My grandfather was a machinist, and this is the era of machine he would have used.  And damn, I know when I'm done I'll have a machine that would have cost at least $10k to buy new.  Of course I'd guess I have at least $5k in fixing this up, new motor and VFD, bearings, paint, metal for the crane, chucks, etc.  I'm enjoying it though, and that's what matters.


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## mattthemuppet2 (Mar 2, 2021)

that's awesome. For sure there's no better way to know a machine than by having taken it to pieces and successfully put it back together again!


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## Watchwatch (Mar 3, 2021)

Stan at BarZ posted the receipt for his Monarch. IIRC, it was over $5k in 1950. You could buy a Cadillac or a nice starter home in those days for that kind of money.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## rabler (Mar 3, 2021)

Watchwatch said:


> Stan at BarZ posted the receipt for his Monarch. IIRC, it was over $5k in 1950. You could buy a Cadillac or a nice starter home in those days for that kind of money.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Maybe what I was trying to say wasn't clear.  I meant that I'll have less than $10k in cost _not counting my time, _and have a machine that is significantly better than any lathe I could buy new today for $10k.  But yeah, these things were not cheap when new.

You could certainly argue that my time is worth something.  And you can also argue that people should not expect to learn skills for free, so I'm writing my time off against what I've learned in the process.  I don't foresee buying machines to fix up and resell, honestly I doubt I could break even on my actual costs not counting my time if I sold this machine.  Although with three Monarch lathes, that does seem like I have more than I can use all at once.


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## rabler (Mar 3, 2021)

Here's the little Grizzly that this is replacing.  Not a bad lathe.  The homemade stand has a substantial beam under the lathe along with bolts set up to level the lathe (the original mount was one bolt at the headstock end and one at the tailstock end which really didn't allow for leveling.  But time for it move out to make room for the other equipment.


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## Ultradog MN (May 7, 2021)

Hi Rabler,
I just got around to reading this thread. It was very interesting and it looks like you are  doing nice, thorough work. I bought that same lathe a couple of months ago. It was built in May of 1942 - about the time of the battle of the Coral Sea. I also have an old milling machine from that era. It was built 4/42 - during the Doolittle raid. (I'm a student of the Pacific War - where a Lot of this machinery was first sent)
You mentioned you bumped up the spindle speed on yours. The one thing I can add to that is mine was factory 1000 rpm spindle speed so I doubt you'll hurt it running it faster.
I have not done much with mine. Replaced the felt wipers and did some cleaning. Need to change oil in the headstock yet. The apron pump is putting plenty of oil to the ways but not sure of other areas yet. I don't plan to tear into it unless I need to.
From looking at other photos of these lathes one thing I have not often seen is a carriage travel indicator which mine has. (Photo) Must have been an option. A fellow I've gotten to know recently here in the Twin Cities also has a 12CK and his does not have that indicator or the feed reversing handle on the carriage that ours has. So that must have been optional as well.
Mine has the 3 hp motor. I built a RPC to power it as my mill is 3 phase too so I can power them both .


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## Janderso (May 7, 2021)

Watchwatch said:


> $5k in 1950. You could buy a Cadillac or a nice starter home in those days for that kind of money.


OK, a starter home in Northern California (North of Sacramento) is probably $250,000 to $325,000. A doghouse in the San Francisco Bay area is over a million.
This is a good illustration of how the times have changed. You can buy a Cadillac for what, $85,000- $95,000?
I can see a lathe made today of the Monarchs pedigree around $80-$100,000. Not a 1/4 of a million.


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## Beckerkumm (May 7, 2021)

Thanks for the idea on the vfd.  When I finally finish the vfd conversion of the 1024, I need to finish up the 60/61 and was dreading the wiring.  My motor is 1800 and the top speed is 700 rpm.  Monarch used the same bearings for the 1000 top speed machines so I think I will swap a pulley and use a vfd.  Your colors turned out way better than mine but they are here to stay.  I clear coated the enamel with Spraymax auto paint that even acetone won't touch so I'll live with the mistake.


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## rabler (May 7, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> Thanks for the idea on the vfd.  When I finally finish the vfd conversion of the 1024, I need to finish up the 60/61 and was dreading the wiring.  My motor is 1800 and the top speed is 700 rpm.  Monarch used the same bearings for the 1000 top speed machines so I think I will swap a pulley and use a vfd.  Your colors turned out way better than mine but they are here to stay.  I clear coated the enamel with Spraymax auto paint that even acetone won't touch so I'll live with the mistake.



