Hi Calum, the scan below is from Chester Machine Tools catalogue 2012, hope this helps.

Regards Nick.

Hi Calum, I've also found it in a 2002 catalogue same spec's but no DRO fitted, but it came with a faceplate as well as all the other standard accessories, but the cabinet is shown as been painted white and the chuck guard doesn't show any windows and was also painted white but the lamp is shown as the same style as the one in your photo, so it may give you a clue on it's age. Oh, and another difference is the leadscrew doesn't have the same guards, it just has one folded steel one fixed onto the tailstock side of the saddle, by the looks of it.

Regards Nick.

P.S. looking through some other catalogues,  the DRO was first fitted in 2008, which should narrow down the date of yours, and the cabinet is painted the same colour as yours in the catalogue previous to 2008.

Edited By Nicholas Farr on 22/05/2021 16:59:24

Welcome Callum.

FWIW, this is my advice. Interrupted by tea time! )

First, strap the lathe to the pallet. so that is less likely to fall off.

Gently lever it up onto some short lengths of scaffold poles. A you will need at least three.

If you use dollies, make sure that they can take the load, Two may be a good idea, rather than trying to balance everything on a dolly that is shorter than the pallet.

Roll the pallet and machine forward, replacing each roller with a spare just before the pallet comes off. You can steer things by gentle slewing on the rollers.

To go over soft ground, it would make make life MUCH easier to be able to roll over boards or steel plates, even if you can manage only two and have to keep "stepping" up the one just left behind. At least the rollers won't sink into the grass!

Once on hard standing, a pry bar can be used to adjust the direction of travel and position.

%mm clearance each side w through the door will be tight.

Any chance you could rig a block and tackle so that everything can be slowly winched through the door way?

Once inside, the prybar can be used to steer things to where you want them.

Ideally, the cabinet should be bolted to the floor. but it may be better to make / fit adjustable feet to bring the lathe l somewhere near level. The first job may be using the lathe to make the adjustable feet!

Once in place, it will be worth adjusting the feet to take nay twist out of the bed.

This will mean that the lathe should cut parallel and not tapered.

You can either use a very sensitive level, or use the method that Myford and Ian Bradley advocate in his book "The Amateur's Workshop" , turning a test piece, and adjusting at the Tailstock end until the bed is free from twist.. Unless you you intend to use flood coolant the level from Headstock to Tailstock is less important, but twist across the bed is a No No if you want be sure of turning parallel..

Once set up you can start making accessories to aid its use, and finding accessories to expand it's abilities.

I would suggest making a Centre Height Gauge, as a useful tool, and then a Mandrel Handle , and possibly a liitle later,,a Saddle stop..

All these will make you more familiar with the machine and be useful items

HTH

Howard

Edited By Howard Lewis on 22/05/2021 19:43:34

Hi ,
I have a Warco GH1000 lathe they are the same as the Chester cub range there are some differences
mostly the layout and position of the apron handwheel and auto feed lever ,i would have thought that it
would fit through the gap of the existing door frame with the door on at the sizes you have indicated.
There would be little to be gained in removing the splashback as the electrical box mounted behind the
headstock protrudes 2 inches further out and the splashback follows the same line as the
stands and tray ,if you need to reduce the width both the apron handwheel and the crosslide
handwheel can easily be removed ,the crosslide bracket fits with two cap bolts and can then be
unscrewed from the crosslide as a complete assembly . Both of these project out most of all and
make up the width of 680 mm with them removed it would be about 580 mm .

John

If you are worried about the foot brake then get two half sheets of ply laid ontop of your rollers and get the lathe onto that then the ply will bridge the gap, 3/4" "gas Barrel" also makes handy rollers. I could push my lathe about with a couple of finger swhen setup like this

Alternative is to put the poles in the direction you want the lathe to move and it will skid across the tops of the poles quite easily, they don't have to be used as rollers

Take the tailstock, topslide and chuck off and wind the carriage to the tailstock end before you start moving it as it will help reduce the top heavy nature a bit. Plus remove handles from the handwheels so they don't get snapped off

Edited By JasonB on 23/05/2021 07:33:41

Those dollies are only any use on a flat and solid surface. They may be ok once you get the lathe into the workshop but not on the ground outside.

