Putting oil on the outside of the M1-89 Spacer did not hurt anything. It also didn't much help anything. The two most under-oiled lube points on an Atlas lathe or an Atlas mill are the back gear shaft, and even worse, the two or three bushings in the cone pulley and small spindle gear. The back gear spindle bushings on the mill are oiled through the hole that the M1-16 Oil Screw sits in. Remove the screw, squirt oil into the hole, install the screw, spin the back gears several times, repeat once. One would think that one would be obvious. The cone pulley and small gear bushings on the mill are oiled through the #8-32 Allen set screw in the bottom of the larger groove in the cone pulley. If you are running the belt in the large groove, you will hae to move the belt over to the smaller groove. Remove the screw, make several squirts with the oil can into the hole, reinstall the set screw, and spin the pulley. This should be done either every 30 days or every time that you use back gears, whichever comes first. If you are doing an ever 30 day oiling, repeat twice. If you are using back gear every day, repeat once.
The belief that sintered bronze (Oilite) bushings never need oil is false. The sintered bronze bushings do store the oil, but they need periodic flushing and replenishment. Both of which periodic oiling provides.
