I just bought a South bend Lath. It was just too good a deal to pass up. Guy at work is cleaning out his dads shop. He said he just wanted it gone. I offered him $400 he said its yours. Dam should have started lower but I have been watching for a decent smaller lathe on craigs list and the only ones I see for near $400 has been the small Craftsman/Atlas desktop ones.

Now I just need to get it home.

 

gona need some help with that one. does he happen to have a fork lift, lol. pretty good deal.

 

Its not as heavy as my lift

 

What's a bend lathe?

 

South bend is the manufacture. This is a manual metal lathe.

 

I love old tool boxes, while I was picking up the lathe I saw an old tool box in the corner. It has to be 60 years old and all the hardware is there. I offered him 50 bucks for it. He just handed it to me. It must have weighed 60 pounds. I didn't even open it till I got home. It was full of machinist tools. Turning tools boring bars inserted and old school tools. Oh and a day planner from 1988

 

The lathe comes home. This is my rigging set up. The large furniture dolly made it to the ramp and collapsed (duh). I just replaced with a car dolly, This is a real lathe, not a one designed for home use. It was converted from 3 phase to single phase 220v. It has been in a basement for 20 years. Seems like everything is there every attachment every oil cap. Yes the entire base is cast. I was a little worried about my trailer. It is call a South bend Heavy 10 with 3.5' bed model 199Z

 

old school. very cool.

 

This lathe has been taking me to school. Turn out it is a little older then I guessed. It is a little over 70 years old. For those of you quick with math you already know it was built during WWII. As everyone knows all metal was used toward the war effort. Anything made from metal that was not a weapon or ammo had to be marked to stop companies from boot legging material. While cleaning the lath I found this tag.


The serial number I found place the manufacture date as 1943.

 

That's a cool touch. Did you make anything on it yet?