This is what I would do:

I would strap the lathe to the pallet , lay some boards or planks on the ground and use some round bars as rollers to sit the pallet onto. If the delivery is via palletways the driver should be able to lift the pallet up so you can get boards and rollers under it and then lower it onto them. Probably put some strengthening timbers between the top and bottom boards of the pallet. Then you should be able to easily roll the lathe on its pallet, moving the boards in front of it as required.

When you get it to the workshop use a bar to pry it round through 90 degrees still on the pallet on top of a board level with the workshop floor . Jack up each end the lathe in turn and put some blocks under each end of the lathe. Remove the pallet and jack the lathe down onto rollers and push it into the workshop making sure to keep the rollers under each part of the stand.

When I was at work, we moved transformers weighing a few tons and switchgear using this method.

Stuart

Well it looks like a very nice lathe you've got there Callum, still in its original unmarked paint by the looks of it. The crosslide and apron hand wheels are not the type that were usually fitted I think, which were delicate looking black cast items, those two hand wheels on yours look to be the chrome plated cast type that were fitted to the old Chester Champion mill and also sold as spares by Chester in different diameters. It's interesting that Chester deny all knowledge of their Cub lathes, but not really surprising.

I do remember when Warco and Chester sold these machines new. Excel machine tools also sold them as the XL1230, and I remember once reading in their spec that the crosslide had a Stainless steel feedscrew running in an oil bath, don't know if that was ever true. The crosslide itself looks like a nice long slab of iron ground all over, but on one I examined I found that the dovetails on the underside of the crosslide did not continue all the way to the far end, with the top and sides being just a thinner walled shell acting like a cover. So any temptation to mill in a useful tee slot or two is best avoided.

Many a time I fiddled with these lathes at various engineering shows and at Warco's premises when I was trying to decide which new Chinese lathe to buy around 20 years ago. Some early versions had a small thread dial indicator rather crudely secured to the side of the apron with just a very thin strip of bent steel and a screw, later ones were improved which looks to be the type fitted to yours.

I can recall when Warco discontinued them and Roger Warren telling me that they wanted a lathe with a screwcutting gearbox with more selectable feedrates built in, i think the Cub box has just nine quickly selectable feedrates, which is fine most of the time especially for home workshop use, chaingewheels are used for more feedrates. The D1-5 spindle nose is a little unusual, most imported geared head lathes of this size use the more common D1-4 fitting, but the rubber wiper on the crosslide dovetails and the tang slot on the tailstock quill are a nice feature on the Chester Cub and Warco's version of it.

Edited By Lathejack on 23/05/2021 20:48:30

Edited By Lathejack on 23/05/2021 20:56:02

Edited By Lathejack on 23/05/2021 21:14:10

Ideally when Palletline deliver, ask if the lathe can be lifted clear of the pallet to insert a 15 mm or thicker board under it, before strapping to the pallet.

When you come to move the lathe, strapped to the pallet, over the grassed area, lay down boards for the rollers to run on. You will need at least three rollers. 50 mm scaffold pole will make movement quite easy over boards or level concrete. (Once had a Colchester try to run away from me on scaffold poles on a level floor when I pushed too hard! )

Two sturdy boards, 15 mm thick, minimum, will allow you to move the machine easily, as long as the uphill gradient is not too steep. Once off the first board, it can overtake the second, and so on, until the machine reaches hardstanding.

Apply the push or pull as low down as possible. The higher the forces, the greater risk of toppling over!.

Better to be longer doing the job than spending time trying to get it upright again to inspect the damage to machine or human!

Once in the workshop, and close to the intended position, I would suggest pushing the lathe, on the board, off the pallet , endways. A prybar should aid skidding sideways to put the machine into position.

Once that is done, you can start setting the machine level so that the bed is free of twist.

Howard