Cleaned up and well cared for isn't a mistake.   
I really like the Monarch 61's and would consider them the ideal large home shop lathe.   Obviously if you swap out the pulley for higher RPM, you do loose some torque.  But that may not even be noticeable for most general purpose work, only if you are trying to remove metal by the pound, as those machines were originally intended for.

How do you like the clear coat?  I've thought of doing some sort of clear  coat on mine.  How fast did the clear coat set up?


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## rabler (May 7, 2021)

Ultradog MN said:


> Hi Rabler,
> I just got around to reading this thread. It was very interesting and it looks like you are  doing nice, thorough work. I bought that same lathe a couple of months ago. It was built in May of 1942 - about the time of the battle of the Coral Sea. I also have an old milling machine from that era. It was built 4/42 - during the Doolittle raid. (I'm a student of the Pacific War - where a Lot of this machinery was first sent)
> You mentioned you bumped up the spindle speed on yours. The one thing I can add to that is mine was factory 1000 rpm spindle speed so I doubt you'll hurt it running it faster.
> I have not done much with mine. Replaced the felt wipers and did some cleaning. Need to change oil in the headstock yet. The apron pump is putting plenty of oil to the ways but not sure of other areas yet. I don't plan to tear into it unless I need to.
> ...


I saw somewhere, maybe on PM?  that you'd picked up a 12CK.  I read that they were available in 1000RPM.  I can run mine to a max of about 1100RPM with the setup I have, although rarely do I feel the need for more than 800.  I'd heard someone say that it they were available up to 1000RPM spindle but had never seen a gear shift plate from one that was set up that way.  Thanks for posting yours.  The travel indicator is neat, but I've mounted a DRO on mine so it wouldn't add anything.  Just interesting to see the options on these.

What year is the the other 12CK?  I had thought the feed reversing handle was standard base on the vintagemachinery.org publications I've seen, but obviously I'm wrong.


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## Beckerkumm (May 7, 2021)

The Monarch has a 10 hp motor so I'm not giving up anything but the ability to hurt myself less.

I don't remember how long the Spraymax took to set up.  I was in tax season so on Sunday I'd pop the can for the two part, spray enough to use up the can and get the hell out of Dodge until the next Sunday.  I know the S-W industrial enamel under it dried in a few hours to the touch but didn't really harden up weeks.  I had the store charge up about 20 cans of the stuff so I could spray piece by piece as I never have more than a couple hours at a crack to work on anything.  Dave


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## rabler (May 7, 2021)

A bit of trivia on using a VFD.  In the picture here you can see the switch that selects 0, 1, 2, 3.  I've got that wired up to two inputs on the VFD, so that in position "0" it uses the poteniometer to select between 40 to 80Hz.   In position "1" it runs the VFD at 40Hz.  in position "2" it runs the VFD at 60Hz, and in position "3" it runs the motor at 80Hz.   That gives a (approximate) RPM of 1200, 1800, or 2400 RPM at the motor, for 1x, 1.5x, and 2x the spindle speeds on the headstock dataplate.   I almost never bother with the poteniometer.  This machine has a clutch/brake mechanism, with two different handles for that to make it very accessible, so it is trivial to stop the spindle and shift gears.


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## rabler (May 7, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> The Monarch has a 10 hp motor so I'm not giving up anything but the ability to hurt myself less.


I know exactly what you mean.  I bought a Monarch 612, it came with a 20HP motor.  I used that 20HP to make an RPC and put in a 10HP.  Still an awful lot of power.   The 612 has three electric motors, four counting the coolant pump, so a VFD there was not a real option.


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## Ultradog MN (May 7, 2021)

I am getting away from playing with old Ford tractors and getting into some home shop machining.
But you always bring a bit of your old hobby with you to a new one. In this case it's the paint.
I've painted about 20 tractors. When I painted my old mill I used tractor and implement enamel. I always use the hardener with it which makes for a tough, shiny finish that will withstand a lot of rain, sun, fuel, oil and general wear and tear. I figured the original castings are so rough that there was no point in doing a first class spray job on it. So I primed and painted it with a good china bristle brush.
With the hardener you have about a 4 hour window to paint and can recoat for up to about 8 hours. I mixed small batches and painted then recoated a few hours later.
With the hardener it is dry enough to handle in 12 hours. My Fords are Blue so that's what the mill got painted. A quart of paint plus a pint of hardener cost about $25-$30 and I could do 3 of these mills for that much.
Also, you don't get any overspray with a brush.
I painted the parts of this in my 7'x11' garage office last winter as time permitted.
No cleanup except for the brush.


