vintage wood lathe........

[Odie]

I know there is interest in older lathes.....especially the higher quality ones. I ran across this Oliver lathe on CL, and thought I'd pass it along. Anyone know how old this one is? Asking price is $750, and don't know if that's in the ball park......but, as with anything on CL, it's probably negotiable!

-----odie-----

 

[olaf Vogel]

Odie

Thats an old "speed lathe" where the motor is the headstock. Which means limited speed adjustment capabilities...normally.
But the bulge on top would indicate some sort of gearing mechanism - thats unusual.

references
http://www.lathes.co.uk/oliveruk/

It looks to be an Oliver 51-b
http://vintagemachinery.org/pubs/609/294.pdf

Likely an excellent machine, unless ridiculously abused.
This one doesn't have the tool carriage which would make it a light duty patternmakers lathe.

Not sure what the market value would be, but I'll bet it will outperform most modern lathes of higher price.
And last another 50 years easily.

Obviously there will be no manufacturer support.

 

[Pete Blair]

Odier, I love old tools and especially old lathes. Just left Missoula last week after a two week stay. I wish I had seen this as I would have loved to take a look or a test drive but I don't think I would have tried to bring it back to BC.

 

[John Torchick]

Looks solid. They just don't make them like they used to.

 

[Owen Lowe]

It’s actually an Oliver No. 54; you can see it on the bed. Not a big lathe at 12” max. by 36”. If the desire is for a mini-midi sized machine, I think the price is pretty attractive compared to what’s available new. Though unless you’re The Hulk, it’s not a portable!

 

[john lucas]

I bought an Oliver accidentally. Our school had it on the auction and it had one bid at $90. I thought I would bid $110 just to get the bidding rolling. I won. It had been used for metal spinning and I thought what the heck. I'll take it home. It was 3 phase but I have a spare variable frequency Drive so I thought I could run it. Well it turns out it has a really strange speed range with 3 separate windings and I don't mean the normal 3 windings for 3 phase. This thing had whole bunch of switches that had to be adjusted just right so you could actually use all the speeds. Anyway I got lucky and found a guy in Baltimore that teaches on Oliver lathes and wanted it. It was around 700 lbs and I had a hell of time just getting it off the truck onto the porch. Now I had to dissasemble it and build a crate to ship it in. I took my chain hoist (which is how I got it off the truck) and put some 4x4's under the 2x4 porch ceiling joists to brace them and was able to lift each section to get the motor off and then the legs. I had the crate on a home made dolly so was able to lift each part and position the crate under it and lower it down. Then I found out that Fastenal would ship it at half the price of the normal shipper. You just had to get it to them and the customer had to figure out how to pick it up. It all worked out and I made few dollars the other guy was happy. I won't bid on something again unless I really want it. Kind of reminds you of scratching your nose at an auction and winning a bid.

 

[olaf Vogel]

It’s actually an Oliver No. 54; you can see it on the bed. Not a big lathe at 12” max. by 36”. If the desire is for a mini-

Some swapping might have occured, because the 54 looks like this:
http://vintagemachinery.org/photoindex/detail.aspx?id=2530

Or its a weird crossover of models/years.

Moving it should not be much of an issue. Unbolt the legs,drop the bed onto a dolly, or a set of rollers.
One person should have no problems, unless there's stairs involved.

I would guess this one is closer to 500 lbs. Where legs might be close to 100 lbs each.

Shipping it, well, I agree, likely not worth it.

 

[Brent@TurnRobust]

That Oliver has a fairly rare early electronic variable speed control. That lump on top of the motor has a mechanical governor that switches the motor on and off rapidly to set the speed. It responds to heavy cuts pretty quickly because the governor slows and turns the motor on more often. The brass contacts start to arc out and the speed control gets erratic. A local club member has one and rebuilt it to operational mode. It's kind of weird to use it as even rebuilt the speed doesn't stay 100% constant. You'd definitely want to test the machine under power to see if it is operational. I think he may have sourced some parts on Ebay or from a specialist to do the rebuild, and may have made a few of the parts himself. If you want to learn more, send me an email and I'll forward it to the club member. Don't PM me as I never check PMs. My email is brent@turnrobust.com. This is different from the one Mr. Lucas described. Those are "motor heads" and most had four different windings in the motor based headstock, giving it four different speeds. If the machine isn't operational, and/or if you don't want to fuss with goofy old stuff, I would not recommend buying it.

 

[Bill Boehme]

I know there is interest in older lathes.....especially the higher quality ones. I ran across this Oliver lathe on CL, and thought I'd pass it along. Anyone know how old this one is? Asking price is $750, and don't know if that's in the ball park .....

