Got My First Lathe... Logan 1875 - With Restoration.

[wa5cab]

Yeah, and big 'ole Acme's. too.

 

[Mr Mike]

I am going to try and recreate the rubber bushing using a blank made from rock hard water putty.
I've used the stuff in the past and it is Rock hard putty - Its also only 3 bucks, so it warrants a try.



After the putty set up I removed it from the cup, I started drilling a small hole in the center and noted that the innards weren't hard yet. I put it in the oven at 150 deg for 3 hrs to dry it out..

Again I drilled out the center to mount a bolt so the lathe would have something to hold onto so I could turn the blank.



This Rubber bushing was the best of the bunch, so I used it as my model along with a metal bushing support, The rock hard bushing came out pretty good. Ill spray it with primer and fill the voids then seal it.

I didn't run into any problems turning rock hard putty to size on the lathe, The motor mount carriage bar was 3/8 but I drilled out the new blank 1/64" smaller for a snug fit, I have no experience with mold making so it would be great to get it right on the first try - Fingers crossed.



As you can see.. The hole in the bushing is stretched out and deformed



If I had to, I could just put the bushings back in and rotate them 180 Deg using the opposite side of the hole, but there hard as rock, cracked and need to be replaced, if not for the extra fun and feeling of accomplishment when I'm done.



Tomorrow Ill try and make a negative mold using a playable OOMOO 30 sores silicon rubber, its intended use is to make exact copies of item and be reusable.. the product is from a company called SMOOTH ON, I watched a couple videos of this stuff in action and it looks promising - I also need to find out what hardness ( Sores ) of 2 part urethane ill need to get to make my rubber bushings out of..

 

[Bamban]

Can you use a hockey puck?

 

[Mr Mike]

Can you use a hockey puck?

Hello Sir, Funny you should mention Hockey Puck.. I don't remember where I've heard of a puck being used in such a manner, but I have heard of them being used as levelers for heavy equipment and all kinds of other uses..

I probably could create a bushing out of a Hockey Puck if I could find one with the right hardness and density. There are other rubber components missing or in bad shape on this lathe too, and since I cant buy them I thought I'd give it a shot and try an make them.

Thanks for the heads up thou..

Edit: The rubber bushings can still be purchased from Logan Actuator Co. As of 10-24-2017 They have them in stock for about 14.00 each.

 

[Mr Mike]

I made and painted a four compartment mold box today in hopes of being able to pour some really awesome, cool ( because I made them ) new bushings for my lathe in the coming days. The Rock Hard Putty bushing is ready to make a mold from, and if all goes well I'll start pouring tomorrow to create negatives from it, I bet a few of you guys out there would have used a 3D printer to make four bushing to mold negatives from in a single pour.




I started working on the Motor Cabinet removing as much rust as I could with a twisted wire brush. then scrubbed it with Phosphoric acid, I'll let it sit on the cabinet over night before rinsing it off. I wil post a photo or two under this one showing the end result of the rusted bottom tomorrow.



The phosphoric acid did an excellent job removing rust, the motor cabinet has allot more pot holes then the storage cabinet.
Again the 1/4 inch beam at the center of the cabinet has much less damage then the 1/8" plate its attached to.



All primed up and no where to go.. Both cabinets are mechanically and cosmetically in good shape excluding the floor pans and should paint up nicely.

Tomorrow I'm going to paint the bottom of both cabinets with a durable coating ( I'm thinking a bed liner paint ) so this cant happen again, and set them aside to thoroughly dry before putting them on carpeted 4 wheel dollies. If all goes well I'll paint the chip pan this weekend so I can test out the HVLP pressure pot spray gun I got a Harbor Freight, and learn about its quirks an settings.

