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I am fixing to look at a Southbend Lathe.

Southbend model 10 K Lathe 4 1/2’ bed m W Taper Attachment. 3 & 4 jaw chucks. Runs as it should. Single phase. $2100

Can anyone comment on this? I have a small Atlas/Craftsman 101. I have always wanted to step up. I mainly just want to dabble. I want to make some small cannons and maybe some mouthpiece experiments.

Thanks for any comments.
Tim

I have one that belonged to my father, made about 1960 or so. Prior to that he had a 6” Atlas that was made about 1980. The SB is a nicer and way more capable machine. I recall him remarking how much stiffer and more precise the SB was. He had been a little concerned with doing precise work on the larger machine but found it was totally not a problem. I never did anything precise on the Atlas - toy cannons and model rocket nose cones - but have done a fair amount of work on my SB and about the same machine in college and found them great to work with. Trickiest thing I’ve done was make a replacement valve cap for my 1928 Martin Eb. Female 64 pitch thread and knurling.

Mine has a quick change gearbox which is a nice feature if you do much in the way of threading, but not all of them have this. Mine also has power cross feed - they all may - which is nice. The taper attachment is pretty straightforward to use - there’s a screw you have to take out of the compound rest to disengage it from the crossfeed. This machine also has a removable gap but it’s never been out in the 30 odd years leve had it. A quick change tool post would be nice to have. Mine has a shop-made “slow chance” one that works with half-inch cutters, and a bought a lantern type to use some other cutters I have. I’ve also had a couple times when a steady rest or follower rest would be nice to have but don’t have those. We

The machine I have has the rear mounted flat belt drive which works fine but takes up a good bit of room. There are some cabinet version of them that would be more compact. Some of these have a v-belt drive that requires removal of the spindle to change the belt. One of these days I need to relocate the machine to a smaller shop where the more compact cabinet version would be nice.

Depending in where in the country you are $2100 seems reasonable if it is in good shape. They seem to be a little less up in the NE and rustbelt vs here in Texas.

If it is in good shape think you’ll likely be happy with it vs the Atlas.

Eric

This site has a ton of info. You may know of it already.

https://lathes.co.uk/#gsc.tab=0

Eric

Thank you so much, Eric. This is just the info I needed. I got a look today. It's in great
condition and owned by a retired engineer who takes very good care of things.

10" South Bend with a 4.5 bed. This is my chance to have a really nice lathe. I spent the summer after my freshman year working in my brother-in-law's wheel factory. I ran an automatic lathe during the day but they gave me the keys so I could open up the front shop in the evenings and teach myself on the BIG lathes. Very cool times for a young fellow.

Tim

The 10K will allow the use of a collet closer which is so nice for holding thin tubing and parts. I've worked in a machine shops for 35 years and very seldom used taper attachments. Most tapers I have cut were short enough to do using the compound or off setting the tail stock between centers. South bend is really a nice machine, if it has the quick change gearbox it will have a very good selection of threads.

Tim Jackson wrote: ↑Sat Jul 13, 2024 4:05 pm Thank you so much, Eric. This is just the info I needed. I got a look today. It's in great condition and owned by a retired engineer who takes very good care of things.

10" South Bend with a 4.5 bed. This is my chance to have a really nice lathe. I spent the summer after my freshman year working in my brother-in-law's wheel factory. I ran an automatic lathe during the day but they gave me the keys so I could open up the front shop in the evenings and teach myself on the BIG lathes. Very cool times for a young fellow.

Tim

That’s very similar to the one I have - same rear drive and quick change gearbox. Nice looking machine. I am sure you’ll get some good out of it.

Biggest lathe I ever used was in one of our labs at work. We needed to make a tool to make a composite duct for a ducted rotor, which we turned out of a 14” long cylinder of mdf we glued up. Think it was about 26” in diameter, and the size of the lathe we had access to influenced our design.

Fun fact - mdf will “creep” and expand a little after it is cut inside of its pressed surfaces. So our tooled surface wanted to have little bulges every 3/4”. We got it to stop doing that by lacquering or using polyurethane on the machined surface, letting that soak in and dry, then machining it to the final size. Be a good way to make a bell forming tool if you had a lathe big enough.

Eric