Courtesy of Lindsay Brown:

I have had my Advance lathe for a few years but just got around to setting it up (or trying to). It looks to be fairly similar to yours, apart from the drive modification and a few other details. I own one, as does a cousin and a work colleague - so there must be still quite a few of them around.

It looks a little weird at the moment as I have removed the original motor and countershaft assembly and have directly coupled a three-phase motor that I'm supplying from a single phase/three phase inverter. I haven't decided if the direct drive variable speed motor is successful - in terms of turning. However, I can say that it has removed a lot of vibration from the machine. With the old setup, the motor mounted to the hinged plate seemed to couple a lot of vibration into the spindle. With the motor mounted off the lathe, the machine spins beautifully; even its previous owner was impressed.

A few notes of interest:

• The power switch on mine (now removed) was located below the maker's nameplate - you can see the mounting holes.
• The bolts that attached the lathe to the base plate must have been over tightened resulting in the threaded holes being stripped. I've addressed this by screwing bolts up from underneath and clamping with nuts.

• There is a letter and 3 numbers stamped into the end of the tailstock and corresponding ones stamped into the end of the lathe, I guess this must be the serial number.

• The lathe came with  3 and 4 jaw chucks as well as a faceplate.

• It also came with the same tool holder and clamp that you show in your photos.

• The 4 way tool post attached was made by the previous owner (a fitter and turner by trade). [Note the longer cross slide with an extra T-slot compared to earlier lathes.]

• Detail of the graduated top slide pivot. [Earlier machines are quite different - the top slide pivots through a large tab on the side of slide base.]

• The oilers for the headstock bearings are little cups with a spring loaded flap. I think a larger reservoir would be a more practical proposal. [Earlier headstocks simply have a hole with no cover. The thrust bearing shown is also a little different than on others, but presumably functionally identical.]

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