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## rabler (Nov 12, 2021)

So I've had quirky issues with the clutch on this machine ever since I got it.  The worst of the issues is that the clutch assembly rattled when the clutch was disengaged.  I've had the clutch apart a few times, a couple just to clean grease off the clutch plate.  The driven pulley has a grease zerk to lubricate the bearing.  Yes, it is grease, there is even a plate on the back of the lathe saying to grease it at some frequency.  I had replaced that bearing originally.  PIA to find, paid dearly for a NOS bearing.

Yesterday I had trouble starting the lathe.  The VFD frequently faulted out with an over current on acceleration message.  I could go in and tweak some VFD parameters, there is a whole slew of 'features' that can be used.  And it's not really drawing more current than it should on acceleration if the VFD's current display is to be believed.    (Note the LED segments in the above picture are also current draw as reported by the VFD through one of the analog outputs).  A little bit of diagnosing and I realized the problem was that the startup was trying to turn the spindle even with the clutch disengaged.  The clutch lever is complicated as one direction engages the clutch the opposite direction engages a cone brake on the spindle.  I worried something was messed up inside the headstock.  My understanding is that isn't easy to dissassemble and reassemble.  I've watched a few YouTube videos on people doing that, Maching360 had a good one although I believe that channel has disappeared.

I decided to work the clutch end first.  Fix the known quirks.
The clutch is basically integrated with the driven pulley, three belts from the motor.  Taking the cover off, the exposed end looks like this:


The spider assembly is pulled in by center rod til it cams over and holds the clutch engaged.  There is a spring loaded pin that registers on the pressure plate ring of holes, that allows the clutch to be adjusted to just enough pressure to cam over and stay locked.  The outer arms of the spider press on the pressure plate.

Here's the pressure plate with the spider removed.  The first of these two pictures is with the center rod from the clutch lever in the engaged position, the second in the disengaged position.  One of the tricks on these clutches is getting the spider on correctly.  It threads onto both the center rod and the large diameter thread on the back plate.   (The nut on the rod above is redundant, but factory design).  The trick is to start the spider threading onto the rod before the center drum.  My spider likes 12 full turns onto the rod before starting it threading onto the drum.  Otherwise the spring, inside the spider, doesn't have enough pressure to hold the clutch disengaged, and it will drag and spin somewhat.




Here's a picture of the pressure plate coming off.  Note that it is held in place only by the spider.  The pressure plate has a slot in the inner hole that is engaged by a dog in the back part of the pressure plate (what would be a flywheel in a car?).  Note the small bright springs behind this plate.  The are often damaged or in part missing on the older monarchs of this design.  I had previously replaced these.  They help push the outer pressure plate off the clutch disc when it is disengaged.



Completely removing the outer pressure plate and the clutch plate, here's the inner pressure plate.  It's held onto the center shaft by two set screws, which each have a locking setscrew on top.  You can clearly see the dog that engages with the outer pressure plate in this picture.  Removing the two setscrews, and the inner pressure plate slides off.   The clutch is completely gone, yet I still noticed here that the pressure plate and pulley wanted to rotate together.  Trying to figure out what could be dragging, that doesn't make sense for anything in the headstock.




I went ahead and removed the large plate that acts as a belt guard too.  Here's a picture of the pulley, belts and motor.  You can see the key that the back pressure plate mated with.  Also one of the dogs in the pulley that engaged the clutch disc.



The drive dogs engage in the clutch disc perimeter.  The disc essentially floats on those dogs, nothing else holds the clutch disc.  Over the 75+ years of this lathe's life those dogs(keys?) take some abuse.    You can see in this picture where they had been hammered away over the years.  About 17 thousands of wear.  That leaves the clutch disc loose and prone to rattle when disengaged.  Obviously when engaged it is clamped between the two pressure plate halves and held pretty well.



I wanted to reduce that play so the disc was less likely to rattle when disengaged.  Adam Booth (aka Abom79 on YouTube) cut new slots in the perimeter of the clutch disc.  I widen mine from .500 to .540, .020 off each side.  And then made new dogs/keys that were stepped, .500" in the pulley side, .540 on the clutch disc side, as widening the inside of the pulley would be a more difficult setup.




I was test fitting the new dogs in the pulley when it occurred to me that the bearing between the pulley and the center shaft was a likely culprit of my drag problems.  Sure enough, spinning the pulley by the belts, I could feel a lot of roughness in that bearing.  The bearing that I'd replaced earlier, as mentioned above.

