Looking at a couple of South Bends

Thread was a great read. Thanks for sharing your journey. Looks like a nice lathe. Congrats. Oh how I wish these sorts of things would show up in my area. :rolleyes:
 
There advance to 9N /10K lots of tooling and. Parts can be found. Most parts on 9N are same as the 10K and the tooling.
For same shop the is better and can be move easily in the shop

The 9N is a ligher duty lathe

Dave

Hi,

I need a little bit of help. I currently have a Craftsman (Atlas) 6" Lathe. It's been fun bringing it back to life, I've made some parts on it that I couldn't have if I didn't have it so I can't complain but I'm quickly realizing it's limitations.

I've been looking for something bigger for a while, not necessarily a SB but something like a 9A is what I had in mind. A 9A and a Heavy 10 have come up for sale near me for pretty much the same money.

The 9A (644A) looks really clean from the pictures, a nice original machine, some of the parts are in SB boxes. I can still see scraping on the ways. It's pretty well equipped, 3 and 4 jaw, follow rest and milling attachment (something that I would like to have). It also seems to have all it's wrenches and other bits.

The Heavy 10 (CL 8187 A) isn't a looker, it's been painted and that paint is flaking off in places. It doesn't necessarily look abused mind you but pictures only tell you so much. None the less it's much more a used machine than the 9A. I know it comes with a 3 jaw chucks and some collets/drawbar. It might have more but I'm not counting on it.

I'm going to see the Heavy 10 on Sunday. There seems to be a lot of interest in it, the lady is letting me get first crack at it since I was the first to ask which is very nice of her.

I guess my question is, and maybe it's impossible to answer but what's the tipping point were the wear/tooling would make the 9A more attractive than Heavy 10? I kind of feel like if there's one or two more accessories with the Heavy 10 and it's not beat to snot it's the Heavy 10. If it is as it sits and it's a bit worn then it's far less clear. Adding things like a follow rest or a milling attachment ads up quickly as do repairs. Also, how would you know if the Heavy 10 had a hardened bed?

Sorry for the long post.

K
 
Thread was a great read. Thanks for sharing your journey. Looks like a nice lathe. Congrats. Oh how I wish these sorts of things would show up in my area. :rolleyes:

I know machinery does have "hot spots" across the country but Maine probably isn't high on the list and I was able to make a purchase I'm happy with. Just keep looking. I started casually almost as soon as I bought my Craftsman last summer. A lot of that was needing parts but I got a feel for what was out there. The selection was pretty thin for the last few months then stuff just started popping up. I've been looking on Craigs List and the Facebook Marketplace. This lathe came off Facebook, I tend to see better deals there for some reason.

Like I said above a Heavy 10 would have been ideal but for my budget a good one didn't fit unless some crazy deal showed up (which they do from time to time) or it was worn pretty well. I settled for this 9A and I'm happy, the more I look at it the better shape it's in. The cross slide and compound have very little back lash, the ways other than the scraping marks being a bit worn off near the headstock shows zero ridge. It's a good tight machine. It's also pretty well tooled, 3 & 4 jaw (the 4 jaw looks like it just came out of it's package), collets, drive plate and a pile of drive dogs, micrometer carriage stop, steady rest, full set of arm strong tool holders and a turret type holder plus all the original wrenches and some miscellaneous HHS and the other random stuff lathes often come with. Tooling was just as important to me as condition, adding stuff after the fact gets expensive quickly! The only thing I would like to add is a follow rest and I'll probably jump for a quick change tool post once I get everything up and going. I'm lucky that this machine came in under my budget so I do have some wiggle room and I hope to sell my Craftsman to recoup a bit more.

Sorry, that got long winded. I guess what I would say is wait and get something your comfortable with, don't buy a unit just because it's there.

K
 
We expect better pictures! :)

Condition and tooling means a lot. Looks like it's on the same cabinet as my lathe. This will certainly be a big upgrade from your 6" Craftsman.

A QCTP is really nice. While I've used the steady rest many times over the years, I have yet to attach the follow rest. I would also highly recommend a Shars magnetic-back dial indicator for measuring saddle travel.
 
The Harding bed way good if forget to oil

The swing of 9N is 9 1/4" and the 10L is 10 1/8" very close
Swing over the cross slide is almost the same too 9N is 5 1/2" and 10L is 5 7/8"

My self I own 4 sb 9N each time I think I do need a small lathe when I had larger new lathes. They just work great for small work over a larger lathe.

If ever buy a larger lathe DO NOT sell the 9N

Dave
It does have have a taper attachment. It's a interesting problem to have. I've been looking for quiet some time and then boom, two show up.

Doing some googleing it sounds like maybe they did have hardened ways as a option. I guess it wasn't until the late 60s/70s that they were standard.

K

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We expect better pictures! :)

Condition and tooling means a lot. Looks like it's on the same cabinet as my lathe. This will certainly be a big upgrade from your 6" Craftsman.

A QCTP is really nice. While I've used the steady rest many times over the years, I have yet to attach the follow rest. I would also highly recommend a Shars magnetic-back dial indicator for measuring saddle travel.

I will, promise!

My Craftsman didn't come with any tool post so I bought an OXA kit from The Little Machine Shop. It's all I've ever used. The lantern will work just fine in the mean time but I suspect I'm going to be missing the quick change.

Yeah, those mag base indicators look slick. I'll have to add one to my wants list!

K
 
It will take you about a week to get sick of the lantern after using a QCTP. :)

It seems Shars is out-of-stock of the combo right now on Ebay, but here's the store link for future reference:

http://www.shars.com/products/measu...ds/magnetic-indicator-back-w-1-dial-indicator

IMHO, of all the cheap dial indicators the ones from Shars are by far the most legible. I should probably pick up another as a spare.

Here's a random picture of one in use.

magind.jpg
 
Agreed, I have that same magnetic indicator. My go-to tool for a lot of things. Works easily for the saddle as shown, or the compound. I also slap it to the QCTP, and use it for centering parts in the 4 jaw. My Shop fox, has a flat top on the tail stock, so that is the indicators home. As I get things going on my SB 16", I'll get one for it.

I like having both the Atlas 6", and the shop fox 13", But I think the SB will be my main lathe when I get it going, save the Shop Fox for the stuff that needs accuracy, that the well worn SB can't do.
 
If ever want the book How to Run a Lathe
I have about 10 books left that slowly selling
Back in the 80'S I give the to all my employees and had few left

Dave

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