First Lathe. Good Deal Or Waste Of Money?

Question; good deal or waste of money?

Answer; yes!

Benefit of buying an older lathe is that you get to know it intimately as you clean up, fix, etc

But you don't necessarily make all the chips you want right off the bat.

Fair price really depends in large degree on location. You may have gotten a better lathe at that price in a tool-rich environment, but would have expense of travel to go get it or shipping cost.

Yes, you hate to overpay (not saying you did), but keep in mind that having a lathe is better than not having one. And if I had minimum wage for every hour I've spent scouring for machine tools, I'd have been able to afford a decent new one. something to be said for just getting one and starting to make chips.
 
I have a neighbor whom has a lathe similar to yours in size,but newer and a different brand. It has been sitting in his shop for over ten years and he has never fired it up. If you use the lathe and enjoy it, then it's a good deal. The only thing that I will add is to learn to use it well and safely, and that is what this site is for.
 
Jmanb13 said:
Cleaned up the ways a little and made a video. From looking at the wear patterns it really looks like the previous owner used the carriage at the far end way more than close to the chuck.

There is the obligatory dents directly underneath the chuck from carelessness, but for the most part the rest of the ways look decent to my untrained eye.

You can see the crazy gunk I had to clean off in the video.

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Seems like you have already started to enjoy your lathe.
There is a lot of satisfaction to be had from reviving good old machines.
Looking forward to seeing the results. Hope you also enjoy the great bunch of folks here.
 
Considering it was delivered to your driveway and it cleans up well I think you did ok. I know some have gotten better deals but with all the tooling I see and delivery included I think you did well.
 
For the size and what came with it and delivered YOU did just fine!
Wipe it down, get used to it and enjoy it as is !
I have ran a lot worse lol, its not the lathe that makes the machinist its the machinist that makes the lathe!
Most of the ways on older and some newer lathes are dinged up so I don't see any thing to be alarmed about and you got enough tooling to get started so go for it.:encourage:
 
Thanks all. I have been watching CL for a couple months now and the pickings have been pretty slim. I see 1 lathe show up every 2 or 3 weeks, and everything I find is either extremely overpriced , 300+ miles away, or totally destroyed.
 
Ways look decent, definitely more visible wear further down the bed which is a good thing if you are making short parts but the wear doesn't look excessive. A rotary VFD is dead easy to make, all you need is another 3 phase motor with approx 50% more HP, a switch or 2 and a capacitor. There's a how-to in the electrical section here.

Also check: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Leblondlathe/info

Looks rough but if there are no major problems I think it's good value. It's one heck of a "starter" lathe!
 
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The LeBlond are good lathes, I can still see factory flaking on the rear way, Id say you did just fine. You do have a project to get it cleaned up and working. All that black dried grease and oil on the front of the front way, Vertical surface has to go but a liberal application of that purple cleaner from auto zone, wal mart just name your "mart" works great then a good putty knife works great to remove it. Citra-strip works well on the paint. Liberal coating let it soak a long time covered in plastic then a putty knife and wire brush work well. Change all the fluids in the head and other gear boxes, make sure the oilers works well and your ready to make chips. VFD works great as a phase converter and can add some top end to those lathes which are a bit slow.
 
martik777 said:
Ways look decent, definitely more visible wear further down the bed which is a good thing if you are making short parts but the wear doesn't look excessive. A rotary VFD is dead easy to make, all you need is another 3 phase motor with approx 50% more HP, a switch or 2 and a capacitor. There's a how-to in the electrical section here.

Also check: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Leblondlathe/info

Looks rough but if there are no major problems I think it's good value. It's one heck of a "starter" lathe!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info! I've joined the yahoo group to see what they have.

TakeDeadAim said:
The LeBlond are good lathes, I can still see factory flaking on the rear way, Id say you did just fine. You do have a project to get it cleaned up and working. All that black dried grease and oil on the front of the front way, Vertical surface has to go but a liberal application of that purple cleaner from auto zone, wal mart just name your "mart" works great then a good putty knife works great to remove it. Citra-strip works well on the paint. Liberal coating let it soak a long time covered in plastic then a putty knife and wire brush work well. Change all the fluids in the head and other gear boxes, make sure the oilers works well and your ready to make chips. VFD works great as a phase converter and can add some top end to those lathes which are a bit slow.
Click to expand...

I finally got the chance to open up the headstock and all the gears have all their teeth fortunately. :D
I'll grab some of the Purple cleaner. I got a couple plastic putty knives to scrape off some of the crusty crap. I also picked up a gallon of Evaporust to clean up some of the rusty parts that I can submerge.

In addition to that I have some Mobile Vacuoline #1409 for the ways on the way as well as a Hitachi WJ200 VFD to power it.

As far as fluids, is there recommendations on good fluids to use in the gearbox etc?
 
I know they have a manual for your lathe at vintagemachinery.org so you could get the definitive answer on lubricant for the head and gearboxes. Usually some sort of hydraulic fluid. I have a hitachi WJ200 on my mill, nice unit.
 
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