Lathe name terminology.

[l u k e]

I'm looking into buying a manual lathe from Enco to cut my teeth on. (pun intended, I've never ran a lath) I do not want to buy a small bench top, I'm looking in the 13x40 range. I don't really know the terminology they use to classify the lathes, such as "Geared Head Gap Bed Engine Lathe" and "Gap Bed Engine Lath". Can someone explain what "gap bed" "engine" terms indicate.

I'm assuming that a geared head means no belt changes.

Any additional info and input on these lathes would be great.

[Al_The_Man]

I have always took the Engine lathe to be an old general term for a manual Lathe.
Gap Bed means there is a piece of the bed that is removable, usually just in front of the chuck, allowing a larger piece of material or face plate to revolve in front of the tool.
And geared head means just that, that the spindle speeds are adjustable by gear change.
There is also a turret lathe that has a multi-tool turret mounted where the tail stock normally is, usually a very short bed.
Al.

[cadman]

The term engine lathe comes from when factories used engines to power industrial equipment. There would be drive shafts running along the ceilings with belts running from them to the lathes. Find an old picture and sometimes there would be hundreds of these belts at large factories.

[l u k e]

Cool, thanks.


One more question, they offer a "Taper Attachment" upgrade for $1000 more, what is it's purpose?

[Old Megawatts]

Hi,
I have been using an Enco 13 x 40 geared head for about eight years. I have done quite a bit of work for one of the automotive machine shops in town. They get a lot of odd jobs that they don't want to mess with so they pass them on to me. As I am retired, I don't charge $70/hr as they do. The lathe will do pretty good work if you are careful. The tail stock is a little light in my estimation. One thing that I can comment on is that the geard head isn't as quiet as the belt drive. Doesn't sound like a Monarch lathe. The only thing that has failed on the lathe so far was the single phase motor. Rather than replacing it with another single phase, which is very expensive, I purchased a three phase motor and a Teco-Westinghouse variable speed drive. I also have a two axis Shooting Star DRO on it. The Shooting Star doesn't use glass scale beams so is easier to install and can be cut to any desired length. The accuracy seems to be very good. I have glass scales on my mill so have some experience with both. Can't cut the glass scales. Hope this helps.

[l u k e]

Thanks for the info.

[cadman]

The taper attachment allows you to cut tapers by feeding the X & Z axis, versus cutting short tapers with the compound slide or small angles with the offset tailstock method.

A taper attachment was an option on my Cadillac engine lathe and unfortunately I don't have one. If you buy a manual lathe and it's offered, buy it or you'll kick yourself in the rear.

[l u k e]

Thanks, that's what I thought but wanted to be sure.