I pulled the pulley, here you can see the end of the bearing.   It's a 2 5/8" OD x 1 5/8" ID  x 2 3/8" double row needle bearing.  I tried to press the bearing out after removing the retaining rings, ended up with a pile of needles.  Must have not engaged the outer race of the bearing.  The needles don't look very impressive.  Here they are after I picked them up off the floor.  The chips and debris is from the floor, but most of the needles have rust, and some of them are damaged (look near the bottom).  That would explain the rough feeling.  I'm guessing the rust must have been included as a NOS feature.  The exterior of the bearing when installed look fine.


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 12, 2021)

Interesting write up and relevant as I have a 61 with what i believe is a similar if not exact clutch.  not much forgiveness with needle bearings if not seated just right.  Every once in a while I replace an old bearing and find that in time the new one is worse than the old.  Usually self inflicted in my case.  Dave


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## rabler (Nov 12, 2021)

*Clutch Post Mortem*
(or my lathe is broke, and I need a lathe to fix it)

So that particular bearing is hard to find.  Obviously I need a new one.  But I also did some thinking here about why this would fail.
Here's the parts line up:





Note that I got interrupted above and have not trimmed those keys/dogs to length:



Here's the lathe itself, sans clutch and pulley:



One problem I have is that the Monarch parts diagrams, while generally pretty good,  are very unclear around the clutch.  I would guess the clutch, purchased from Edgemont(?), was never drawn out in the typical exploded parts diagram style of the rest of Monarch's diagrams.  It is more a picture of the assembly with some arrows to parts call outs.

The bearing is held on the pulley by two retaining rings (one of which went flying off to the dark corners of my shop).  The inside of the bearing registers on the flange on the lathe.  The outside (clutch side) of the bearing is constrained by the fixed (inner) part of the pressure plate.  There is a spacer there (actually hardened) that would seem to keep the inner race captive against the inner pressure plate.    But that spacer was also worn out enough that it was loose on the shaft, and definitely rattled horribly.  I'm suspicious that rattling and/or wear caused problems with the bearing.

Now I'm left with a problem.  My bearing shop couldn't find that bearing originally, and I had ordered the NOS replacement online (locateballbearings.com).  I'm a little wary of going that route again.  My understanding is that Monarch doesn't have this part and that there is a replacement kit, for $$$.
I'm leaning toward doing a modification myself.  One possibility is two needle bearings of the NA4910, 50x72x22 mm.  That would require boring out the inside of the pulley about .210" (it is currently 2 5/8 = 66.675mm), and making an inner sleeve since the shaft is 41.275 mm.

I'll need to think about this, and the axial registration.  After all, my lathe is now broke, and boring out pulleys and making sleeve sounds like a lathe job.  I may have to put my 612 back together without reworking the cross slide.


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 12, 2021)

What is the bearing number? Dave


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## rabler (Nov 12, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> What is the bearing number? Dave


McGill FRD 1 5/8


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 12, 2021)

I googled clutch bearings and Mcgill and see your problem.  Dave


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## will.mcray (Nov 12, 2021)

Quick tip. When you get your bearing, don’t over pack it grease. Just lightly. If you do, the grease will cause the bearing to drag and the spindle will still spin. Ask me how I know……. I the read it in the manual. Pays to read first. I had to pull it apart and clean out all the grease and start over. Works as should now. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## rabler (Nov 12, 2021)

will.mcray said:


> Quick tip. When you get your bearing, don’t over pack it grease. Just lightly. If you do, the grease will cause the bearing to drag and the spindle will still spin. Ask me how I know……. I the read it in the manual. Pays to read first. I had to pull it apart and clean out all the grease and start over. Works as should now.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Yeah, I've had my clutch apart for that reason.  The grease eventually works its way to the clutch material.  Lesson learned the hard way.


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## rabler (Nov 19, 2021)

Going down the rabbit hole ....

The original bearing was a double row needle bearing.  I haven't been able to find anything of similar size.  McGill makes cageroll bearings that can match the OD or the ID, but they're not cheap.  I'm going to replace the old bearing with two 6909 deep groove roller bearings.   Those bearings are 45mm x 68mm x 12mm, vs the 1.625 x 2.625 x 2.375 (ID, OD, width) of the original bearing.  The metric variation converts to
1.7716" x 2.6771 x  .4724" . 

So I'll need to bore out the pulley/sheeve by .052" on either side, and make a sleeve for the interior.  And make a retaining bushing that properly registers on the inner race of the bearing, to be held in place by a circular retaining ring. 

I started putting the 612 cross slide back together today.  It's going together as a hack so I can turn the parts for the CK.


