This was my lathe. It is in good condition and shows very little wear.
When purchased it did need a clean, lube and adjustment, but otherwise
appeared to be in perfect working order. I purchased it at an auction for
Perth Dental School of all places, complete with standard accessories and
a very heavy steel bench.
The above pictures are of the accessories that came with the lathe.
Head stock end with covers removed. You can see the gear assembly with
its single arm banjo set up for the finest possible carriage feed (171.6
tpi). Earlier machines without the tumble reverse have a banjo with two
arms. You can also see the countershaft setup. The countershaft and motor
are mounted on a single casting that is hinged at the base. To loosen the
pulley between the countershaft and head stock spindle the entire countershaft
assembly swings forward.
Here you can see the novel approach used to tension the belt. The belt
cover is a solid casting. The tensioner is the piece shown in the second
picture. When the copper part is turned clockwise, the ends expand, the
belt cover (and countershaft assembly to which it is attached) is pushed
back and the belt is tensioned. It is effective and easy to use although
its not especially rigid, resulting in some vibration in operation. Also
note the somewhat questionable location of the power switch.
A shot of the head stock spindle assembly. This lathe has split plain
bearings, some other (later?) lathes have a tapered roller bearings.
The carriage with factory tool holder. Note the T-slotted cross slide.
It also has a threading dial (not shown) that attaches to the right hand
side of the apron.
This lathe has a graduated friction collar on the cross slide, but
not the top slide. Some lathes have a collar on both, some have neither.
It is graduated 0-60 (thou). I am unsure whether the feed screw actually
matches this (16.67 tpi) or whether the screw is a stock 16tpi and the
graduations are an approximation only.
A shot of the set over tail stock.
The locking mechanism for the tail stock. (The tail stock is on the
bed backwards for the purpose of the picture). A simple design that seems
to work well.
To date I'm quite satisfied with the lathe and it will do what I need until a well priced larger lathe comes along. At first I was unimpressed with the amount of chatter but some adjustment to the bearings corrected that. The only other comparable alternative for the price would be a cheap Asian 7x12 mini-lathe. While I have no hands on experience with them, my lathe is clearly of a more expensive construction, has a T-slotted cross slide and can handle larger work.
Documentation
While the lathe didn't come with a manual, it did come with a couple of pieces of paper. Click images for larger pics.
Pratt scroll chuck guarantee with advertisement for "Cone-Lok" Jig.
Eclipse grinding instructions for VH tool bits.
Pretty dry stuff but it might help date narrow the date of the lathe. I think its fair to assume the chuck is original to the the lathe - the seller (Perth Dental School) had no other similarly sized lathe. Pratt was named F. Pratt and Co Ltd. from 1953 to 1967. According to the info from Tony Watson, my Alfred Stewart made lathe must be early 60's or later. The chuck is stamped BP66, which if it is a manufacture date, would imply the lathe was made in 66 or 67. The building and furnishings of the seller were consistent with '60s government stuff. This fits with my assumption that the lathe was the first they purchased, then shortly after they went to the other end of the scale with a Colchester Chipmaster (a slightly larger capacity, far heavier machine that was also sold at the same auction).
Since the second piece of paper has a printing date of '74 which is inconsistent with dates indicated by the chuck, I assume that it was purchased sometime after the lathe.