Atlas 618 year of manufacture ???

[wesson]

Hi,
I'm a new member here. Glad to have found this great forum!
I just bought my first lathe as I always wanted to learn turning.
It's an Atlas 618 and, I would like to know the approximate year of manufacture.
the only numbers I found is on the bed and inside the gear gate.
It as the timkens bearings ant the shaft is threaded 1x10.
It don't as the original compound pulley assembly. I don't know if the motor is original too.

Thanks for any info!
Mat

 

[RJSakowski]

Our resident expert on Atlas and Atlas/Craftsman lathes is @wa5cab. I believe there is a table in the downloads section of Atlas serial nos. and year of manufacture..

Atlas & Craftsman Serial Number and Model Number Locations

I have added a field to the Atlas Machines database for the location of the model and serial numbers. The database is in Downloads, although the copy currently there does not have the field (because only two records have anything entered in the new field. There is also a copy of the database...

www.hobby-machinist.com

 

[Aaron_W]

The Atlas 618 is harder to place than the Craftsman lathes because it basically stayed the same through its 40-ish years of production. The Craftsman variant on the other hand went through several distinct changes with only the later Craftsman 101.21400 being essentially identical to the Atlas version.

There is a date stamped on the Timkin bearings, but that assumes the bearings are original, which the older the lathe the less likely that is the case.

I believe the serial number is that M2705 stamped on the bed, which probably places it pretty early in a run that went from the late 1930s into the early 1970s.
My Craftsman 101.21400 is best guess early 1970s with a serial number in the 23000s and I believe Sears started over with each new series, so yours is likely much older.

I can see yours has had several small modifications / replacements, but looks like it is still in pretty decent shape considering it is probably 70 something years old.


As RJ said Robert is the resident Atlas guru and will be able to provide far more detailed information. I'm basically just repeating what I learned from him when I got mine.

 

[mvagusta]

The model you have was first manufactured in 1939. For the first few years the lathes had the serial number stamped on the top surface at the right end of the front way, just like yours. The Atlas Instructions and Parts bulletin for 1940 indicates that the serial number was stamped in that fashion, but the bulletin for 1945 indicates that by that time the serial number was stamped on a plate that was fixed to the right end of the bed casting as in the photo below. So your lathe was made before 1945. For sure. But I think it was made earlier than that. There is an entry in the Hobby-Machinist database that indicates that its owner has a lathe with serial number 4703 that his grandfather bought in June of 1941. Your serial number 2705 is roughly half that, so at first glance I would guess it was produced in 1939 or 1940. Also, if 4703 lathes is averaged over 2 and a half years between 1/1/39 and 6/1/41, it's about 1900 per year. So perhaps more likely made in 1940 than 1939.

Here is the serial number plate on my lathe:



You can skip the rest of this if math is uninteresting to you. Or guessing.

Last year I took it apart, measured every component, and created 3D CAD models of them all. So I have measurements of all the parts. A thought occurred that it might be possible to determine when some of the parts were made by looking at the descriptions of the revision blocks in some of the Atlas factory drawings. You know ... if revision A had a hole diameter called out as .500 and revision B called it out as .563 and the hole on the part is .563, then the part is revision B or later. So I did that, and found 16 parts that had enough information in the drawings to determine which revision they were and therefore have a range of dates during which they could have been made. It turns out that all 16 of them could have been made between the middle of 1946 and the early part of 1948. So it is reasonable to believe that lathe serial number 011120 was produced in 1947 or 1948. The average production rate for 1939 to 1947 would be 1390 per year. If that rate was used with your serial number your lathe would have been made in the first two years of production. So that would support 1939 or 1940.

So that is my guess and I'm sticking to it.

Hope you have some fun with your new old lathe.

 

[wesson]

Thank you very much! It's very interesting.
It works very well. Tight and, .001 off when turning a 8" rod.
My pulleys are not originals. I have only 1 on the motor and 1 on the compound.
Could you give me the diameters on the 2 double pulleys please? I would like to replace them so I have all the RPM combos.
Thanks again
Mat

 

[wa5cab]

Mat, the original speed adjusting pullies (there were 2) were all 4-step like those on the larger 10" and 12" lathes and the first version of the Mill. For some reason they changed them to 3 and then 2 on the mill but did not on the lathe. I think that the 618 first came out in 1937 but as they didn't for some reason start engraving the inspection dates on the Timken bearings as the did on the 10" and 12" and we don't have any early invoices its difficult to say.

The Pulley drawings may be in Downloads. To answer a question about downloads, full access requires Doner status (any level from $10.00 per year up).

 

[mvagusta]

Robert is right, there are over 100 drawings for your lathe in Downloads and $10 per year to support Hobby-Machinist.com is a bargain. That's only 83 cents a month! Definitely worth it. This is a great group of enthusiasts who have a genuine interest in these machines and helping each other with them.

To answer your question on the pulleys, here are some dimensions for the 2-step pulley on the motor:



And here are some dimensions for the 2-step pulley on the countershaft:

You can make your own pulleys if you have the skill or you can find used articles on eBay. Also, there are a number of small businesses that make parts for Atlas lathes. I have obtained parts for my lathe from eBay and haven't used any of these vendors, but perhaps someone else could recommend sources for new replacement parts.

You may also wish to get a copy of an Atlas 618 Instructions and Parts bulletin, which has a listing of the parts for the machine. I would recommend the one from 1945 because it is close to the guesstimate date of your lathe and it has exploded assemblies. The one from 1940 is much harder to decipher. I haven't seen any parts list bulletins between 1940 and 1945 online. The ones I have found for the 618 and downloaded are 1940, 1945, 1950, 1960, 1962, 1967, and 1976. We have some in the Downloads section of our site and VintageMachinery.org also has some. Here is a link to their nice collection of documents from Atlas Press Company.

 

[wa5cab]

Aron,


Sorry that I missed your earlier question about the spindle and countershaft pulleys. I don't have the diameters at my fingertips but the four spindle belt pulley diameters are the same as the four countershaft belt pulley diameters except turned around (reverse order). The largest spindle pulley is to the front or right, next to the bull gear. The largest countershaft pulley is to the rear or left, next to the two-step motor belt pulley.

 

[wesson]

Thank you all for the answers!
Didn't know for the downloads page.
I'll hunt for the pulleys.
Mat

 

[wa5cab]

Mat,

The one photo that you did not include in your initial group which should normally always be included in the initial group is a front view photo of the headstock with the headstock top cover fully opened and with the camera a little higher and pointed down more so as to show the spindle pullies fully. Between 30 and 45 degrees down angle.

I believe that your lathe was built a little earlier than the other guesses, maybe in 1937 or 1938.

I am somewhat handicapped at present when it comes to dates or finding anything in Downloads. I had failures in software and hardware that I haven't fully recovered from.