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## rabler (Nov 19, 2021)

Here’s my doodlings of the clutch bearing mod.  These are all round parts, I’ve jst drawn the top half of a cross section.  Be nice to (re)learn CAD for this as it is just complicated enough to warrant scaled and dimensionally checked drawings.

Poor quality drawings but it has been 40 years since I took drafting. The top sketch is the current dimensions.  The purple part is the driven shaft.  The blue is the back or inner pressure plate.
Red represents the inner diameter of the 3 groove pulley.  The green is the original needle bearing.

I’m replacing a needle bearing with two deep groove ball bearings, 6909’s.  Second sketch.  Two green bearings.  Orange sleeve to hold larger
ID of these bearings.  Pulley turned bored to accommodate larger bearing OD.  Note these bearings spin when the clutch is disengaged, and the pulley is held rotationally to the purple inner shaft when the clutch is engaged (power to spindle).

While the bearings handle primary radial loads (belt tension), they also keep the pulley from moving axially.  Not shown is two retaining clips on the pulley ID.  So in addition to providing the larger diameter the sleeve resists axial shift.


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## extropic (Nov 19, 2021)

@rabler 

I think I understand the sketches, except I'm not certain about the part noted "Build this last, . . .".
Is that part to be retained by the pressure plate and needed to axially load the new inner sleeve/bearings against the existing spindle shoulder.
If otherwise, please elucidate.


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 19, 2021)

Would two 15 degree angular contact bearings and a spacer give some axial as well as radial  load?  The lower the degree the more the bearing acts like a deep groove and less like a thrust bearing.  Dave


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## rabler (Nov 20, 2021)

extropic said:


> @rabler
> 
> I think I understand the sketches, except I'm not certain about the part noted "Build this last, . . .".
> Is that part to be retained by the pressure plate and needed to axially load the new inner sleeve/bearings against the existing spindle shoulder.
> If otherwise, please elucidate.


You have homed in on the key issue in this design.  A variation of that part existed in the original.  It was essentially a large washer.  But it was hardened as if it was a bearing part.  The original part fit in there quite sloppily, and rattled like crazy.  Something was amiss.  The inner and outer race for the needle bearing was hardened, the shaft isn’t, nor is the cast iron pulley.

The shaft has a circular groove in it about .235” to the left of where the shaft steps down from 1.625 to 1.312.  I tried to illustrate that in the second drawing. It looks like a groove for a circular retaining ring.  It would seem that spring retaing circlips had not come into popular use, much is done with a retaining ring of circular cross section.  There was no such retaining ring actually installed, although two where used in the original design to hold the bearing in the sheeve.  

When I’d had this apart previously, I’d assumed the pressure plate back was intended to be flush against that hardened washer, but the dimensio don’t work.  The pressure plate is held in place by two set screws that have significant pre-drilled divots to lock into.  Best I can tell with those set screws installed, there is .390 between the 1.625/1.3125 shoulder and the pressure plate.

My intention is to go with the circular retaining ring hypothesis.  I’ll need to make one by annealing, forming, and rehardening some music wire.  Since such a ring is not as secure against axial force as a modern retaining clip, the technique seems to favor using a chamfered surface to provide some compression to hold that ring more securely.   I have that “washer” marked to build last as I am skeptical of my measurements, so I’ll want to install the sleeve and bearings and measure from there for final dimensions.  I don’t need the inner most (thickest) step on that washer, as that would press against the 1.625/1.312 step rather than keeping the bearings and sleeve tight.

I am trying to keep the bearings axially constrained by the right shoulder, sleeve, and retaining washer.  Since they are not tapered/anguar bearings I don’t think an axial compression preload through the pulley is ideal.  The original design used needle bearings so axial forces don’t seem to be a problem.  Might be worthwhile to rebalance the pulley.

Much of this would probably be obvious if I had a fully detailed CAD drawing posted here.


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## rabler (Nov 20, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> Would two 15 degree angular contact bearings and a spacer give some axial as well as radial  load?  The lower the degree the more the bearing acts like a deep groove and less like a thrust bearing.  Dave


I’d thought about tapered bearings like a typical car wheel.  Problem is getting the right preload, without having any mechanism (threads) to adjust it, would mean messing with shims.  Given that the original design used needle bearings, i.e., no axial strength, I think the dual deep groove bearings will suffice.  The three drive belts give it reasonable radial preload so it isn’t free to rattle around on the bearing tolerances.


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## extropic (Nov 20, 2021)

@rabler

Thanks for the explanation of design details.

