Dont drop your lathe

[Lakc]

I suppose dropping my lathe counts as a boo boo. Mistake 1 was the questionable parentage of the hooks in the basement ceiling, but I figured it would go along with the questionable Chinese heritage of the lathe. It weighs approx 375# fully dressed as a 3n1 machine, but I had removed the mill column, table, tailstock, chuck, etc. and I would guess it was less then 200 #. Mistake #2 was, as always, being in a hurry. It lifted off the table just fine, I pushed, poked, and prodded it from afar and it seemed stable enough. The second I moved the table out from underneath it one hook pulled out of the ceiling. Dinged the motor mount and a few pulleys, but near as I can tell, thats it so far. If it had landed on the leadscrew or geartrain it probably would have been a write off.

Things that went right, were keeping the hell out from underneath anything I am lifting like that, :-\

 

[Alan J. Richer]

Personal opinion from having lifted too many things in dodgy ways - never rely on a screw thread to hold in wood in tension (pulling out on it). Then you are relying on the wood to hold on...never a great idea depending on the species.

Whenever I have to do something ugly like that I'll either drill a small hole through the beam and put through a bar (which is a LOT harder to shear), then put the lifting chain/whatever onto both sides of the protruding bar.

Glad you're all right and that the damage seems to be minor.

Alan

 

[itowbig]

oh boy thats not good. good thing u were not under it. i ordered a lathe from HF and it arived in broken bits i mean broken bits. it was broken in half some body droped it from the fork lift and it hit the concrete. what a mess
hopefully urs is ok. got a pic of the damage

 

[Lakc]

got a pic of the damage

Cant focus the camera through the tears at the moment
Actually, I may get some pics, but if you have seen one dinged cast iron v belt pulley, you probably would be bored by another. The only interesting looking part is the motor mount, went from the square U shape to a trapezoid.

 

[Lakc]

Whenever I have to do something ugly like that I'll either drill a small hole through the beam and put through a bar (which is a LOT harder to shear), then put the lifting chain/whatever onto both sides of the protruding bar.

Glad you're all right and that the damage seems to be minor.

Alan

Absolutely correct. Thats where the "in a hurry" part got me. This particular basement kitchen was refinished by the former owner with a detestable tongue and groove 1'x1' ceiling tiles. Rather impossible to remove without destroying the 4 surrounding them.
Jeff

 

[jwsvandr]

Personal opinion from having lifted too many things in dodgy ways - never rely on a screw thread to hold in wood in tension (pulling out on it). Then you are relying on the wood to hold on...never a great idea depending on the species.

Not machining related but I had a very uncomfortable walk through the bush to get back to the launch area when the rudder on my sailing dingy parted ways because the person who restored it used screws instead of bolts...

 

[cfellows]

My 11" logan went face first onto the asphalt about 10 years ago during a move. Like an idiot, I had jacked each end up and placed a piano dolly under each of the 2 cast iron legs. The wife and I were rolling it out to the Ryder truck which had a rear lift gate. I got it to the truck whereupon one of the piano dollys slewed out from under the front half of one of the legs. Luckily both the wife and I got out of the way before it slammed to the ground from about 40" up. Cost me over $500 to replace all the broken bits. Broke both quick change handles, the quickchange cover, the carriage and cross slide handwheels, the compound and bent the cross slide screw. It's amazing how every now and the the brain seems to disengage and let you do things that you know are highly risky.

Chuck

 

[rake60]

I have dropped a heavy item or two in my career.
The heaviest was a 32 ton crusher spider that I was attempting
to flip with a 10 ton overhead crane. The "can do" attitude of the
shop I was working for assured me that the spider weighed only 20 ton.
That would be no big deal for a 10 ton crane. In short they lied to me
and I trusted them. That was MY fault!

Anyway, I picked the spider up and when the weight broke over the crane
brakes failed. The wire rope cables spinning off the hoist drum of the crane
sounded like a fire siren winding up. I hit the up button on the control
pendent to try to fight the drop with the clutches. It did slow it down some
but the spider slowly sank 9 inches into the concrete floor before I actually
had control of it again. Even then I wasn't aware of the weight I was dealing with.
After the job was finished I was loading it onto the flatbed trailer that had
brought it in. I asked the driver what his bill of lading was. When he told me
64000 pounds I was less than impressed.

Rick

 

[Lakc]

Well, after a few long weekenights, and a couple of 12 hour days this weekend, the lathe is back up and running at its new location. I loose 2 speeds due to damaged pulleys. I'll have to try casting new ones sometime later. The motor armature did try to exit the endbell, leaving a few radial cracks, but it still works for now. I was hoping to convert it over to 220v operation, but its a 110v only motor. ??? All this work probably calls for a good post in the shop forum, so I'll try and take some pics and start a post over there before it gets too filthy again ;D

 

[zeeprogrammer]

I can bet there are a bunch of members shuddering at this thread and happy it hasn't happened to them.

Very sorry for the accident.
Very glad you're okay.

 

[Lykle]

When I got my first lathe I went to the shop and then used a forklift and two guys to get it in my car. It was a hefty 9x20 lathe.

Happily I drove home.
Oh, I am alone, now what?
So I made a slide out of scrap wood, lifted the tailstock end balancing it on the tailgate and slowly maneuvered it out and out. It dropped and started to slide down the ramp.

And of course I could not hold it back, at the end it was going quite fast. Luckily I had space so it came to a stop in the middle of the garage.

I had cleared the space on a strong shelf in a wall to wall rack. How to get it up there.
OK, screwed in a eye in the wooden beam overhead.

Tied some rope to it, got out my old tackle and pulley and started lifting. It was heavy, I could only just lift it. Got it a little above the right shelf and was thinking about how to move it over onto the shelf. Hmm should have thought of this before!

Creaking! More creaking! The eye was coming out. While it was starting to drop I gave it a big shove and it landed on the shelf, perfect!

A lot of sweat was wiped and a lot of breaths were taken. Then the giggles began.

Lykle

 

[bentprop]

Hell,Lykle,you were lucky to get away with that one
It that was me,it would have tipped over and landed on my left foot!
Jeff,before you go through all the trouble of casting pulleys,many large supply co's have pulley blanks,that just need to have the relevant hole bored in the middle,and the groove machined to suit your belts.I had a look at them when changing the motor on a mini-lathe.

 

[phlegmatic]

@Lykle Rof} Rof} Rof} Rof} Rof} thats the kind of story u cant invent, reality beats fiction everytime!

 

[jack.39]

When I worked District Maintenance for Sears Roebuck, I got a job to install a new box baler in one of the Tucson stores. These balers are big and heavy, standing about ten feet high, weight I guess about 2 to 3 tons. They are basically a hydraulic press, self-contained, with oil reservoir, pump, big cylinder, moving platen, which squashes down card boxes placed within.

The machine had been trucked to the store lying on it's side, no surprise there. After deliberating, I ordered some 1" all-thread, washers and nuts, and a BIG forged eyebolt. From the second level of the store, working amongst the refrigerators for sale, we drilled a 1-1/4" hole through the concrete floor, below which, on the 1st. level, was the stockroom and area for the baler. With the eyebolt up at ceiling level above the baler, all-thread through the hole in the floor, we used a length of heavy chain and a chainfall to slowly raise the baler from it's side, upwards until it finally over-centered, with a mighty boom, boom, boom, as it rocked from side to side until it finally settled down.

The store manager swore the building shook, filed a complaint with my boss, who countered with the estimated cost to have a contractor do the job; we saved them a couple thou, anyway, even if some customers were scared sh**less! jack