While waiting for the various parts to show up, I started cleaning and
stripping the headstock end of the lathe.
After lots of scrubbing & Citristrip and WD-40, there seems to
be a lathe in there somewhere.
I removed the cover
from the feed/power shaft shifting assembly and found a substantial
nest of ancient chips and sludge. Ugh. On the other hand,
no broken gear teeth. :)
And later, after a little cleaning & painting;
The black color is the remainder
of whatever filler coat ATW used to build up a paintable surface over
the ground castings. Citristrip softens it enough to scrape away,
but enough remains to give a patina and to mitigate some of the rough
surface. Thankfully, it hardens right back up once the Citristrip
evaporates and will still serve its purpose under the new paint.
My old South Bend had a similar undercoat and it worked just fine in
the same circumstances.
Now that everything is off the lathe, the basement is starting to get a
little crowded.
Tonight's puzzle is to find a place to stash the carriage sufficiently
out of the way so I can get the crane back onto the bed. At that
point I'll remove and clean out that catchbasin under the headstock
end. I'll strip the bed in sections, putting the basin under each.
;;; eof