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

She's looking beautiful, Mike!

The base cabinets are a bit big for an ERR bath, although it can certainly be done. I think I would opt for a brass brush in a 4" grinder and get most of the rust off, then hit it with Phosphoric Acid spray and while keeping it wet, finish by hand. Then I would prime it and then do the bodywork.

If the door will come off the right side pedestal, it shouldn't be too hard to flatten it.
 
Today I dilled out the spot welds and removed the door from the right cabinet, you can see in the photo how bad the compound bend is.
I'll run it by a sheet metal shop and see what they say.. its a 1/16 inch piece, I'm pretty sure it will have to be fabricated.

HingeSpotWeld.jpg

I drilled out the spot weld just enough to get the door off just in case I can save it. if so I'll Mig weld it back on.

HingeSpotWeldDrilled.jpg

I have a 20 ton press, but I don't have plates large enough to press this out.. I'll check and see if the steel yard has some scraps.

CabRightDoorBend.jpg

Other than the door.. the right cabinet pedestal is in pretty decent shape... less rust then I would have guessed.

CabRightBottomRust.jpg
 
I would try beat that out... clamp it to something simiar size and go to town?
 
Today I dilled out the spot welds and removed the door from the right cabinet, you can see in the photo how bad the compound bend is.
I'll run it by a sheet metal shop and see what they say.. its a 1/16 inch piece, I'm pretty sure it will have to be fabricated.

View attachment 243901

I drilled out the spot weld just enough to get the door off just in case I can save it. if so I'll Mig weld it back on.

View attachment 243902

I have a 20 ton press, but I don't have plates large enough to press this out.. I'll check and see if the steel yard has some scraps.

View attachment 243903

Other than the door.. the right cabinet pedestal is in pretty decent shape... less rust then I would have guessed.

View attachment 243904
The sheet metal can definitely be brought flat again. The thing you must keep in mind is that the metal must be shrunk where it has been stretched. Any additional stretching caused by pounding on it will only make things ultimately worse.
 
Not that I need to do it, but how do you shrink metal?
 
Not that I need to do it, but how do you shrink metal?
I'm guessing a few heat up and slow cool down cycles, while you reshape it. your kinda annealing the steel at the same time to relive the stress hardening that builds up and shrinking it back some after tooling it. Just guessing of course, its what we use to do with copper pipe so we could bend it without breaking it.
 
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OK. Makes sense
 
She's looking beautiful, Mike!

The base cabinets are a bit big for an ERR bath, although it can certainly be done. I think I would opt for a brass brush in a 4" grinder and get most of the rust off, then hit it with Phosphoric Acid spray and while keeping it wet, finish by hand. Then I would prime it and then do the bodywork.

So I found a different brand of Phosphoric acid at the big box store, it stated exactly on the label for rust removal and inhibits flash rusting.. " all that you stated to a T " Figure this is a good time to give it a shot as you recommended.
I also got some rust transformer for the interior of the cabinet floor - and the top of the cabinet had some rubber feeling compound between it and the chip tray so I got Rust-oleum rubber spray. I've got a spot picked out for the lathe, I'd like to get the bases ready this week so I can get the lathe bed mounted - and back to work on it...

RustSupplies.jpg

I used a wire brush on the grinder to knock off all the rust scale, then fallowing the directions I used a paint brush and the full strength solution to coat and kept wet while scrubbing to loosen the remains.. which I did for about 15 minutes with a bristle brush. And already its looking better after the acid bath, the rust is starting to blacken some after a couple of hours - so far so good..

Original rust found on the bottom right cabinet..

CabBotRust.jpg

After knocking off all the loose rust with a wire brush on a grinder.

CabBotRustRemoval.jpg

Photo below is after scrubbing with phosphoric acid. Per directions after scrubbing, leave it over night then rinse, let it dry and primer it.

I also scrubbed the lower 3 inches of the cabinet sides to see what effect it would have on the paint.. If phosphoric acid has no effect on the painted surfaces then I'll treat the small amount of rust in the cabinet interior as well, I don't want to strip the interior paint off, just etch, prim and paint it..

CabBotRustRemovalPhosAcid.jpg

Photo below is after 12 Hours, Looks like the acid is kicking some rust butt.

CabBotRustRemovalPhosAcid12Hrs.jpg

This photo is at 17 hours, after being rinsed and dried. The rust is either gone or has been neutralized.
The paint on the cabinet sides was etched some but still in-tacked.

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Lol Just a few rust pits can barely be seen in the newly primed photo below :)
The center beam however is in excellent condition, just a single pitted area in the center of the 1/4" thick bar.

