Hafco AL900A lathe, is anyone able to identify what it really is?

[dgrev]

Terry

I will do a search for "TJB", that should find your posts.

Being an Aussie machine, the motor would be 50Hz 240v, that would last a few seconds or less if hooked up to US power?

Australia was part of the British Commonwealth. We take part in the "Commonwealth Games" to this day and the Queen of England is on the back of all our coins. Like England we have a Prime Minister, not a President.

Do you have any idea who the common manufacturer was that all were buying their parts from?

Regards
Doug

 

[dgrev]

Bob

Points all noted with thanks.

Drill bit - I am ok to about 3/8th, after that I struggle a bit to 1/2" as I have quite a small 2 wheel grinder. The bigger bits are a challenge due to wheel size.

The crossfeed and compound are that snug, that any more and it would be hard work to turn the handles!

I will have to investigate a diamond lap, don't have one.

Regards
Doug

 

[tjb]

C) Does this type of lathe mean that to change between metric and imperial thread cutting requires cog swapping ie. take a cog off and install a different cog or is it a case of reversing the orientation of the cogs?
If cog swapping is the case, then there are no loose cogs with the lathe.......

Mine had a different set of change gears to convert from Imperial to metric. Unfortunately, I don't remember the specs and no longer have access to the lathe.

Regards

 

[tjb]

Terry

I will do a search for "TJB", that should find your posts.

Being an Aussie machine, the motor would be 50Hz 240v, that would last a few seconds or less if hooked up to US power?

Australia was part of the British Commonwealth. We take part in the "Commonwealth Games" to this day and the Queen of England is on the back of all our coins. Like England we have a Prime Minister, not a President.

Do you have any idea who the common manufacturer was that all were buying their parts from?

Regards
Doug

Doug,

The motor on the machine was the only thing missing. As you noted, it would not have worked anyway here in the US. I bought a Leeson motor (had to modify the attachment bracket), and it worked fine. Most likely, the motor was removed when the owner relocated to the US (several decades ago), and the machine was never used since.

I did quite a bit of research when I acquired this machine but was never able to identify the original parts manufacturer. Best of my recollection, it was essentially the ONLY manufacturer for what became the Jet-type machines. (Jet seems to have won the competition for most appealing to the Western market.) The other feature (again, best of my recollection) was that the manufacturer was indeed based in Taiwan.

I located an owner's manual for the Jet P1024 which contained quite a bit of information. If you need a copy, I can send it to you by PM. (Again, as a practical matter, it seems to be essentially the same as your model except for obvious size differences.)

Also, Doug, I just sent you a separate post regarding change-gears necessary to convert from Imperial to metric threading. There IS a different set of gears. Mine had them with the machine. (It was really a pristine find!) Unfortunately, I have no way of getting details for you.

It never became necessary, but it was my understanding (from other very knowledgeable H-M members and from outside sources) that many of the Grizzly parts are 'possibly' interchangeable. A word of caution - evidently, some parts may appear to be interchangeable but in fact are not. Mercifully, I never had to find that out the hard way.

Let me know if I can be of any assistance to you.

Regards,
Terry

 

[Downunder Bob]

Mine had a different set of change gears to convert from Imperial to metric. Unfortunately, I don't remember the specs and no longer have access to the lathe.

Regards

Most medium to large lathes use two gears on the same shaft 120 x 127 T, so it's a two step gear train. that will give an exact metric thread. Most smaller lathes, because the 127 x 120 is too big to fit, use 60 x 63 T gears as its almost the same ratio, there are charts that will show the error.

 

[tjb]

Interestingly yours is painted the same green as mine, and most Hafco machines are grey. The cabinet stand looks almost identical as well.

Also the same green as my Kin Shin.

 

[Downunder Bob]

Bob

Points all noted with thanks.

Drill bit - I am ok to about 3/8th, after that I struggle a bit to 1/2" as I have quite a small 2 wheel grinder. The bigger bits are a challenge due to wheel size.

The crossfeed and compound are that snug, that any more and it would be hard work to turn the handles!

I will have to investigate a diamond lap, don't have one.

