Watchmaking Lathe Restoration - 8mm USA 'WW' style Elson Watchmakers Lathe
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- čas přidán 27. 07. 2024
- Teardown, cleaning, lubricating and reassembly of a vintage 'WW-style' 8mm watchmakers lathe.
In this video I restore my first watchmaking lathe, an American-style Elson model #305. I found very little information about the Elson brand…so if you have any resources about the company I’d love to know more! According to Lathes.co.uk, the Elson brand might have been manufactured in Johnstown, Pennsylvania - which is a relatively close 250 miles from where I live! The lathe feels solidly built, and seems to be a one-for-one copy of a Boley / Leinen WW (Webster Whitcombe) style lathe.
The lathe bed, head stock, tail stock and motor are all similarly finished and branded, and I assume originally came as a set, which is desirable from an alignment standpoint.
I have several videos coming out in this Watchmaking lathe series, and I’ll update my watchmakers lathe playlist as the shows are released: • Watchmaking Lathes
If you have questions or additional information about this lathe, I’d love to hear from you in the comments section below.
00:00 Watchmakers lathe overview
00:39 Cleaning the bed
01:25 Disassembling & cleaning the tail stock
01:53 Rust removal using Evaporust in an ultrasonic cleaner
02:44 Cleaning more lathe parts
03:03 Polishing brass
03:40 Rust-proofing the parts with oil
04:10 Reconstructing the lathe
04:52 Paste wax on the bare steel sliding surfaces
05:26 Assembling the tail stock
05:41 Installing the tool rest
05:58 Assembling the head stock
08:43 Installing & testing the head stock
09:19 Installing the motor
10:07 Final testing & adjustment
#watchrepair #watchmaking #watchwithmike - Jak na to + styl
Wonderful equipment,Mike.You are on the ball.Thank you.
Thanks Angel! This is completely new territory for me and I am having fun!
Hi, Mike! Another great video! Congrats on having completed the restoration of your lathe! Looking forward to any updates, it would be great to see your first finished watch part.
Hi Kirill, thank you! I've made a few cuts, but nothing that's actually a watch part yet. Stay tuned! 😁
Nice job of cleaning and protecting. For very lightly oiling the parts you can't reach like the slots and inner bores of the collets I'd like to share a trick from a buddy that long ago used to service camera shutters. The old mechanical ones. The trick was to prepare a bath of solvent with only a couple of drops of light machine oil. Your mineral spirits and the 3in1 would be fine for this. Once stirred to mix it up simply drop the parts in, swish it around a touch to reach any air pockets and then remove and drain well. For small parts like this I suspect a tea ball would be a neat method. Lay the parts out for the solvent to dry away and you're left with a minimal oil film on all the surfaces. Including the parts that are pretty well impossible to reach without a full dunking.
I'm looking forward to seeing more of your watchmaker's lathe learning. I'll try to follow along with the one I have which is currently apart and awaiting attention similar to yours along with a little more. It's one of the nickel plated ones and the nickel is in pretty bad shape.
Hi Bruce, I really like your suggestion of doing the oil treatment for light rust prevention! I'm going to give it a try. 😁 Thanks for following along on these videos, and good luck with your lathe restoration!
Have you ever wondered what watches this lathe help make? Imagine the parts floating around out there in watches from people that will never know that their pride and joy is powered with parts from this little lathe! I did not know you could polish other metals with Braso... Cool trick with the razor blade too! I have a dial guage that I would use just as a further precaution! This came out very nicely Mike! Well done as usual!
Thanks Johan! It's a nice thought about what parts this lathe could have touched out in the universe. 😀 Putting a dial gauge is a good idea. I felt for runout with my finger, which is calibrated to +/- .1 mm. 🤣
@@WatchWithMike I should have my fingers calibrated haha! All in all its going to be a fantastic tool for you with many years of good service!
It looks great Mike! You are on your way now. I find that a foot switch/pedal to control the motor useful to keep hands free and on the work. Maybe something you can add later.
Hi John, a foot switch is on my wish list - but I'm also considering switching to a variable speed motor. I want to use the lathe as-is for a bit, and then make modifications after having some experience and feedback. Stay tuned! 😁
A job well done. Enjoy the lathe Mike !
@khronosbest9448 - Thank you! More videos coming shortly... 😁
That was very satisfying to watch. Stop teasing us! We want to see the screw! 😉
Thanks Jimmy! Spoiler alert...no screw yet, but metal chips did go flying!
@@WatchWithMike 🤣
As always very impressive, Mike. What impressed me too was the different watches or the lack thereof during the process. :)
😂🤣 Yes, I have been changing watches almost daily! Sometimes when I am editing I am conscious of the time jumps on the watch. I try to make it look like action is consecutive but if you read the time on my wrist that you know it wasn't done in one take.
@@WatchWithMike 😁
Thanks for sharing Mike, i bought a 6mmm Lorch lathe recently in amazing condition...gonna do a course first, can't wait to use it
Sounds great! Good luck! 😄
Great video! I like the way you reduce what took me eight weeks to do badly into ten minutes and you did it right as well! 😂😂😂
Hi Dayton, thanks! It only took me one month after doing my unboxing video to get to this point. This ten minute video is the fermentation results of 4 hours of video, and many more hours of me making mistakes or just scratching my head and staring at it. 🤣 Now I feel the time is right for me to launch my series documenting, in painstaking detail, how I did things badly leading up to, and including, using the lathe. 🙄😁
@@WatchWithMike Well, it doesn't look to me like you did things badly getting it ready! Just make sure that you don't get slapped in the face by that loose lathe belt! By the way you've got to tell that hammer story if you haven't already!
@@IMakeWatches the hammer story has not been told!