My OCD says I should bondo this and make it look smooth.. fortunately I have a bad memory so I just need to restrain my self till its Upright.

CabBotRustRemovedPrimed.jpg

The bent door from this cabinet is on hold for now as it's not essential to readying the cabinets.

Id love some advice / opinions about leg levelers.. I would like to have the stands off the cement a couple inches and be able to accurately level out the stand. The support beam in the middle of each stand has a 1/2 inch diameter hole at the front and rear of each stand, can I attach leg levelers those points or is that only for direct mounting to concrete..?

Edit: I called Logan Act. There tech support will call me on Monday.
Interestingly they make Mining safety equipment as there main business now.


CabRightBottomRust.jpg LegLeveler.jpg
 
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Looks like the Phos. Acid worked well, Mike, although its hard to tell from pics. If you have a lot of white crystals you can spray it with diluted PA and wipe it off, let it dry and then prime and paint.

Hard to tell how thick the support bar is; looks to be 1/4"? If so, its probably a bit thin; the existing bar looks bent up at the ends. Personally, I would cut off that bar and weld on a 3/8" to 1/2" thick bar and then mount levelers or leveling casters. I prefer Carrymaster leveling casters myself.
 
Today I ran into a little issue.. I have the right pedestal set aside all ready to prime, sand and paint, But the left pedestal I can't lift onto the work bench to gut the mechanicals out, So I figured I would run out get some supplies - and make a wooden gantry and mount a simple rope pulley to it..

Off to Harbor Freight I go.. I got the stuff I need and headed out to the big box store for wood. I'm pretty good at just getting what I need and leave but out the corner of my Eye I spot a the new Vulcan 215 Mig welder in the 3 day sale tent for 200.00 off. I've been looking at CL over the last couple months to find a replacement for my Lincoln sp175 welder thats 20+ yrs old with no luck. And every-time I'm at HF I keep looking at this new Vulcan line which they claim is equal to Lincoln and Miller for half the cost - and each time I just tell my self its HF it has to be junk. I've looked at a couple reviews and read on a couple sites that these welders were designed by a real engineer from Lincoln, so while I was there I asked to see a manger and told them my concerns and asked if it was really designed by a Lincoln Engineer - without hesitation he said yes it was.

Now I now your laughing in your chair so hard tears are coming out, But HF is trying to improve there brand with some new tool lines.. and it just so happens that they jacked a Lincoln engineer to design their new Vulcan welder line-up, so if there are any hiccups or issues with this first run of machines then all the R&D they put into this new line will go up in flames, along with there comparison claims of equality with Red and Blue.

If you thought you were done crying - oh no, theres more.. It was priced like that because it was an open box ( Store calls it a rental ) that some one bought and returned - It gets even better.. hope you have a towel - because it was a return and was price to move, It only has a 5 day return policy. I went trough the contents of the box pulling everything out and checking against what should be there - checked the welder over and all the contents, which were still in their plastic bags... The accessories box still taped which means this welder appears to have never been used, Or the person but it all back tit for tat.

I only have 5 days to make sure theres no issue, so I head strait home to set it up for some test welds. I hook everything up, don my helmet open gas valve... Nope.. my tanks empty, and go figure its the weekend. I already know the welding stores are closed.. so I hit the net looking to find a place to refill on a weekend, I searched and made calls with no luck... I had one last idea to try out hydroponic stores. I called another dozen places and finally found one that has CO2, Unfortunately they only carry 5-10 and 20lb filled tanks.

Knowing I only have today and tomorrow to test this out or bring it back, I went ahead and bought the 20lb filled tank went home and did some test welds, I soon found out after only a couple of welds that its easily better then my old SP175 because of the newer technology it has like Pre and Post gas, Synergy setup, 110v or 220v, a better duty cycle to name a few. The only con I see right off the batt on this welder is the torch which seems a bit flimsy, real light and looks like it would break after a few falls, the work clamps good - knobs all rotate smooth, and case feels sturdy.

Last but not least, The test welds I did looked just as good as with my Lincoln but now I should be able to do single pass on 1/4" with out stopping to cool down every few minutes because I have more head room.

Unfortunately I wasted a whole day running around calling to get this welder tested out. I had to because I would not have any time during the week to do this. And I really need a new welder for a future fence project I've been putting off.

NewVulcan215MigWelder.jpg

So it was a good day all in all but I got nothing done on the Lathe today ..!
Tomorrow Ill build a gantry and get back to work & be ready next weekend to paint the pedestals and chip tray hopefully.

I usually get allot done on weekends so I just thought I'd show you why I didn't this weekend.
 
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