Touchdown, new toy has arrived. Warco WM290V

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Hey everyone.

Well my new toy (WM290V) is here, it only took Warco (Warren machine tools) a week from the date of order to delivery.

Arrived on one pallet (well two but the crate one on top another normalone), very well packed and even had an anti tilt indicator on it!!

It was dropped off at the top of the driveway by the delivery company (very helpful chap) and now I had the task of moving it through a gate, up the side of the house and into the garage.

I unpacked it and removed as much weight as I could including the tailstock, chuck, compound etc and lifted one end of the crate base up onto axle stands (used my sack truck to lever it up) then did the same the other end so I could remove the big pallet and place my wheels under it, lowered it down onto the wheels and rolled it up into the garage.

Next I assembled the stand, I couldn't find instructions but wasn't too taxing.

The lathe was then rolled to its new home and a chain hoist put on a double joist above, lifting straps attached to each end and now the moment I had been worried about, lifting 250kg up on my own, turns out I had absolutely nothing to worry about, up she went easy peasy.

Once it was high enough I put the stand underneath and lowered the lathe back down, aligning the bolt holes as I did so. The bolts hold the lathe to the stand were tightened up, then I leveled it all out (digital spirit level on the ways)

Levelling feet need another nut on top to lock them once adjusted but they only come with one her foot (well bolts as they are not actually feet) 4 at the headstock end 2 at the tailstock end (will add 2 more at the tailstock asap)

The lathe was pre cleaned and oiled and the DRO was pre fitted I just had the fit the display and the bits I had taken off.

Powered her up a did the test runs, all good apart from the Apron oil level is low and the compound is very tight.

Overall I'm impressed, crossslide and compound are tapered gibs, (compound gib is as loose as it will go, just one turn on the screw and it falls out), they had even pre fitted my QCTP when they tested it.

Couple of minor paint defects here and there and the top of the front plate is creased where the join to the change gear cover is but very I'm generally pleased.

Few things that could be improved:

8 feet bolts and locking nuts for the top and bottom of them instead of only the bottom would be good.

Stand assembly instruction would be nice.

Longer chuck key so the 'T' is clear of the control panel (first thing I'm going to make on it) to save the knuckles.

The usual paintwork defects.

Good points:

Tapered gibs rather than the usual grubscrew adjustment is brilliant.

Camlock chuck mount is excellent.

Has a very bright LED work light already fitted.

Came with a live centre that I wasn't expecting!

Has a mains isolation switch as well as the E stop.

Will add pictures to the next post if I can work out how to do it Excuse the mess in the garage, my shed is arriving tomorrow so can move all the stuff out and get the benches made and the milling machine up off the ground, the garage is going to be machine shop and shed is going to be wood working but it's all piled in the garage at the moment from the move.

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

[Thor 🇳🇴Participant @thor]

Hi Rob,

Congratulations with your new lathe. Glad to hear you got it up and running without problems.

Thor

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

I'm really gutted my 3 year old 290V didn't come with a cam lock chuck.

Tony

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Forgot to mention, customer service so far is excellent, I emailed them asking what oil to add to the Apron as it was low and they have sent out 2l of oil for it FOC, had a reply within 20 minutes, impressive.

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Posted by Thor 🇳🇴 on 24/05/2022 17:29:49:

Hi Rob,

Congratulations with your new lathe. Glad to hear you got it up and running without problems.

Thor

Thanks Thor, I was worried about lifting it but it was so easy.

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Posted by Tony Pratt 1 on 24/05/2022 17:44:12:

I'm really gutted my 3 year old 290V didn't come with a cam lock chuck.

Tony

Hi Tony.

I think it was probably the American Market that made camlock happen for us, they seem to be mostly camlock with their lathes over there so the Chinese had to change for them, we just get it as a bonus so they only have to make one spindle. 🙂

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Sorry i couldn't resist, I just had to put the chuck from my other lathe in this one for comparison 🤣🤣

[DalboyParticipant @dalboy]

I brought the 280V not long back and also found the chuck key could have been longer, I will eventually get around to making a couple more one for the three jaw and one for the four jaw chucks as both are different sizes.

