Sold May 2009 Back to Archive

A little-used Chester 6 inch lathe, capable of swinging 12 inch diameter over the bed, there is a removeable gap increasing the capacity up close to the chuck.

Since being bought new from Chester some years ago, the machine has done little work. It has, however, ended up standing in water in a cellar, which has attacked the bottom of the stand (which also has a ding to the tray). The four jaw chuck, although lightly surface rusted, looks as if it's probably never been out of the manufacturer's wooden shipping box.

Hardened gap bed (this is the long bed version of the basic lathe), dual-reading metric/imperial dials. screw-cutting gearbox with thread dial indicator, imperial 4 to 112 tpi, metric 0.25 to 7.5mm pitch. Belt drive with back gear. Power-feed to saddle for traversing and facing in either direction. Four way toolpost. Tailstock is 3MT and comes complete with a centre and tailstock chuck.

The machine was supplied from new with a 3 phase motor which the owner ran from an inverter.

Well worth the work required to get it cleaned up and back into decent running order - it's quite a big machine, similar in size to a Colchester Student, that would tackle most jobs on larger locomotives and traction engines.

Weight 8 cwt