I had not previously seen the retaining ring groove on the input shaft. I had wondered about the chamfer at the ID of the new special washer, but it all makes sense now. The circular cross section retaining rings (CCSRR) are news also. I had assumed the two retaining rings in the pully ID were conventional Waldes Truarc type snap rings. When I bump into interesting design details, like the CCSRRs, I wish I could have a conversation with the responsible designer to understand the rationale. I'm pretty sure that snap rings were available earlier than the '40s so there must be some reason the Monarch designers chose the CCSRRs. I wonder if the CCSRRs are intended to leave zero axial clearance. Maybe they were malleable enough to be upset, in place, to eliminate axial clearance. If I were boring out the pully ID, I'd cut grooves for modern snap rings rather than CCSRRs.

It took a fair amount of re-reading and viewing your pictures, but I think I understand the clutch system pretty well now. The pulley drives the friction disks through the two lugs so the pulley doesn't see any axial force from the pressure plate. Like you've said, there is no significant axial load on the pulley.


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 20, 2021)

Have you been through the sticky on Practical machinist about the rebuild of the monarch 60/61 from Harry?  I don't know how similar or different the machines are but the thread is very informative.  I did not go through it in detail so I can't say if it will help.  Dave


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## rabler (Nov 20, 2021)

extropic said:


> Thanks for the explanation of design details.
> 
> I had not previously seen the retaining ring groove on the input shaft. I had wondered about the chamfer at the ID of the new special washer, but it all makes sense now. The circular cross section retaining rings (CCSRR) are news also. I had assumed the two retaining rings in the pully ID were conventional Waldes Truarc type snap rings. When I bump into interesting design details, like the CCSRRs, I wish I could have a conversation with the responsible designer to understand the rationale. I'm pretty sure that snap rings were available earlier than the '40s so there must be some reason the Monarch designers chose the CCSRRs. I wonder if the CCSRRs are intended to leave zero axial clearance. Maybe they were malleable enough to be upset, in place, to eliminate axial clearance. If I were boring out the pully ID, I'd cut grooves for modern snap rings rather than CCSRRs.



Thanks for taking the time to go through this.  Mechanical design is not my bailiwick, so I very much appreciate other eyeballs on it.
I've already ordered 68mm conventional snap rings for the pulley ID.  I'll just have to grind a 2.65mm HSS grooving tool.  I thought about trying to use snap rings instead of CCSRR's on the shaft too, but that would require regrooving the shaft, which I'd rather not pull out of the lathe.

I too wondered about the design.  I believe Monarch sourced the assembly from Edgemont clutch, which is now Mecco Edgemont clutch.  Maybe it was a WWII supply issue on snap rings?


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## rabler (Nov 20, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> Have you been through the sticky on Practical machinist about the rebuild of the monarch 60/61 from Harry? I don't know how similar or different the machines are but the thread is very informative. I did not go through it in detail so I can't say if it will help. Dave


I have looked through quite a bit of the PM Monarch forum, and corresponded off the forum with several members.  Recutting the key slots on the perimeter of the clutch disc seems to be pretty common.  Abom79 even has a video of doing that on his 40's Monarch.   I started this current rebuild with doing that when I realized something was amiss with the bearings.   I haven't seen anything on modifications for the bearings.


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## rabler (Nov 20, 2021)

Fortunately the 12CK and the 612-2516 use the same D1-6 mount.  I only have a 12" 3-jaw for the 612,  I'll want to use a 4-jaw to dial in the pulley before boring that.  Fortunately I can use the 4 jaw from the CK. 

  I've made some test cuts with the 612, but haven't used it for anything yet, so this will be an interesting first project for the 612, helping it's older cousin.  I'm waiting for the bearings to come in.


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## extropic (Nov 20, 2021)

rabler said:


> Thanks for taking the time to go through this.  Mechanical design is not my bailiwick, so I very much appreciate *other eyeballs on it*.   >snip



If I don't pay attention I won't learn much. Worse yet, I might misunderstand.


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## rabler (Nov 22, 2021)

I'm waiting for bearings to arrive.  Feeling dead in the water.  I did get the 612 back to a basic running shape.  I guess I could go true up the backplate for the 6-jaw auction find that will go onto the 612.  I had been working on another project with the CK, a rotary stand for the mill tools.  I think I'm hitting my limit of open projects.  Still have trenches and a front porch to work on, although rain yesterday means everything needs another day to dry out to work outdoors.


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## rabler (Nov 25, 2021)

Progress on the CK clutch repair.  Got the driven pulley turned out on both sides for the bearings.  Turned a conventional spring retaining ring groove in it.  But turns out one of the "features" of the original wire/round cross section retaining rings is they take minimal ID clearance.  The modern retaining rings wouldn't clear on the shoulder on the headstock side, so I used one of the original retaining rings there.