Have fun with the new lathe

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Hi Derek.

I was looking at the 280V but by the time I had added a stand and the DRO the 290V just made more sense, it has a bigger chuck and spindle bore too.

It looks like the top control panel has been changed for a longer one so the "normal" chuck keys are about 2" too short.

Another thing I forgot to say was it has two fans at the back to cool the inverter I presume, even with the motor turned off they are running at full speed and are quite loud, they do stop if you hit the E Stop though.

I did do a few test cuts and I thought the surface finish was very good.

It was nice to be able to dial in a decent depth of cut for the carbide tooling and not hear the motor struggle.

I'm building the new shed tomorrow and I ordered the wood for the benches today, that's being delivered Thursday and Friday will be taken up sorting all my tools out so won't get a chance to really play with it till the weekend now, I really need to get the Mill off the floor, 😳 every time I look at it I cringe with embarrassment.

I have been here a month tomorrow and had hoped to have it done but the shed has taken over 2 weeks!

Will have to run everything on extension leads for now until I can get a sparky in to fit more sockets and wire the shed (house is rented so I'm not allowed to do it myself)

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Had a productive few days, got the basics of the benches down each side done in the garage, one at 4.3m and one at 3m, nothing fancy just 100x50mm timber frames with 2 layers of 18mm MDF on top.

Milling machine is up on the bench next to the lathe and setup and I unpacked the tooling for it.

I couldn't resist having a play with the lathe so decided to make a new chuck key, I have some 25mm steel round bar so grabbed a bit.

On my old lathe (Clarke 300) I could never get a nice finish with carbide insert tooling or get decent chips (it was always stringy and ) it just didn't have the grunt to take a decent DOC, took an initial cut then dialed in a 1.5mm one, well the surface finish was really good and the chips coming off were perfect.

Blank done in no time and into the mill to do the square.

Here is the results, excuse the handle, it's just a bit of 12mm bar I had.

It's now long enough to get a good purchase on and clears the top of the control panel so knuckles are safe.

[SteviegtrParticipant @steviegtr]

What a lucky boy Rob is. That looks very nice. Looks well made too.

Just looked at your last post. You could put a thermostat close to the inverter to control the fans. You may find they hardly ever come on.

Steve.

[not done it yetParticipant @notdoneityet]

Posted by Steviegtr on 27/05/2022 22:33:36:

What a lucky boy Rob is. That looks very nice. Looks well made too.

Just looked at your last post. You could put a thermostat close to the inverter to control the fans. You may find they hardly ever come on.

Steve.

Personally, I would think it needs a transducer or (bi-metal switch) actually within the inverter – likely affixed to the important heat sink(s) – to provide a signal (or control) for fan on/off?

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

The inverter is tucked away inside the casing at the back, I think its a Delta one and would have thought it would have temp control built in. The fans seem to be to remove the heat from the casing.

The one thing i do find annoying is there is a start button but no stop button, (only the E Stop and that kills power to the inverter) to stop the motor I have to switch the direction to 0, to re start it I have to select direction again and then press the start button.

I may have a look at adding one if I can, I'm sure there will be the option for it in the wiring connections on the inverter.

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Is the feedshaft driven independently of the screwcutting geartrain? Are sensible turning and facing feeds still available when a thread geartrain is set up?

The advertising description of the feedshaft as 'dedicated' suggests it is.

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Posted by Mick B1 on 29/05/2022 09:20:02:

Is the feedshaft driven independently of the screwcutting geartrain? Are sensible turning and facing feeds still available when a thread geartrain is set up?

The advertising description of the feedshaft as 'dedicated' suggests it is.

Hi Mick.

I saw your post on the Chester DV10VS, I was looking at that one but decided to go with the Warco as I wanted the stand and DRO factory fitted.

No it's driven by the change gears the same as the 250, you can select either the leadscrew or the feed shaft on the gearbox and change the direction and speed but it is still dependent on the ratio of the change gear for the input speed.

I haven't even looked at threading yet so it's still on the change gears it arrived with.

