# Show us your war time production machine tools



## Janderso (Apr 26, 2021)

Rabler, posted his war time production K&T production vertical mill.
I thought I lost it but I found the pic of my war time South Bend lathe.
It was manufactured in December of 1941, so I doubt if they had converted or shorten their finish process.
I know many of you share my passion of old American iron, especially machines that built our defense and offense against Hitler.
This is my South Bend 13”. It was lost in a fire.


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## cathead (Apr 26, 2021)

This is my Monarch 14C, 1942 vintage.

Note:  The light switch turns the lathe on and off.  It might look wimpy but it is a 20 amp double pole single throw switch wired in parallel.

Last used: yesterday afternoon.



I'm lucky in that my placards are made of brass as some later production used zinc placards.


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## nighthawkFmobil (Apr 26, 2021)

Janderso said:


> Rabler, posted his war time production K&T production vertical mill.
> I thought I lost it but I found the pic of my war time South Bend lathe.
> It was manufactured in December of 1941, so I doubt if they had converted or shorten their finish process.
> I know many of you share my passion of old American iron, especially machines that built our defense and offense against Hitler.
> This is my South Bend 13”. It was lost in a fire.


Thanks for sharing. Interesting perspective considering these machines helped us out in WWII. 
Did someone else own the south bend in the fire or was it in your possession at the time?


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## benmychree (Apr 26, 2021)

Hitler is one thing/man, but we should not neglect Hirohito and Tojo either.  Jeff, you have seen my stash, it is quite a testiment to our country's productive output and the productive output of all those machine tools.


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## FOMOGO (Apr 26, 2021)

Which war? Mike


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## Ulma Doctor (Apr 26, 2021)

1939 SB11 USN Mare Island




1943 Monarch 10EE USN


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## Braeden P (Apr 27, 2021)

1941 hardinge tr-59 less than half a tenth runout I am in the process of restoring and a starrett micrometer used to measure shells starrett no 127 serial number is 173


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## Steve-F (Apr 27, 2021)

That's going to be a really nice lathe Braeden!!


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## Braeden P (Apr 27, 2021)

a long journey!


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## T Bredehoft (Apr 27, 2021)

Sorry, my technology doesn't support images today. My contribution is a 1943 (end of March) Ames turret lathe. Maximum size would be 5 by 9 if it were an engine lathe, but with collets it's made for much smaller work.  It still holds ± .001, probably better but I don't ask that of it. It was first owned by the Navy. The "frame" is one solid bar of steel, the head and turret both mount on that.

_Edit:_ correct typo


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## Janderso (Apr 27, 2021)

nighthawkFmobil said:


> Thanks for sharing. Interesting perspective considering these machines helped us out in WWII.
> Did someone else own the south bend in the fire or was it in your possession at the time?


This was my lathe.
 The 13" South Bend has a special place in my heart. I learned the basics of running a lathe in High School. There were two lathes in our metal shop, 13" South Bends. One had the taper attachment. (Thank you Mr. Wade)
I also had one to use when I was in the baseball business in Haiti back in 1982-3.


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## Janderso (Apr 27, 2021)

benmychree said:


> Hitler is one thing/man, but we should not neglect Hirohito and Tojo either


Very true!!


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## talvare (Apr 27, 2021)




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## Nogoingback (Apr 27, 2021)

My 10" Logan was built in early 1944.  Note the olive drab paint job.


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## Braeden P (Apr 27, 2021)

if it counts I have a square made in 1867 by disston and morrs all metal 3 inch the franco-mexican war and there was american intervention


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## brasssmanget (Apr 27, 2021)

Picked this one up quite some time ago. Dated 12/11/40  10L 4 1/2 Stored at Ft. McHenry in MD. Refinished it after setting it up. It has worked well for me .....


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## Janderso (Apr 27, 2021)

brasssmanget said:


> Picked this one up quite some time ago. Dated 12/11/40  10L 4 1/2 Stored at Ft. McHenry in MD. Refinished it after setting it up. It has worked well for me .....
> 
> View attachment 364071


Beautiful lathe and cabinet.


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## rabler (Apr 27, 2021)

Here's my other WWII era machine, as it came in the door, and as it looks now.


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## Janderso (Apr 27, 2021)

August of 1944. Our boys had been in France since June. We were fighting in the Mariana's in the Pacific.
Meanwhile, back home they were building your lathe!


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## Aaron_W (Apr 27, 2021)

My Diamond horizontal mill was finished on December 28, 1944, 2 days after Patton's 4th Armored linked up with the 101st ending the siege of Bastogne. The Clausing is almost 20 years younger so made during a different war.






I have a pre-war (1932) Rivet lathe with US Navy Markings which could have still been in use by WW2.


