# My New 1963ish Clausing 5914



## Holescreek

I've been wanting a longer lathe to compliment my little Cinci Traytop 12.5" x 18" and stumbled on this 12"x36" Clausing  5914 about an hours drive from my shop.  I primarily do home gunsmithing and wanted the extra distance between centers for turning barrel contours.   The machine came with a 3 jaw and 4 jaw chuck, a steady rest that had been modified to fit the machine, and I opted to purchase a home made taper attachment the previous owner had made.  I checked spindle runout and listened to it run through the gear ranges, paid and loaded it up.

There are always repairs that must be made to these vintage machines but I figured I'd have to make repairs to a brand new Chinese lathe too and at least I could still buy parts for this one.   The seller had implied that the headstock oil had been changed recently, at least that's how I took the comment that it was "clean and red" last time he'd looked.  I'd brought wrenches along to look for myself before I bought it but opted not to pull the cover when I saw the hydraulic lever on top and I wasn't sure what was involved at that time.







I was able to use my folding "Big Red" engine hoist to move the lathe to the rear of the trailer then moved the trailer into the garage and with the hoist on the garage floor, lift it off the trailer bed and drive out from under it.

Once slid into position I started taking stock of the little things that I'd need to address and pulled the top cover off the gearbox to find  black oil with teensy flecks of metal suspended in it.  I drained the head (not much oil in there by the way) and found plenty more metal fines in the bottom. I'd guess the previous two or three owners had never changed the oil, my first clue was that the hex opening in the drain plug was filled completely with paint.  I got the headstock cleaned out best I could and flushed it with mineral spirits.  It appears that the metal shavings were the result of someone trying to engage the back gears with the spindle running.  Further investigation found that the "safety lockout" (my definition) inside the head that stops the back gear knob from being turned with the spindle running was out of position.







I ordered some Mobil DTE24 for the headstock and moved onto other parts.


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## Holescreek

The most obvious issue I was aware of before I bought the lathe was the slow drip from the lower hydraulic cylinder down  in front of the variable speed pulley.  I probably could live with it just as the previous owner had "because it didn't use all that much oil" but I found a fellow who sells seal kits for the upper and lower cylinders cheap and got a set ordered. I just received the kit a couple days ago but haven't got them installed yet.  While I was waiting on the seal kit I looked at all the play in the countershaft gears and started pulling gears off to see what all needed to be rebushed.  I ordered a 7/8"x 13" bar of bearing bronze  from Enco.

One of the shafts was badly worn and the bushings were wallowed pretty badly so I O.D. ground the shaft until it cleaned up straight (went from .625 OD to .617 OD) then made the new bushings for the gear.

After grinding:



I ended up replacing all the bronze bushings I could with the exception of the sliding gear and the lathe sounds much better now without the gears beating against each other.

I had an extra 2 HP VFD in the attic and set it up to run this lathe.  Someone asked about it in another thread but every VFD has their own nuances to contend with.  In my set up I just programmed the VFD to provide 60Hz and used a 3 way switch to control the motor with FWD/OFF/REV.  I didn't bother with a potentiometer for speed control because the lathe already has variable speed.  Rather than mess with the 6 or 8 wires coming out of the existing fwd/rev switch I just leave it in the fwd position all the time and use my toggle switch to control motor direction.

I needed a back splash for the lathe so I cobbled one together from  square tubing and 20 ga sheet metal last weekend. The tubing is welded to some angle iron that bolts to the insides of the uprights so the whole backsplash can be removed as a unit with 4 bolts.  The tubing is just there to support the sheet metal and a tool rack I haven't made yet.










Now that the lathe is operational I will turn my attention back to the hydraulic seals in the variable speed system.


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## Holescreek

I got the hydraulic seals from the repair kit installed.  I did the bottom one first, bled it out and the variable speed adjustments worked perfectly.  I did the upper seal kit next and have been having a heck of a time getting the variable speed to work within the ranges on the scale around the dial.  It hits the high ranges but won't rotate all the way down in the low range.  I got tired of messing with it last week and will get back to it eventually.

In the meantime I changed focus to a couple of other problems. The compound screw nut was badly worn, I could grab the compound and push it back and forth about .08".  I ordered a 3/8"-10 acme tap from Ebay and made a new nut.  Now the total backlash is .003".   

Today I decided to check the tailstock concentricity to the spindle and discovered that the tailstock sat .006" taller than the headstock. I'm not sure how that could happen given that the tailstock is serial numbered to the lathe but I can only assume that someone had the headstock off in the past and removed some shims installed at the factory.   There was obvious wear underneath the tailstock, and surely it didn't wear itself taller so I removed the baseplate from the tailstock and cleaned a couple decades of junk out of it and checked it again.  Sure enough, an even .006" too tall.
I put the base on the surface grinder and gave each side a dusting, reassembled it and checked it again and it was a solid .005" to go.  I tore it down again and took the .005" of the top of the base and brought the tailstock in line with the headstock.

Tonight was my first time to actually try to cut metal on it.  I ordered some BXA tool holders from CDCO Thursday night and they arrived this afternoon.  I made some test passes with carbide on a 1" bar of CRS  and got a nice even finish.  I wanted to test the threading controls  because they are different than I'm used to and the thread dial obviously is from another brand of machine.   Threading didn't start out so good, I had the machine set up for 24 tpi and the leadscrew kept stopping when I engaged the halfnuts.  There's also something loose inside the apron, possibly attached to the handwheel.  I'll need to break the apron down and see what's going on.  Long story short, I found that the aluminum shear pin on the leadscrew had indeed sheered off and once replaced the machine threaded fine.


