rescued a bit of america

[nobeard]

Hi rescued this machine this week from getting smashed,know some people may think its not worth saving but i like old machines and would rather put some time into this than a chinese machine the other reason is if you can forgive this yorkshire saying its built like a brick **** house lol anyway its been around since the 1940,s and still working so that deserves some respect alone.

http://i1061.photobucket.com/albums/t462/rayfirth/markham grange/hardhinge/S6001665.jpg

http://i1061.photobucket.com/albums/t462/rayfirth/markham grange/hardhinge/S6001664.jpg

yeah it has had a hard life but all the ways and the table moves nicely with no apparent wear it worked but was very noisey but i found that the belt had been replaced with a round joined belt that was noisey when the joint ran over the pulleys but after removing this the bearings are smooth as silk with no wear in them.The 2speed lever and reverse leaver missing isnt an issue as i would have removed them myself

http://i1061.photobucket.com/albums/t462/rayfirth/markham grange/hardhinge/S6001666.jpg

then i found whoever fitted the motor had left the pulleys so far out of line that the belt was hitting the pulleys causing them to ring so on removing the motor i found the front bearing had partially collapsed.The motor that had been fitted was 1hp which for the size of the machine i thought was a bit oversized so one question i would like to ask is would a 1/2hp motor be strong enough and secondly to save spliting the windings and adding a reversing switch does this really need to run in reverse at all. Its a bit too warm here at the moment to be draging this around and pulling it down so the idea was to get it running smoothly then leaving it untill the end of the year to strip it and replace the smooth coat and paint it and to repair the cabinet were the switch gear has been removed.

http://i1061.photobucket.com/albums/t462/rayfirth/markham grange/hardhinge/S6001667.jpg

http://i1061.photobucket.com/albums/t462/rayfirth/markham grange/hardhinge/S6001668.jpg

 

[rcfreak177]

Wow Nice score,

Bit of cleaning up and a few repairs then I reckon you will have a good solid little machine that will definitely last the test of time.

Thanks for sharing.

Baz

 

[Hopper]

Excellent acquisition indeed. Well done. I would keep the 1hp motor and not worry about reverse. I think you will find you more often want more power for deeper cuts, quicker feed etc than you need to run the spindle in reverse. (Not sure about the table feed set up on this machine though?)

Look at how solid the pillar/neck of that machine is, and the knee. It will handle bigger faster cuts than cheaper machines with a similar size table.

Yes if you are going to spend a bit of time tidying a machine up, you might as well do it on a quality unit like Hardinge and have a top notch machine at the end, rather than spend the time sorting out a poorly made Chinese cheap and tearful, at the end of which you still have a cheap Chinese machine.

My old 1936 lathe does a lovely job and I would not trade it for a new Chinese lathe and half a dozen wheelbarrows full of Chinese accessories and tooling.

Have fun with your new toy.

 

[Tin Falcon]

Looks like nice little mill.
Tin

 

[aarggh]

What a beaut score! I'm insanely jealous!

cheers, Ian

 

[Smithers]

Sweet.... glad you saved it from the scrap recyclers. Quality old machines sold as scrap to China to get reborn into inferior low cost imitations. Having said that, that is my own personal view, maybe there is some quality Chinese machines out there, but I haven't seen them. I suppose its a bit like the early eighties when everyone frowned upon Japanese machines, but look at them now.

Andrew

 

[Rivergypsy]

Ah nice - is this the one from Ebay last week? If you you outbid me, and I'm extremely jealous!

 

[nobeard]

I dont think so rivergypsy it was bought privatly not from ebay a freind came and told me were it was but thats not to say it hasnt been on ebay at some point in time.

 

[Rivergypsy]

Ok, I'll let you off, lol. I'm still envious though, as I have a Hardinge Cataract at home, and this would have gone very nicely with it
Fancy selling it on again??

 

[nobeard]

sorry rivergypsy to tell you the truth ive been trying to buy a mill for ages and have been down the road trying to buy from ebay for so long now and getting outbid in the last seconds i aint going there again m8 think no ill keep it .