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## NCjeeper (Apr 27, 2021)

1942 G&E 16" Industrial Universal shaper.


1943 DoAll ML-16 bandsaw.


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## projectnut (Apr 28, 2021)

As mentioned earlier "wartime" machines covers a broad area.  I have several machines in the shop that were produced during "wartime" periods.  Some were built for private industries supporting the war effort, and some were built for the military.  The oldest is a 1916 Seneca Falls lathe.  It was built in 1916  for a company that was supplying vending machines to military bases in WWI.

The next 2 are from the WWII era.  The AMMCO shaper came out of the Badger Army Ammunition Depot in Baraboo Wisconsin.  The US Machine Tools horizontal mill came from the Oscar Mayer plant in Madison Wisconsin.  Oscar had huge contracts supplying the military both in the US and overseas.  Even Rosie the Riveter used one in a poster for wartime production.

The last one is a Black Diamond drill grinder.  It was made in 1974 as part of a military contract during the Vietnam War.  It spent most of it's life unused in a National Guard Equipment Repair Depot warehouse.  For some reason they bought the 3 phase machine even though they had no 3 phase power in the repair depot.


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## Braeden P (Apr 28, 2021)

I also have a 1975 Rockwell 18 inch drill press it has a 1/32 to 1/2 inch albrecht chuck it was my great grandfathers.


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## kb58 (Apr 28, 2021)

projectnut said:


> ... The oldest is a 1916 Seneca Falls lathe.  It was built in 1916  for a company that was supplying vending machines to military bases in WWI.


Huh, I never gave any thought to how old vending machines might be, and wonder what ones from back then were like. I'd wager that even back then, you'd see people beating on the front of them, trying to get their snack to drop...

Boy that's a slippery slope, searching on "oldest vending machines". Here's one from Britain in the 1920s - and yes, I'm now off-topic!


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## DiscoDan (Apr 28, 2021)

My P&W 3C horizontal hand mill.


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## Braeden P (Apr 28, 2021)

wow yours has a tag I dont think my lathe was used for production but instead one of parts because it has no tag and very little wear on the ways


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## Weldingrod1 (Apr 28, 2021)

This drill press came with a glued in, typewritten memo that said parts delivery may be affected by the war production board...  It was rated to drill a 3" hole in steel using a #5 Morse taper!  It got a new life as an oilfield plug milling test rig.  Somewhere I have a photo of me sitting on the table, but darned if I can find it!  One of the fun/wacky features on it was the two rotating oil drippers; one spun on top of a jack shaft and the other orbited around the splined shaft.  You had to be careful not to fill them up too much or they would sling oil out the fill fitting.  They were about 8' off the floor, so you had to have a ladder handy every morning you ran it.
My first lathe was actually build on D-day...


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## Janderso (Apr 28, 2021)

Aaron_W said:


> My Diamond horizontal mill was finished on December 28, 1944, 2 days after Patton's 4th Armored linked up with the 101st ending the siege of Bastogne. The Clausing is almost 20 years younger so made during a different war.
> 
> View attachment 364122
> 
> ...


Aaron,
I haven't been to your shop. The Rivett is sweet!
The horizontal mill is perfect for a hobby shop! 
And of course I love your Clausing.
Awesome tools man!


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## Janderso (Apr 28, 2021)

kb58 said:


> Here's one from Britain in the 1920s - and yes, I'm now off-topic!


That's perfectly acceptable. That's a neat pic.


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## Janderso (Apr 28, 2021)

Weldingrod1 said:


> My first lathe was actually build on D-day...


So was war time production compromised in any way?
Did they let up on QC?
Lots of machines were made during the WW2 years. Many were probably made in factories with female employees.
I know they let the finishes slide but I'm not so sure about quality and tolerances.
Anyone have any ideas on this subject?


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## projectnut (Apr 28, 2021)

I'm pretty sure surface finish of cast parts was the major difference between machines built explicitly for the war effort and those built for the retail market.  In most cases machines built for the retail market were ground as close to possible to a smooth finish.  Small casting voids were filler with either lead or similar filler product, then sanded to a smooth finish and painted.

Machines built for the war effort had rough spots ground down, but rarely had the small casting voids filled, or were sanded to a smooth finish before applying paint.  I have some inspection sheets in publications from Sheldon for periods before, during, and after WWII.   All the technical specs appear to be the same.


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## Weldingrod1 (Apr 28, 2021)

On the Baker drill press, they were telling the user that parts delivery wasnt just controlled by them; the war production board had first call...

Sent from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk


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## Aaron_W (Apr 28, 2021)

Janderso said:


> Aaron,
> I haven't been to your shop. The Rivett is sweet!
> The horizontal mill is perfect for a hobby shop!
> And of course I love your Clausing.
> Awesome tools man!



I'm really looking forward to playing with the Rivett, but the motor set up it came with was kind of jury rigged, so I've been redesigning the motor mount and tensioning mechanism. It would be a lot easier if I actually knew what I was doing.


