# HafCo Tools



## NortonDommi

Hello,
          I own a hafCo AL - 356V Lathe and a HafCo HM - 46 Mill/Drill. They were bought because I have always wanted to own something half-way decent from new.
  Along with an Alba - 1A shaper, a Tanner pedestral drill and a few welders I indulge in repairing/rebuilding old vehichles and machinery.
  I'de be interested in the views of or modifications made by owners of similar machinery.


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## markba633csi

Were they Haf price too? LOL


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## NortonDommi

Nice one, they should have been.
Actually not that bad but not industrial and dealers have no information other than the brochure it turns out, they can't even supply parts so basicly I got sucked in by an Aussie company which is to be expected given their ancestors were picked by the best judges in Britain....


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## markba633csi

Got pictures? Let's see this apparatus-
MS


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## NortonDommi

Hei MS,
              I'm recovering what I can from a  crash disaster while transfering data from old computer to new so can only post this at the moment.
Still trying to recover the Adcock & Shipley photo's and as it is Autum and the beauty is under cover you will have to wait until Spring  or until I recover the photo's aye.  
  I've bought some great factory stuffup T-slot cutters which will work exactly within the parameters of cross-slide thickness to allow me to use stock 
10 mm T-nuts with just a couple of thou' adjustment.  A job to be done within a month or two..
  - Barry.


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## fitterman1

Hi NortonDommi, I'm in Adelaide, Sth Australia. There's a mob here called General Tools that sell Hafco products. I've had a look at these and they look alright to me.
I have a smaller lathe but from what I see your lathe should be a quite capable machine. I've added the brochure they have for your model. Its not small with a 2" bore.
And they even come in a variable speed version. If your looking to modify/peak it, keep looking around on this site. Lots of help.
Cheers Alby


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## NortonDommi

Thanks Fitterman 1,
                                  I bought mine from Machinery House,(HafCo, yes the're over here too), here in Auckland. I was told all goods unpacked in Aus and checked then repacked ,sent to NZ, unpacked here and then sold.
  Well I couldn't get it to run first up, it would jog but not run. I found the grub screw holding the plectum to the control rod was stripped so not tripping the microswitches.
  Secondly the drive belts were flapping around. They are a matched set which are really hard to tesion correctly when the motor is not squre to its mounting frame AND a SIN the bolt that was hardest to get too had a different head size to the others! Hands should be chopped off for this!
  When I first looked at one of these I was shown one in pieces that was being repaired after the bed snapped when it was dropped by a customer unloading with a large forkhoist. Turns out the stack of change gears next to it were from something else, it came with one, a 40 tooth.
  Not impressed with the dealer at all, after two years the control transformer packed up, dealer not only did not have they couldn't get and wanted a technition to come out at $85hr to "have a look".
  Bought two custom made transformers on Alibaba from China for US$59 on my doorstep 3 days after ordering with an appology for the delay as there had been a local public holiday! WOW I know where to go for great service. top quality as well.
  I have bought some oddball T-slot cutters to slot the cross slide. The size means I have plenty of meat left and only have to skim 0.002" off the bottom and 1mm off the top of standard 8mm T-nuts.
  Overall happy with it, need a few more change gears but a decent spindle bore and that variable drive are great. For the price about the only other option would have been buy 3-phase and convert or secondhand and do the same.
  It'll see me out.
  Hope that cyclone pased you by, we caught the tailend and there was a bit of damage, mainly flooding this far North.
  Have a good one.
  - Barry.