 

[Mr Mike]

I got up early and called Logan Actuator, I talked to an engineer and asked about the 1/4 beam at the bottom of each cabinet.. I wanted to know if the 5/8" holes in the bar are for securing the cabinet to cement or if they can be used to mount leg levelers on - He said both, He also stated that royal machine levelers should be used, I've goggled them and their a bit pricey but worth it.. I think this is the one Royal Machine Mount.

I told him that I was restoring a lathe, and told him I was getting ready to make some rubber bushings for the motor mounts.. lol he rattled off the dimensions and the part number as if he just made them and said they have them in stock. I'm thinking damn I've made the mold already..! we talked very briefly so I didn't get allot of info..

LOL on the plus side I did pour the first of four molds today, its nice to know if I fail.. I can still buy them

I do not recommend this particular smooth on oomoo 30 silicone rubber mold mix, because it is way to viscus to determine when to stop pouring, And that should have been the easy part because I made the box to the same hight as the part so I would know when to stop.. and It was near impossible to not introduce bubbles during the mixing phase, to be fair I did buy it at a craft store and it clearly states on the instruction which are in the box that it should be used very soon because it has a short unopened shelf life.

Never the less I'm excited to see how this turns out.

 

[Mr Mike]

Today I painted the bottom of the cabinets with a rubberized paint that I will top coat with Dark Grey when I am doing the final spray finish..

Sorry I know this whole restoration process seems to be taking a long time..! Half of it is Me - I'm slow, and the other half is just the massive amount prep work it takes to get things ready for painting, And I only have a couple hrs a day to do it.. their getting close thou and will be ready soon.

The rubber mold is coming along fine, and should be done tomorrow.. It takes 6 hrs to cure each pour so I can only do two a day, and one of Negative pours was a failure so I have to redo it.

I also added 11 inches to the width of the Gantry this evening, I was a bit too conservative when I first built it at 37" It's now 48" wide, That way it will be easier to lift the cabinets from their sides to an upright position, lol I see HF is having a sale on an electric winch.. Hmm

Before I can paint these up I'll need to make a few simple Tee drying stands to keep them steady and off the ground while the paint cures. then I'll put on the levelers and start to reassemble all thats done up to the lathe bed.. After this is done I expect the hard part will begin.

It's amazing how many life skills it takes to do a project like this. Or I should say to make it easier. Ever since I was a kid I was always tearing things apart to see what makes them tick, and its not that you need to have a multitude of skills in todays times, you can pickup what you need using the net, just like I learned how to do Electrolysis. But I cant imagine doing this without aids such as an engine hoist to move stuff or a press that I use on the kids cars.

In any case great respect goes out to all the people that have already done this.

 

[Nogoingback]

No need to apologize for anything. You're doing a huge amount of work and you're doing it well. That lathe will be
a real credit to you when it's finished.

 

[Mr Mike]

Stuff I completed today..

The Negative mold is complete, there are a few small bubbles in each cell.. I'd give it a C+ should be fine.
I had one disaster pour that I removed and re-poured, The funny thing is, I thought it was going to be the good one.




For any of you that are thinking about trying out or getting a new Harbor Freight Vulcan welder..
I'm a hobby welder and have never done it professionally, I have only welded maybe a couple thousand joints like this in my whole life. This is my first Inverter welder too, Not to mention I'm real rusty since its been about a year since I last welded anything. My first welder was an Lincoln SP-175 plus, It was heavier but smaller then this Vulcan. This Vulcan welder seems to be built well in both fit and finish and I had no issues at all from the first weld to the last so I'd say with some more practice I'll have a real winner here..

Oh and the Vulcan Helmet I bought at the same time is every bit as comfortable as my old Lincoln helmet, Its full view and works great and its cheap at $140.00

This Anchor only had 16 welds which isn't enough to make a good assessment from and its guna take some time to get use to Pre and Post gas, I'm use to welding as soon as I pull the trigger. Now I have to anticipate when the wire will start rolling out to do a one or two second tack, so far so good thou, After I do my fence project I'll have had allot of time on this welder and be able to make a better assessment about it.