For this price range of the lathes from China I doubt there would be many that are totally independent.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Unlike industrial lathes that tend to have the change gears driven by a shaft coming out of the head at a reduced rate of revs to the spindle the 250,280 & 290 all drive the gear train by a fixed gear on the spindle so you have to have a very different geartrain for feeds than you do for screwcutting. Combine that with only 3 ratios in the "gearbox" and you have need a very different geartrain for feeds than you do for screwcutting so can't just flick the lever to go from useful feed to actual thread cutting.

Really it just saves the leadscrew from wear and if screwcutting two parts eg male and female then they are best done by getting all the turning complete first so you have the feeds then do the screwcutting otherwise you have to change geartrain for each part. I don't do a lot of screwcutting so can live with that.

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Rob and Jason, thanks for the answers and comments.

I still think it's a bit shifty to add and advertise a feature that doesn't actually deliver a capability the buyer might reasonably expect.

What Jason recommends is what I've been doing on my 250V

[Rob WheatleyParticipant @robwheatley66643]

Clough42 did and electronic leadscrew on his lathe to overcome this issue BUT it involves encoders and programming etc, he drove the leadscrew via belt as his lathe didn't have a gearbox but it could be done on the input of the gearbox to retain the seperate feedshaft a leadscrew.

It did look very good as he just entered the pitch/feed rate in the control panel, no gears or working out ratios, I think he used a closed loop stepper or servo motor, they certainly have the power for it.

I replaced the stepper for the Z powerfeed on my mill yesterday with a closed loop 8N.m nema34 stepper and coupled it directly to the leadscrew (it was a nema 23 driving the handwheel via a belt)

On max speed it can move the head from bottom to the top in about 10 seconds, the handwheel spins so fast now and it's on a bevel gear! The slowest speed is about 0.01mm/second but may be even less.

Now I'm about to change the controls for both the Z and X feeds to pulse generators from the arduino, that is just way too susceptible to electronic noise to be reliable.

[Mike Barnes 2Participant @mikebarnes2]

Hi all,

I have just had delivery of my new Warco WM290v D1-4. I have the machine all levelled and everything taken of for ease of moving it has been put back on. The instruction manual supplied with the machine seems to be from the earlier model. The control panel I have is different. Anyway, the upshot is I cant get the lathe to run. The RPM indicator light comes on but nothing else happens. the guards are all in place and chuck guard is down but its as dead as a Dodo. Guess I will be contacting Warco after the weekend.

Regards, Mike.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Make sure the gear cover on the left is making proper contact with the interlock switch, the metal tab can get bent.

Also the big red safety switch on the left needs to be pulled out and rotated to activate it

Edited By JasonB on 24/09/2023 18:51:14

[Mike Barnes 2Participant @mikebarnes2]

Jason B, Thanks very much for your help, it was indeed the gear cover micro switch not aligning properly. All up and running now. I still need to find out what size tooling I can use on this lathe, again the manual doesn't state the capacity.

Regards, Mike.

[Mike Barnes 2Participant @mikebarnes2]

Jason B, Thanks very much for your help, it was indeed the gear cover micro switch not aligning properly. All up and running now. I still need to find out what size tooling I can use on this lathe, again the manual doesn't state the capacity.

Regards, Mike.

[Chris CrewParticipant @chriscrew66644]

If I were to be starting over again it would be a no-brainer to buy this, or a similar model of lathe, so I am a little envious of your shiny new purchase. I have never subscribed to the notion that if a product is of 'far-eastern' origin it must be rubbish because clearly they are not as this nice new machine easily demonstrates. I think the prejudice against Chinese products has almost dissipated but it still rears its ugly head occasionally.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Mike Barnes 2 on 24/09/2023 20:11:33:

Jason B, Thanks very much for your help, it was indeed the gear cover micro switch not aligning properly. All up and running now. I still need to find out what size tooling I can use on this lathe, again the manual doesn't state the capacity.

Regards, Mike.

I shim up 10mm on my WM280. I guess it would take 12mm but that's bigger than I need. I find advantage in smaller tools for fine work – the lathe is loaded with 8mm tools at the moment. Main thing is ensuring the shank is small enough to position the cutting edge at or just below centre-height.

If the lathe was delivered strapped with steel-bands, save it! Makes good shims.

Dave

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