This is a good time to mention that threads which are started to advertise or promote a product aren't allowed. This includes "reviews", announcements of sales, contests and drawings, and things found on eBay and Craig's List. This also includes invitations to visit a web site whether commercial or personal. This applies only to the opening post of a thread. During the course of discussion in a thread, however, it would be appropriate to mention any of these things as long as the thread isn't being hijacked completely off topic. I deleted the link to CL and decided to leave the thread open.

That Oliver has a fairly rare early electronic variable speed control. That lump on top of the motor has a mechanical governor that switches the motor on and off rapidly to set the speed. It responds to heavy cuts pretty quickly because the governor slows and turns the motor on more often. The brass contacts start to arc out and the speed control gets erratic....

Thanks for the very interesting information on this old Oliver lathe.

.... Don't PM me as I never check PMs. My email is brent@turnrobust.com......

I updated your profile page so that others can't start a conversation with you (I know it sounds silly, but a "Conversation" is the Xenforo equivalent to the old vBulletin forum "Private Message"). I also inserted your email address into your profile page.

 

[Odie]

This is a good time to mention that threads which are started to advertise or promote a product aren't allowed. This includes "reviews", announcements of sales, contests and drawings, and things found on eBay and Craig's List. This also includes invitations to visit a web site whether commercial or personal. This applies only to the opening post of a thread. During the course of discussion in a thread, however, it would be appropriate to mention any of these things as long as the thread isn't being hijacked completely off topic. I deleted the link to CL and decided to leave the thread open.

OK, I think I understand, Bill. For sure, I wasn't trying to promote the sale.....was just interested in discussion of what an interesting old lathe I found on CL, and wherever that led to. So......if I mentioned that it was on CL in Missoula.....that would be OK? I'm sure anyone interested in purchasing could find it if they wanted to......but, like I said, the purpose of my post wasn't to promote the sale of the lathe. I was interested in what thoughts there were about what these old lathes are worth, though......out of general curiosity sake........

-----odie-----

 

[Bill Boehme]

OK, I think I understand, Bill. For sure, I wasn't trying to promote the sale.....was just interested in discussion of what an interesting old lathe I found on CL, and wherever that led to. So......if I mentioned that it was on CL in Missoula.....that would be OK? I'm sure anyone interested in purchasing could find it if they wanted to......but, like I said, the purpose of my post wasn't to promote the sale of the lathe. I was interested in what thoughts there were about what these old lathes are worth, though......out of general curiosity sake........

-----odie-----

I knew that you weren't trying to promote a sale on CL, but occasionally someone does try to do something like that.So, I can't play favorites when it comes to enforcing the rules. As far as mentioning "that it was on CL in Missoula" I would be inclined to say no that it isn't OK unless there was some very compelling reason that convinces me that it needed to be a part of the discussion. There were some interesting things that I learned about the Oliver model 54, but mentioning how to find it is just an alternate way of promoting a product. But, like I said previously, if there is a thread where someone is searching for an old Oliver lathe near Missoula and you knew about this one then there is no problem in giving details including a link or physical address.

 

[Odie]

I knew that you weren't trying to promote a sale on CL, but occasionally someone does try to do something like that.So, I can't play favorites when it comes to enforcing the rules. As far as mentioning "that it was on CL in Missoula" I would be inclined to say no that it isn't OK unless there was some very compelling reason that convinces me that it needed to be a part of the discussion. There were some interesting things that I learned about the Oliver model 54, but mentioning how to find it is just an alternate way of promoting a product. But, like I said previously, if there is a thread where someone is searching for an old Oliver lathe near Missoula and you knew about this one then there is no problem in giving details including a link or physical address.

Well, OK, Bill......I really don't "get it", but will try to comply with the rules as you intend to enforce them. There was another thread recently where I posted a link to CL for a McCullouch chainsaw I was considering purchasing......post #28 here:

http://aawforum.org/community/index.php?threads/chainsaws-size-probably-again.12901/page-2

I was looking for opinions on the chainsaw as I mulled over purchasing it. I eventually passed on it.....but, as I understand it, this too, would be against your rules.....?

-----odie-----

 

[Bill Boehme]

That post is just fine. I'm just talking about the first post in a thread. If you start a thread that looks like it is promoting a product then that is a no-no. For example I wouldn't start a thread saying how much I like my lathe nor would I start a thread bashing any product.

 

[Ely Walton]

That Oliver has a fairly rare early electronic variable speed control. That lump on top of the motor has a mechanical governor that switches the motor on and off rapidly to set the speed. It responds to heavy cuts pretty quickly because the governor slows and turns the motor on more often. The brass contacts start to arc out and the speed control gets erratic. [...] This is different from the one Mr. Lucas described. Those are "motor heads" and most had four different windings in the motor based headstock, giving it four different speeds. [...]

I love learning about the mechanics of these early lathes!... I guess all that sparking from the governor contacts helped factory workers get their daily minimum requirements of ozone back in the day. Thanks Odie and Brent for sharing!

Ely