I finally got to use the new HF Vulcan welder today to build an anchor for the Gantry..
The welder was set to full auto/synergy mode in this photo, weld looks pretty decent - but I got allot of micro splatter..



Next I set the welder to manual mode and increased the gas flow to 30 cfm from 25cfm, Again an ok weld but with much less splatter.



I put a prime finish on the Anchor and attached a new Back saving device on the Gantry.
The hoist is from Harbor freight and works like a charm, Its the smallest one they carry and cost 79.00 after discount. My back will be happier.



I built the simple tee supports for the cabinets to rest on while the Paint Dries, I welded on 1/2" X 3" bolts and drilled out some 3/8" washers so I can mount this on the center beam under the cabinets to keep them off the ground.



I feel I got plenty done today, I'll be doing some paint prep tomorrow.. And if I'm lucky get something primed up.

 

[Mr Mike]

I started Paint Prep on the chip pan today...

First I completely scrubbed the " HE Double Hockey Stick " out of top and bottom of the chip pan with Purple Power, My favorite goto cleaner. It easily took 1-1/2 Hrs just to get all the Dirt, Oil & Gunk off.

After the chip pan was rinsed & dry I went to town on the rust with my twisted wire brush to knock off all the rust scale & sticker in the center.

I used a scraper to get the rubber coating off the underside and a metal file to remove nicks and burrs along the edges. Then I used Phosphoric acid and scrubbed the chip pan and let the sun bake it dry.. after about an hour I scrubbed and rinsed it. The chip pan came out excellent.

Edit:
To be honest, Looking back on all the work thats been done with these 3 large items... It may have been beneficial to just build an electrolysis tank for them, Before you can get at the rust you have to do a great job of De-greasing then remove Rust Scale then soak with phosphoric acid and rinse numerous times.. Then when thats all done you have to make sure to check for loose paint and by the time your done theres bound to be many spots where the paint is all but gone, really thin and may even peel down the road, as can be seen in the 3rd photo..

Now that you have the Items all cleaned up and ready to prime ( Yes you did a great job..! ) your still left with less then an ideal surface. You bought enough of the best primer to spray the whole project.. The question is do you was to prime a really clean but decaying surface or a factory fresh substrait.

For people that have a very small or no yard this may be the best and only option, you would be asking for nothing but trouble having a tank in your garage large enough to hold these items, which is fine... This chip pan will be in great shape for years to come if you did a great prep job.

If you have the room - Even if the the hours you spend preping the items vs the hrs to build a tank along with some post cleanup were equal, you would be " or in my case would have been " better off I believe going the tank route.. Because you end up with the ultimate prep job - just the pure substrait.

I doubt ill have to prep Items this size again anytime in the foreseeable future... But if I do, there will be a tank involved.






After all the Dirt, Oil, Rust and loose paint was removed I let the chip pan thoroughly dry, I was now ready to prime and paint it, I began assembly of the new HF HVLP pressure pot spray gun so I could knock this puppy out in a single day.

Nope not going to happen - One of the hoses.. specifically the air hose to the gun had a connector different in size from the rest.. which is fine because you wouldn't want to connect a paint hose to the air inlet on the spray gun, except the gun had an adapter mismatch.

I took the sprayer back to HF and showed them, the gal was nice enough and said sometimes these things happen ( I don't know if its just me.. but I've never had any luck with HF spray equipment ) She refunded my money. I didn't get another spray gun because the day was getting long and I would not have enough time to get back and complete the job..

I'll hit a couple of spray shops this week and get a good spray gun and try again next weekend. I'll prep the motor cabinet during the week if time allows.. Maybe ill be ready to paint all three pieces who knows..

LOL I have had a rough time with this whole painting thing from the start... I know I need to use a professional paint on these parts If its to endure another 30 years - I can get away with rattle can paint above the chip pan, but the chip pan and cabinets need to be durable. I intend to win this battle.