Regards
Doug

Diamond lap is easy to find most good hardware shops or kitchen shops will have them, they are used to sharpen knives.

a small flat blade about 4" long plastic coated handle at one end, flat diamond surface on other end, they come in at least 3 graded, coarse, medium and fine, may be others, fairly cheap. use them to hone the carbide tips and also HSS.

Speaking of diamonds, did you have a look at the diamond tangential tool holder I mentioned earlier. Look up eccentric engineering. Australian invented and made. makes sharpening toolbits a dream, just one face to grind. they also have some super hard cobalt tool bits. I use the size 12 on my lathe but you'll have to measure the height from the center height to the base of your tool holder, there is a diagram on their website.

 

[Downunder Bob]

Also the same green as my Kin Shin.

Strange because I tried to find Kin Shin in Taiwan and had no luck But I can find Liang Dei.Maybe they have changed their name, who knows. strange things happen in Taiwan, I used to rna business here importing goods from Taiwan, and found I could get identical items from different factories.

I have heard that a small group of parent factories will contract out the manufacturing of all the parts they need to a number of smaller factories. The parent factories will then assemble all the parts into finished products, which they then sell to a group of wholesaler exporters, who then onsell to the importing retailers, and this is how we end up with having identical looking machines, but with different names. one batch will be painted green and another will be blue and another grey etc.

 

[tjb]

Good news, the lathe is now mine and is in my shed. Still sitting in the trailer, so still to unload.

It came with 4 micrometers, 2 in cases, small and medium. Also 2 smalls, which are unloved, gunked up and lying in the bottom of the drill
bit box.

Now for a stupid question, the oil level is at the bottom of the LHS sight glass, where do I put more in?

For those who would like to see it, attached a photo of the head gears and pulleys.

Would anyone have a threading data plate that even if it doesn't have the same appearance as mine, has the same data?
Bob kindly took a photo of his for me, but when comparing it to mine, the data is different.
As you will see below, parts of the data are not readable.

.View attachment 269726View attachment 269729View attachment 269730View attachment 269731View attachment 269732View attachment 269733View attachment 269734

Dave,

Attached is a photo with threading plate data that seems to be identical to yours. (It's the green plate on the right with the large 'KS-3.5FK' on it.) Unfortunately, it's rather small, and you lose some clarity if you zoom in, but on first blush it does seem to be identical. Hope it helps.

With regard to oil levels and sight glasses, I had an issue with what I thought was a major leak on the apron (where there is no sight glass). Turns out that these older machines are notorious for leaking because the shafts are not adequately sealed where they mount to the casing. I over-filled my apron and - surprise, surprise - it leaked out to just below the shaft. As it turns out, that's exactly the correct level.

Regards

 

[tjb]

Strange because I tried to find Kin Shin in Taiwan and had no luck But I can find Liang Dei.Maybe they have changed their name, who knows. strange things happen in Taiwan, I used to rna business here importing goods from Taiwan, and found I could get identical items from different factories.

I have heard that a small group of parent factories will contract out the manufacturing of all the parts they need to a number of smaller factories. The parent factories will then assemble all the parts into finished products, which they then sell to a group of wholesaler exporters, who then onsell to the importing retailers, and this is how we end up with having identical looking machines, but with different names. one batch will be painted green and another will be blue and another grey etc.

Bob,

That's consistent with what I learned as well - with a bit more detail. My understanding (which may be incorrect) is that after Jet won the marketing prize, the smaller competing factories simply vaporized. In any event, the good news is that very nearly ALL of these vintage machines are essentially alike. Makes it a bit confusing trying to identify a specific brand, but comforting to know that if you find detail on any one of them, you've got it on all of them.

Regards, and thanks for the history lesson.

P.S.: Several have posted this comment and I most certainly agree: These are extremely well-built machines! I was at the seller's large shop to look at some tooling that he had for sale (he's in his late 80's and selling off much of his stock). I saw this little gem sitting among some other large tools, basically just collecting dust. It was immediately obvious that this was a solid little machine. My number one 'go-to' lathe is a 2000's vintage 15 x 40 floor model, and it was clear that the Kin Shin, although smaller, was a much sturdier machine. Should have kept it.