This was an challenge in using a lathe in another building, about a 1/4 mile away from my shop, so I had to run back and forth several times for odds and ends as that building isn't stocked for machining.  The 612 doesn't have a DRO either.  That will have to change!   Also a couple more things went on the long term to-do/repair list for the 612.  There is a definite bad spot on the cross slide leadscrew.  And the rapid traverse apron shaft needs new bronze bushings, it is a bit noisy.  My contactor on the RPC is also buzzing badly.  I think it is just a cheap contactor, easy enough to replace.

In the first picture you can see the two areas turned out for the two slighly larger 2.677 (68mm) OD vs orignal single 2.625 OD bearings.  The central groove is a grease distribution ring, which is no longer needed as I used sealed bearings.  They may only last 10 years of hobby usage, I can deal with that.

Next step is to make the retaining washer for this pulley.


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## rabler (Nov 26, 2021)

Well, )&*^%.

I was over at the barns this morning for the usual morning chores, and then went into the garage there to make the retaining washer.  Got a piece of 1018 round chucked up and dialed in to something around .005".  Had the 4-jaw on from turning the pulley above, wasn't worth pulling it off and putting the three jaw on for this.  Plan was to turn the OD down from 2.25 to 1.800", so getting it dead on wasn't necessary.

Wanted to bore the center out first, so chucked up small drill bit, fired up the RPC and started up the lathe. Lathe was set on 285 RPM.  Figure for a 1/4" bit I'd like around 800RPM.   Went to shift the headstock.  This Monarch 612 lathe has a novel headstock,  there is a large round dial with 18 positions, and two good sized levers above the dial.  The left lever is to select between "Run" and "Shift".  The right lever is "Hi, Neutral, Low".   Each of the dail's 18 positions has two speeds marked, one for Hi and one for Low.  I'd thrown the right lever into neutral when indicating in the piece of stock, and back into high.  I tried to pull the left lever into the shift position, which is required to rotate the dial, and it wouldn't budge.  Argh




This lathe is a bit different in that the shifting has some hydraulic assistance, and you therefore can't shift with it not running.   I suspected the hydraulic/lubrication pump, and sure enough the dripping from the headstock sight glass was abysmally slow to non-existant.  I loosened the line out of the pump and sure enough it leaked oil when I fired it up.  So I've got something plugged up somewhere.  Possibly just a filter?  It was quite cold last night so that may be related, I left the heat cranked up in that building to see if that resolves it.  Obviously a full tear down of the lube system would be prudent, just wanted to limp along and get the the other lathe back on it's feet.  Three inoperative lathes, and no working lathes, is a bit disconcerting.  Obviously there are advantages to owning new machines, less trouble prone but not foolproof either.

Editted to add: Well, I ran back over to pick up the manual for the 612, and after heating that garage for a while, it shifted fine, oil flowing nicely in the sight glass.  Still feel that a good overhaul of the lube system is in order.  But I should now hopefully have the last of the parts I need to fix the CK.

Don't mind my grumbling.


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## rabler (Nov 26, 2021)

Success, the CK clutch is back to running.  Bearings run nicely.  Still a bit of ringing from the clutch when it is disengaged, but with the way the clutch plate floats in there I'm not sure how it could be totally eliminated.  Anyhow, the collection of obnoxious and distressing noises from there are gone.  I'll button things up tomorrow, covers and guards need to be re-installed, but it is once again functional.  Big sigh of relief, not having a working lathe is not a good feeling.


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## woodchucker (Nov 26, 2021)

rabler said:


> Obviously there are advantages to owning new machines, less trouble prone but not foolproof either.
> 
> Don't mind my grumbling.


Some new machines... I think the monarchs are high end, so owning a new high end machine (with a new set of problems) is not worth as much as having a tried and true master... She just needs (well all three) a little pampering, and she'll treat you right.


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## rabler (Nov 26, 2021)

woodchucker said:


> Some new machines... I think the monarchs are high end, so owning a new high end machine (with a new set of problems) is not worth as much as having a tried and true master... She just needs (well all three) a little pampering, and she'll treat you right.


I’m not about to give up on these old beasts.  It will be years of work at my methodical plodding, but the machines will continue to be improved along with (hopefully) my skills.  It really is a hobby/passion though, not a pragmatic approach to making things.  These rough patches just point out things that need doing.


