On the renovation of machine tools

Personally, I would view renovation in it's original meaning, from "Nova", meaning "new".

So, no. you're not being overly critical/obsessive, if a machine is not restored to (at least) near-new accuracy, it's not renovated. It's been painted.

Here in the US a popular brand of spray paint is KRYLON. The joke is that if you paint something to make it look good while nothing has been done to actually fix it it is called a "Krylon rebiuld". ERS

Maybe that article was intended for used machinery dealers? :-))

It seems that they put the machine on a pallet, pull it into the backyard, clean it with the power washer and, after spending 5 minutes for masking off, cover it with some oil tolerant paint. Make a nice photo and ask at least 4 times the price they paid.

Never buy a freshly painted used machinery!

Nick

You see them on eBay all the time - with tell tale overspray on the adjacent floor! You'd think they had the sense to at least move it before taking the photo

AWEM

I agree entirely with you Mark. The hard bit of renovation is restoring the machine to as close as possible its original accuracy, (within our capabilities) otherwise whats the point? The modern world seems to say that if a job cannot be done in an afternoon or no more than a three page magazine article it is not worth doing. Any more lengthy a project or description is getting boring, attention spans are wavering, time to move on to another more exiting, even quicker bodge. So is it fulfilling and something to be proud of? or just modern short term ism. Alan

The mill which I just bought off ebay certainky hadn't been 'restored', they hadn't even cleaned the swarf off it ;-)

I've never really seen the attraction of spending hours paining up a machine tool, it won't do a better job as a result.

Tim

Or degreaser :-)

BugBear

Philistine,

In my immaculate and well designed workshop any slight scratch on my machinery is cause for a complete s*it down and restore..........................................................................................................As if...............

John S.

restore..........................................................................................................As

I guess you don't suffer from constipation often :)

This is a good warning to all on the dangers of buying machines supposedly "renovated" by a stealer:

Mark

Just got round to reading the article and I agree it says more about filler application and paint cutting than anything else. It was definitely not a guide to rebuilding tools. There was a very good article in MEW 32 by David Machin on rebuilding a lathe. That would be a really useful one to put on the soon-to-be-launched MEW website (a hint for David C there). However to remember the author was working on a Raglan Loughborough training lathe that probably saw more paintwork abuse that hard action.....

Please detail the Beaver when you do it, either in MEW or, if it's easier, enter the world of Blogging to tell us all what's happening online.

Charles

I'll do my best. It'd be nice to start work on it before this summer.

Mark Rand RTFM