Is It Possible To Accurately Grind Lathe Ways At Home?

There are plenty of lathe buyers who dont even know what bed wear is,or even care ,in some cases.If you sell at a newby price,a worn bed wont affect anything............in answer to the question.......can it be done? ..yes.................is it advisable? ....no.
 
I have to bring the SB heavy 10 home this weekend . The bed is toast , the rest not so bad . I'm following along all the bed grinding threads trying to determine to get it done or just live with it . I have no need to hold .0001 on anything . I'm thinking of a pretty it up and paint it job and let it be , or make it a donor and try and get ahold of that 9" Jet .
 
I’m sorry to say, but if you offered the 9A and or 9C to me for free, I would not take them. I have been around the block. Been there and done that kinda thing. I no longer want any frustrations that go along with lathes that have idiosyncrasies. If I had limited space and short on time. I would get the best newer working lathe with bells and whistles and be done with it. Use it and enjoy it. And not play around with repairing anything about it to maybe make it work. I have 10 generations of hobby shop projects and only one lifetime to do it in. Maybe some folks have it in their cards to do this sort of lathe entertainment, I do not. Sorry, my three cents…Dave.
 
On the subject of worn beds..............I worked for a multinational co that had the most abysimally worn machines I have ever seen.......some had 1/4" wear in the beds...........and multispindle autos that were scrap metal................Crane Copper was the name.....the factory had massive output,but went out of business because of the development of chromed diecast mazak bathroom fittings............absolute rubbish,but new house builders loved the non copper prices.
 
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All these amateur devises have been thought of already, lathes have been worn for years and years. Nothing new. Go for it and wreck your lathe bed. Be sure to take a lot of photo's a You Tube shows. . We all need a good laugh.
 
Susan -
I don't know diddly anything about surface grinding ... but you can get a taste of what's involved in scraping a lathe in the January/February issue of The Home Shop Machinist. The lead article describes scraping the saddle, cross slide, etc. of a 9x20. Unfortunately, the author did not include the bed ways. But you can at least get a sense of what's involved.
 
Or search You Tube and "Richard King Scraping" and see a dozen shows from my students. I also sell the Edward Connelly book "Machine Tool Reconditioning and my DVD that teaches all sort of rebuilding and scraping. Can see them advertised on Ebay under BIAX
 
On the subject of worn beds..............I worked for a multinational co that had the most abysimally worn machines I have ever seen.......some had 1/4" wear in the beds...........and multispindle autos that were scrap metal................Crane Copper was the name.....the factory had massive output,but went out of business because of the development of chromed diecast mazak bathroom fittings............absolute rubbish,but new house builders loved the non copper prices.

With the well worn machines were they still able to produce quality commercial parts? Just wondering because it could go to show with compensating for the wear on the machine it is still able to make a good part. Comes down to the operator. For example one person may fret about wear on the lathe bed and not even try to use it, the next person just uses it and gets the quality part they want out of it.

Also, worth mentioning having a worn lathe to work with is better than having no lathe to work with...
 
I had .010-.015 wear mostly on the front 6" V way on one of my 9A's. What I did for a few years was to move the headstock down about 10". All you need is an extension for the stud gear and some guards. Then I finally decided to plane the front way with a taig compound attached to the tailstock using a carbide toolbit. Took about an an hour with some fine adjustments with a scraper. Now I can cut within .001 for several inches.
 
If the lathe has any of the below, I don’t want it…



It has change gears that are stored in a draw

It uses a belt just like you wear around your waist

The chuck will smash your toes if the lathe is run in reverse

It turns a taper, but the lathe does not have a taper attachment

The spindle turns so slow, you think you’re looking at a second hand

You wonder why the longitudinal feed handle is way over on the right end of the bed

You can’t find any carriage power feed, maybe longitudinal, but that’s not good enough

The bed is made out of aluminum or something other than a good grade of cast iron.

The jib shims/wedges are plastic
 
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