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## fitterman1

That would be Hare and Forbes would it not? From the faults you've described I don't think any unpacking and checking went on because they should have powered it up and found that faulty grub screw. I hope you've got it all sorted now.
I want to ask you how deep are you going to put your tee slots? I would go as deep as possible without interfering with other parts like the dovetails. Simply because I don't trust the iron quality in these lathes.
I like the variable speed on lathes, I've also converted mine (G0602) to this and its the best, no stuffing around flipping belts. I have a thread here detailing what hacks I've done to mine if your contemplating rework.
Its here, you're welcome to have a look - http://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/my-workman-g0602-my-way.55166/
Cyclone didn't really bother us here in Adelaide, more so the east coast, friends of ours in Brisbane live on the Broadwater and they were nearly flooded out. Mate reckons he had a 3 meter rise in the river behind him. It was lapping his steps.
Cheers Alby


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## NortonDommi

Yep, Hare & Forbes.
                                 Well we're represented, one from either side of the ditch, must be others surely?
  If I knew some of the brands and model numbers that the universal manufaturer in China produced I bet this thread would be a jumping.
  I'll bet a toad lick that a a lot of the Grizzley stuff is made in the same factory as my stuff was.


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## fitterman1

Yep, there's another guy from here in Adelaide called Bob on these forums as well as another fella I've seen from Qld.
you'll find just about every brand of lathe represented here somewhere. My Workman (Grizzly G0602) is pretty popular around here and other forums. Good value for the money I thought considering the size, (think sweetspot). I don't think your lathe comes from China, I'm pretty sure its from Taiwan (better quality and more experienced factory)


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## NortonDommi

Hey Alby,
                  I sent you the specs on the cutters PM. They were hybrid odd balls that I lucked on first time I looked at Amazon.
 I'll have 5mm above top of bottom releif. Only way I could get any better load distribution would be to follow the great Mr Witworth.
  However I have a personal policy to not mix  Imperial & metrickery. Even a cursory look at what those Victorians,(age not state mate), were doing shows we haven't learnt much. ISO standard T-slot clamp kits can be had cheap, the 8mm set I bought in anticipation set me back NZD$46 including p & p.
  I'm a big fan of keeping everything in the club aye.
  Winter setting in is not good as I still need to build a new shed to house stuff as I want to get the Adcock & Shipley 2AGU mill inside to start rebuilding the rest of it.
 Thanks for the thoughts on size vs value re the lathe. I'm happy. I just wanted something brand new that nobody else had played with just so I could stuff it up all on my lonesome.


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## NortonDommi

Hey Alby,
                  I sent you the specs on the cutters PM. They were hybrid odd balls that I lucked on first time I looked at Amazon.
 I'll have 5mm above top of bottom releif. Only way I could get any better load distribution would be to follow the great Mr Witworth.
  However I have a personal policy to not mix  Imperial & metrickery. Even a cursory look at what those Victorians,(age not state mate), were doing shows we haven't learnt much. ISO standard T-slot clamp kits can be had cheap, the 8mm set I bought in anticipation set me back NZD$46 including p & p.
  I'm a big fan of keeping everything in the club aye.
  Winter setting in is not good as I still need to build a new shed to house stuff as I want to get the Adcock & Shipley 2AGU mill inside to start rebuilding the rest of it.
 Thanks for the thoughts on size vs value re the lathe. I'm happy. I just wanted something brand new that nobody else had played with just so I could stuff it up all on my lonesome.


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## Downunder Bob

fitterman1 said:


> Yep, there's another guy from here in Adelaide called Bob on these forums as well as another fella I've seen from Qld.
> you'll find just about every brand of lathe represented here somewhere. My Workman (Grizzly G0602) is pretty popular around here and other forums. Good value for the money I thought considering the size, (think sweetspot). I don't think your lathe comes from China, I'm pretty sure its from Taiwan (better quality and more experienced factory)




G'day Alby Barry and others, Yeh, one of the other guys from Adelaide, Bob. I looked at Hafco quite a bit when I was looking for a lathe, visited their agent here in Adelaide, General tools, but was less than impressed they weren't very well presented and the sales guy didn't appear to know much about them, except "Yeh, the're pretty good mate". I don't know if they had your model there as it was too big for me, I wanted as big a swing as I could get, but had a very serious limitation on length. I have bought a few other things from them  The AL 250 was the biggest one that would fit and I did like the look of it,  although the gear change was rather clunky, and a bit gritty when rolling it over by hand, but just a bit too small in swing.

