"I too have an Advance lathe which I have recently refurbished. However, it appears somewhat earlier than yours. Here goes the story.
Courtesy of Tony Watson:
"I too have an Advance lathe which I have recently refurbished.
However, it appears somewhat earlier than yours. Here goes the story.
My lathe is serial no AK (Albert Kirby?) 287. I would guess my machine to have been made in the late 1950s. It was painted in light grey hammertone, applied after assembly - the paint went into the bearings and everywhere! A neighbor of mine has serial no 81. His earlier machine differs in the countershaft arrangement and the tailstock barrel does not appear to have originally been drilled right through (using a centre with flats al la round bed Drummond). It now has a quarter inch hole to facilitate centre removal. It has what appears to be the original paint - machine beige.
I have cleaned and repainted in beige. The main work I had to do was make a new leadscrew nut, a threaded insert to replace the stripped thread in the tailstock handwheel and a new countershaft. The primary drive pulley was also replaced as the original in diecast zinc had age cracks. My home-made four way toolpost appears in one photo - next job is a back toolpost.
It came with three chucks - a four inch Warren and Brown three-jaw,
four inch all steel Burnard four jaw and a Jacobs No 32. A face plate
was included, as were the ten change gears.
You will notice in the above photo there are two face plates. On the
left is the advance plate and on the right, the one from my round bed Drummond.
As the Advance plate is slightly smaller all round, it would appear that
Bert used one for a pattern. The difference being the spindle size
- 1x10tpi for the Advance and .75x10tpi for the Drummond. Incidentally,
my faceplate was badly scored. I turned up a dummy mandrel nose in my nine
inch Hercus, screwed on the plate and resurfaced the whole mess. Luckily,
the Hercus has power cross feed - one cut across the plate took about 35
minutes. The result was gratifyingly accurate with less than one thou runout
at the periphery.
My machine is lacking a tumble reverse, I take it that, like some early Myfords, this was an optional extra.
I think the Advance lathe is closer to the Myford ML2 than the ML4. The ML4 is of similar design but rather larger with 3.5 inch centre height compared to 3.25 for the ML2. The Advance appears an amalgam with its 3.5 inch centre height, three inch wide bed and 12 inches between centres.
The final result is somewhat of a Disappointment. The lack of headstock rigidity does limit what the machine can do."
Tony followed up with the following:
"On further reflection, the Advance lathe is probably no better or worse than its ilk. The crudities such as the V-form feed screws cut directly into the slides and lack of overall 'beef' mean that good work takes a lot of care and compensation on the part of the user. Chatter is not far away in any operation.
I would describe it is a useful toy - probably the 1950s handyman's delight.
The lack of an index on the cross slide is somewhat of a problem when screwcutting - I have done it with pencil marks and a dial gauge. One more job to do is a proper friction dial. However, the 16tpi feed screw will require some thought as to graduations - ten-thousandths of a cubit maybe?
I did not mention that my lathe's headstock has plain bearings compared to others with tapered rollers. I hope the latter provides more rigidity than mine - and also better oil control. I need to add oil about every five minutes and am contemplating fitting drip oilers. It is also hard on your shirt!
I should also mention my theory that an instruction book was not produced for these lathes - if you bought one you knew how to use it - or bought The Amateur's Lathe by Sparey."