Hello. Last year I aquired from a mate's grandfather a Denham lathe of WWII vintage, in bits, but it was all there, and in good condition. I have put it all together in the garage, but it needs properly setting up to make it properly useful. It runs OK, the gears select, and I can turn things roughly, but getting the tailstock centre to line up is proving tricky, even after adjustments, and getting it to cut parallel all the way down the main travel has so far been beyond me. I'm guessing that the bed needs levelling properly and further adjustments are needed. I've never done that before, and don't really know where to start, because adjusting something improves one area, and makes another worse!
I'd start by setting the bed flat with an accurate level and take the top off the base of the tailstock, clean it and check that any centre line keys haven't worn allowing it to move sideways where it shouldn't. After that you need to put a dead centre (if you've got them in both the headstock bore and the tailstock then bring them together to check that the tailstock doesn't need shimming. Next try turning something without a centre in and if you find you're getting a taper then you need to adjust the headstock to get it out but that'll be pretty easy and you either adjust it with screws or a big mallet. There's no point in adjusting the tailstock to remove taper until you've got this bit right. Once you've got that sorted put a parallel bar between the centres and clock along it then move the tailstock with the adjusting screws to get a constant reading on your clock and you should be in the ballpark. If you can't blag a piece of parallel bar then you can turn something but a parallel bar makes it easier because you don't have to worry about tool wear or the bar pushing off as you turn it. .
That's probably the most important part. There should be hold down bolts for securing it plus jacking bolts for leveling so what I'd normally do is put a decent sized packer under the jacking bolts to spread the load or they dig into the floor after a while. I know it's obvious but make sure it's sitting on all of the jacking bolts and the base isn't down on the floor because even though you'd expect to start with one down then work backwards you can end up with a bit of shit under that corner that eventually breaks up and leaves you with a corner that isn't held down properly. Turning is easy if the machine is something like right but if the machine isn't set up properly you'll just struggle for ever and every little job you do turns into a nightmare. I did my apprenticeship as a centre lathe turner and part of our training was setting the machines up but that was 38 years ago and since then the only things I've lined up have been bloody great big steam turbines and they're a bit different :wink: I still work lathes occasionally so can always try to offer help if things aren't going well plus I like to laugh at other people struggles when it comes to machining. It's all that keeps me going when things aren't going well on my own job and right now I'm having an epic trying to control 1500 man hours worth of on site machining at a power station. Edit - I was underselling myself, it's 1500 man days and likely to reach 2,000 the way things are going