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## Beckerkumm (Nov 26, 2021)

Glad to hear you are making progress.  I share your fun at making the high end old stuff outperform.  It always costs some money but still usually pretty low in comparison to new stuff.  You are giving me incentive to tear into finishing up my Monarch soon.  The fun of fixing machines is a hobby itself.  Dave


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## rabler (Dec 7, 2021)

I did pull the clutch apart again last night and put a bit of Loctite 641 (medium strength bearing retaining compound) around the sleeve and bearings.  I had cut things to a tight slip fit not a press fit, and the tolerances and/or less than ground finish meant that there was just a bit of play in those fits, with the multiple stacked parts that added up.


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## rabler (Dec 7, 2021)

Beckerkumm said:


> Glad to hear you are making progress.  I share your fun at making the high end old stuff outperform.  It always costs some money but still usually pretty low in comparison to new stuff.  You are giving me incentive to tear into finishing up my Monarch soon.  The fun of fixing machines is a hobby itself.  Dave


Let me know how work on your 61 goes.  Nice looking machine from your earlier pictures.


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## rabler (Dec 21, 2021)

Today's project was using some scraps from building the porch to make a chuck caddy for the lathe.  The hoist helps getting the chucks on and off the lathe but I was still carrying them around after lowering them to the floor.  Those 10" chucks get heavy.    
Idea stolen from Tom Lipton.


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## woodchucker (Dec 21, 2021)

rabler said:


> Today's project was using some scraps from building the porch to make a chuck caddy for the lathe.  The hoist helps getting the chucks on and off the lathe but I was still carrying them around after lowering them to the floor.  Those 10" chucks get heavy.
> Idea stolen from Tom Lipton.
> View attachment 389331
> View attachment 389332


Randal,
Does the hoist move on the gantry? Looks like you have a bolt at the end to prevent it from coming off... So I'll assume you put ball bearings on top of your attachment point.


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## rabler (Dec 21, 2021)

woodchucker said:


> Randal,
> Does the hoist move on the gantry? Looks like you have a bolt at the end to prevent it from coming off... So I'll assume you put ball bearings on top of your attachment point.


Yes, some smaller roller bearings.  The jib is also a bearing mounted shaft, a ridiculous overkill.  I wouldn’t lift more than 100 lbs with it. But I wouldn’t be without it, very helpful for changing chucks, or pulling the tailstock, etc.


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## woodchucker (Dec 21, 2021)

rabler said:


> Yes, some smaller roller bearings.  The jib is also a bearing mounted shaft, a ridiculous overkill.  I wouldn’t lift more than 100 lbs with it. But I wouldn’t be without it, very helpful for changing chucks, or pulling the tailstock, etc.


Looks like it can take more than 100lbs


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## rabler (Dec 21, 2021)

woodchucker said:


> Looks like it can take more than 100lbs


I have hung my weight from it in three directions as a load test, so that is about 2.5x 100 lbs. Wall won’t allow full 360 degrees.  But I like a good safety margin.  The base is not embedded in concrete, it integrated with square tube that extends under the lathe as well as to the back and out to the sides.  In essence the lathe sits on the crane base, raising the lathe up a bit over 2” to a good work height for me.  So if I rearrange the crane goes with the lathe.  Important since the DRO and control panel are mounted to the crane.


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## Charles scozzari (May 8, 2022)

Hi, I wasn't on this site when you posted this but very nice restoration on a beautiful lathe. You did a great job, now you can enjoy it.


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## rabler (May 9, 2022)

Charles scozzari said:


> Hi, I wasn't on this site when you posted this but very nice restoration on a beautiful lathe. You did a great job, now you can enjoy it.


Thanks Charles
I do have more work on it that needs to be done. I like coming back to a working machine and progressing in small steps.  The underside of the carriage will get a turcite treatment at some point, and the tailstock quill needs to be relaced.  I’m currently working on finishing a new shop, but more will be added to this thread when  get back to this lathe.


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## slodat (May 14, 2022)

Lathe looks great! 

Do you have more photos of your gantry? Specifically, what it looks like on the back of the lathe. I need to do this on my Pacemaker. Chucks are too heavy to manhandle safely.


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## rabler (May 14, 2022)

slodat said:


> Lathe looks great!
> 
> Do you have more photos of your gantry? Specifically, what it looks like on the back of the lathe. I need to do this on my Pacemaker. Chucks are too heavy to manhandle safely.


I'm in the middle of moving the shop around (finishing construction on a new shop) so things are a mess.  Best I can get right now:
The headstock sits on a square frame of 2x2 steel tube (well, actually a couple of solid 2x2 cubes welded to the tube).  The tubing sticks out the back and a piece of 3" pipe is welded to that with some braces.


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