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## Janderso (Apr 28, 2021)

Aaron_W said:


> It would be a lot easier if I actually knew what I was doing


I get that. For me it's the lack of creativity. I think the more I use that part of my brain, I'm getting better. I took a few decades off.


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## rabler (Apr 28, 2021)

projectnut said:


> I'm pretty sure surface finish of cast parts was the major difference between machines built explicitly for the war effort and those built for the retail market.  In most cases machines built for the retail market were ground as close to possible to a smooth finish.  Small casting voids were filler with either lead or similar filler product, then sanded to a smooth finish and painted.
> 
> Machines built for the war effort had rough spots ground down, but rarely had the small casting voids filled, or were sanded to a smooth finish before applying paint.  I have some inspection sheets in publications from Sheldon for periods before, during, and after WWII.   All the technical specs appear to be the same.


The K&T was definitely paint over casting.  The other non-war machines I’ve seen tend more toward fillers than ground casting, just grinding on casting seams.


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## Superburban (Apr 28, 2021)

Here is two Gorton engravers I picked up many years ago. The first has the war finish tag, the second looks to have a less refined finish, and is close in serial numbers. The second I picked up for the accessories, and it also had a nice DC motor, and controller that I swapped to a drill press that my father got through military surplus back in the fifties, so it might even be a war baby. I do not have pics of it.







I have watched many documentaries on wartime production, and am amazed at how many metel and wood working machines that had to be made just before, and during WWII. Watch the movie on the Chrysler tank factory, or the Ford airplane factory that were both built during the War, and look at all the mills and lathes, and other machines. How did the machine manufacturers keep up?


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## Janderso (Apr 28, 2021)

Superburban said:


> Watch the movie on the Chrysler tank factory


I saw that one.
What was it -6-8 months? They broke ground - worked 24-7 and had heavy machinery going in in a very short time. They were pouring concrete in the winter, in the Midwest!!
Couldn't do that today. Where would the workers come form?

The engraver is awesome. Very handy to have. I want one


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## Nogoingback (Apr 28, 2021)

Janderso said:


> What was it -6-8 months? They broke ground - worked 24-7 and had heavy machinery going in in a very short time. They were pouring concrete in the winter, in the Midwest!!


It's amazing what can be accomplished when it's really necessary.  During WWII, the Soviets moved, on a crash basis, thousands
of factories eastwards away from the Germans and across the Urals.  They started production in tents until they could build factory
buildings, in the winter.  Of course, they had slightly different incentives than our people did...


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## Braeden P (Apr 28, 2021)

During WW2 in Russia they would work in the shops when bombs where falling -40 no heating and only food was one potato a day rough conditions!


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## cathead (May 7, 2021)

Possibly WW1


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## Nogoingback (May 7, 2021)

cathead said:


> View attachment 365175
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Looks great!  What is it?


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## Braeden P (May 7, 2021)

I dont think my lathe was a war machine because it was made in 1941 and we entered ww2 in December of 1941 so it could be made before the war and it has no war tag or excessive wear but it was used to machine brass parts because it has brass chips packed everywhere.


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## cathead (May 9, 2021)

Nogoingback said:


> Looks great!  What is it?


Springfield "Ideal" Lathe


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## hman (May 14, 2021)

Absolutely beautiful!


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## Ultradog MN (May 22, 2021)

I have two war time machines.
My Midway Millmaster was built in March of 42.
Jimmy Doolittle and his boys were training hard to make short take-offs then and aside from Doolittle himself, None of them knew what they were training for or where they were going.
Also my recently purchased Monarch 12CK. It was built 2 months later during the time of the Battle of the Coral Sea which was the first check on the Japanese advancement into the South Pacific.
My Monarch has a crack at the bottom of the base under the headstock which has been welded. Probably a moving accident but I like to imagine it was aboard a ship that took a shell from a Japanese cruiser or a Long Lance torpedo from a destroyer at the battle of Tassafaronga or some such and survived the day to make it home for repairs.


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## Janderso (May 22, 2021)

Ultradog MN said:


> I have two war time machines.
> My Midway Millmaster was built in March of 42.
> Jimmy Doolittle and his boys were training hard to make short take-offs then and aside from Doolittle himself, None of them knew what they were training for or where they were going.
> Also my recently purchased Monarch 12CK. It was built 2 months later during the time of the Battle of the Coral Sea which was the first check on the Japanese advancement into the South Pacific.
> My Monarch has a crack at the bottom of the base under the headstock which has been welded. Probably a moving accident but I like to imagine it was aboard a ship that took a shell from a Japanese cruiser or a Long Lance torpedo from a destroyer at the battle of Tassafaronga or some such and survived the day to make it home for repairs.


I doubt they would believe someone who said, yeah and you are gonna take off from an aircraft carrier!


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