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## Kroll

That sure looks like one nice lathe,love your back splash.Congrats ----kroll


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## FOMOGO

That's a nice lathe you have there, especially after all your repairs and upgrades. Was going to say, wouldn't it be nice to buy a used machine that someone had already none all the work on, but I'm beginning to think that going through them ourselves is half the fun. I think it gives you a more intimate knowledge of your machine, and the certainty that everything is as it should be, along with any improvements made. I'm sure you'll soon have the speed control issue figured out. Mike


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## Holescreek

FOMOGO said:


> That's a nice lathe you have there, especially after all your repairs and upgrades. Was going to say, wouldn't it be nice to buy a used machine that someone had already none all the work on, but I'm beginning to think that going through them ourselves is half the fun. I think it gives you a more intimate knowledge of your machine, and the certainty that everything is as it should be, along with any improvements made. I'm sure you'll soon have the speed control issue figured out. Mike



Funny you should mention that.  Every complete lathe I ever sold went to a new owner working 100%.  

Last week a lathe I really want (another Traytop) came up for sale and unfortunately for me it was two weeks after I bought this one.  Friends and family keep telling me to buy it and sell the Clausing.  If I had a place large enough to store another lathe I just might have done that. As it is I'd have to leave the extra lathe on the trailer.


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## songbird

Holescreek said:


> I got the hydraulic seals from the repair kit installed.  I did the bottom one first, bled it out and the variable speed adjustments worked perfectly.  I did the upper seal kit next and have been having a heck of a time getting the variable speed to work within the ranges on the scale around the dial.  It hits the high ranges but won't rotate all the way down in the low range.  I got tired of messing with it last week and will get back to it eventually.
> 
> In the meantime I changed focus to a couple of other problems. The compound screw nut was badly worn, I could grab the compound and push it back and forth about .08".  I ordered a 3/8"-10 acme tap from Ebay and made a new nut.  Now the total backlash is .003".
> 
> Today I decided to check the tailstock concentricity to the spindle and discovered that the tailstock sat .006" taller than the headstock. I'm not sure how that could happen given that the tailstock is serial numbered to the lathe but I can only assume that someone had the headstock off in the past and removed some shims installed at the factory.   There was obvious wear underneath the tailstock, and surely it didn't wear itself taller so I removed the baseplate from the tailstock and cleaned a couple decades of junk out of it and checked it again.  Sure enough, an even .006" too tall.
> I put the base on the surface grinder and gave each side a dusting, reassembled it and checked it again and it was a solid .005" to go.  I tore it down again and took the .005" of the top of the base and brought the tailstock in line with the headstock.
> 
> Tonight was my first time to actually try to cut metal on it.  I ordered some BXA tool holders from CDCO Thursday night and they arrived this afternoon.  I made some test passes with carbide on a 1" bar of CRS  and got a nice even finish.  I wanted to test the threading controls  because they are different than I'm used to and the thread dial obviously is from another brand of machine.   Threading didn't start out so good, I had the machine set up for 24 tpi and the leadscrew kept stopping when I engaged the halfnuts.  There's also something loose inside the apron, possibly attached to the handwheel.  I'll need to break the apron down and see what's going on.  Long story short, I found that the aluminum shear pin on the leadscrew had indeed sheered off and once replaced the machine threaded fine.
> 
> I sure like that lathe. I have one just like it, made in 1966. I have the same issue with the speed controller not slowing the spindle down as it should with staying in sink with the lever scale. I first thought it was an issue of using a static converter, (loosing about 30% efficiency), by then should be turning slower than indicating. I do not believe my hydronic seals are bad,but since have added a cheap tachometer bought on e-bay, and have lived with the problem. Let us know if you figure it out. Thanks, Jim.ATTACH]126231[/ATTACH]


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## songbird

2nd try at reply, sorry. Nice lathe, I have one just like it made in 1966. I also have the same issue of the speed controller not slowing the spindle down all the way to the lower speed range. I thought this was an issue caused by using a static phase converter, (loosing efficiency about 30%), but realized that should have the opposite effect. Please let us know if you figure it out. I've since installed a cheap electronic tachometer bought on e-bay, and living with it. Thanks, Jim.


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## jcd3

songbird said:


> 2nd try at reply, sorry. Nice lathe, I have one just like it made in 1966. I also have the same issue of the speed controller not slowing the spindle down all the way to the lower speed range. I thought this was an issue caused by using a static phase converter, (loosing efficiency about 30%), but realized that should have the opposite effect. Please let us know if you figure it out. I've since installed a cheap electronic tachometer bought on e-bay, and living with it. Thanks, Jim.


You need to thoroughly bleed the vari speed system.


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## amsoilman

I've heard of twisting the knob to the slow position and securing it there overnight for the air to bleed out.


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## songbird

amsoilman said:


> I've heard of twisting the knob to the slow position and securing it there overnight for the air to bleed out.


I think I will try that, I have already tried bleeding over and over, with no improvement. I will let you know if it works!


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## Holescreek

I may give that a try myself. Truthfully, I haven't used the Clausing lathe for anything short of some experimentation I did shortly after I first posted the photos.  I bought it to do barrel work on and  as a back-up to my Traytop in case I wasn't able to use it for various reasons. It mostly just sits there looking pretty.


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