However I seriously doubt if your model was made in Taiwan, as there is no mention of that in any of the info I can find on it. Generally any machinery made in Taiwan is advertised in a big way. Like for instance, the Hafco bandsaw that I did get, they make a big issue about it being made in Taiwan. And it's pretty well made.

The short length with a decent swing was really the final decider for me when I bought my LD1216 lathe from Modern Tools in Melbourne, they were very helpful and surprisingly knowledgeable on their products and have looked after me very well since. More than I can say for Hafco, I do have a tracking problem with my bandsaw, the local guy had no idea, so I called the Melbourne office  and they also had no idea. I probably won't be buying anything else from them.


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## celtic1522

NortonDommi said:


> Thanks Fitterman 1,
> I bought mine from Machinery House,(HafCo, yes the're over here too), here in Auckland. I was told all goods unpacked in Aus and checked then repacked ,sent to NZ, unpacked here and then sold.
> Well I couldn't get it to run first up, it would jog but not run. I found the grub screw holding the plectum to the control rod was stripped so not tripping the microswitches.
> Secondly the drive belts were flapping around. They are a matched set which are really hard to tesion correctly when the motor is not squre to its mounting frame AND a SIN the bolt that was hardest to get too had a different head size to the others! Hands should be chopped off for this!
> When I first looked at one of these I was shown one in pieces that was being repaired after the bed snapped when it was dropped by a customer unloading with a large forkhoist. Turns out the stack of change gears next to it were from something else, it came with one, a 40 tooth.
> Not impressed with the dealer at all, after two years the control transformer packed up, dealer not only did not have they couldn't get and wanted a technition to come out at $85hr to "have a look".
> Bought two custom made transformers on Alibaba from China for US$59 on my doorstep 3 days after ordering with an appology for the delay as there had been a local public holiday! WOW I know where to go for great service. top quality as well.
> I have bought some oddball T-slot cutters to slot the cross slide. The size means I have plenty of meat left and only have to skim 0.002" off the bottom and 1mm off the top of standard 8mm T-nuts.
> Overall happy with it, need a few more change gears but a decent spindle bore and that variable drive are great. For the price about the only other option would have been buy 3-phase and convert or secondhand and do the same.
> It'll see me out.
> Hope that cyclone pased you by, we caught the tailend and there was a bit of damage, mainly flooding this far North.
> Have a good one.
> - Barry.


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## celtic1522

Seems that it depends on what manufacturing plant inside China is used, and how much our local suppliers are willing to pay for the item governs the quality we recieve. My Global C6251A lathe came from Chevpac in Dunedin, my CQ 6132 X 500 lathe and ZX7550CW mill from Roger Drayton at Coastal Machinery in Feilding, Manawatu. It  turns out they were all  made by Yangzhou Super Machine Tool Company in china. Apart from the tailstock being well out of adjustment and an oil leak in the gearbox on the 6251, also the footbrake microswitch needed adjustment, it is a very accurate machine. The 6132 on the other hand has never missed a beat! Apart from the fact one of the main change gears was missing. This was remedied within a week by Coastal. My 7550 has developed an annoying leak on the quill which I must get to one day. Both these machines are very accurate too. I also have an old VDF German lathe and a Taiwanese mill which is quite old as well. For the money there is nothing wrong with the Chinese product. Compared to a second hand Colchester, Harrison, Myford, or Boxford they run circles around them. Even if they have a few leaks and setup problems at times they are good to use and I enjoy owning them. As a footnote, I have a friend who started in business 40 years ago and bought at that time a very large Chinese lathe. It was Chinese best quality at the time and is still in daily use today. Chinese know how to make good product just as good as anything out of Europe or the USA but at a cost that I can afford. They will also furnish you a very cheap ordinary product too if thats what you want. From a distance they both look the same but of course they are not!


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