My (New to me) Gorton 1-22 is coming home this week!

[parrothead]

I made a deal on a Gorton 1-22 and an old Leblond lathe with a phase converter the other day. Now I have to move the stuff! The current owner has a pretty rickety backhoe to load them, but it has pretty shaky hydraulics and no brakes. This stuff is only about 7 miles from my house, so I'm considering a tow truck service. I have a good trailer, but my loader tractor can't lift the mill when I get home. Any thoughts / ideas?

 

[JRock1000]

Pallet Jack.
Get him to set it down on a pallet jack, then you can tilt the trailer, and Feed it out with a chain hoist when you get home.

 

[matthewsx]

I moved mine with a forklift, blocked under the ram and lifted it onto and off my trailer. Call your local forklift rental company and see how much they would charge, obviously you need high enough ceilings for the lift to work though.

If you use a tow truck service make sure they send someone who has done it before, pretty easy to make scrap metal out of it

John

 

[parrothead]

I think I'll have to use the tow truck option. I don't think a fork lift would work well at this guy's place. The tow truck guy said he can load & unload them off my trailer (my car hauler doesn't tilt). I have an old Clark 2000lb capacity fork lift at my shop, but it's not man enough for this job.

 

[brino]

Congrats on the "new" machines!

Be safe when moving them.
-brino

 

[Liljoebrshooter]

I have a Gorton 1-22 mill also. I could barely lift it with my case 580c backhoe. They are heavy, like 3000 lbs.
I torn mine down almost to the last bolt and cleaned and put new bearings everywhere i could even the spindle. It is a great machine to own.
Joe Hynes

 

[parrothead]

I got it home! We stuck these machines on the back of a tow truck and made 2 trips. Now I need to scoot them into their new home against that wall on the right. I plan to put the mill in the corner and put the lathe on the right side of the mill.

 

[parrothead]

Does anyone have an idea of what year my mill was made? I was just curious. the S/N is 37417.

 

[Choiliefan]

Serial number 37767 is from 1955 which may be the 1st year of production.

 

[parrothead]

I got the beast settled in and fired up last night. I'm wondering if I need to tear the spindle down to lube bearings, etc, or just use it like it is. It makes a little noise, but it doesn't seem to be excessive.