THE ELGIN TOOL WORKS STORY: I am frequently asked about the history of the Elgin Tool Works and their relationship with Hardinge. Elgin machines are virtually identical to Hardinge machines. The Elgin Tool Works was started by a renegade group of Hardinge employees who realized that most Hardinge patents had expired. In most any corporation you will have disgruntled employees; this is par for the course. This renegade group of former Hardinge employees made machinery that was every bit as good as Hardinge; in many cases Elgin machinery is beefier than Hardinge just because, I am guessing, they wanted to save design time rather than steel and weight. The nameplate on the lathe below reads, "Elgin Tool Works, 1770 Berteau Ave. at Ravenswood Ave., Chicago, IL." That was done to show that the Elgin Tool Works was just across the street from the Hardinge Manufacturing Company at the intersection of Ravenswood and Berteau Avenues. Elgin Tool Works was capitalizing on the success of the Hardinge Manufacturing Company. The Hardinge Brothers were not stupid; it wasn't long before Hardinge bought out Elgin Tool Works. For awhile some lathes were made and labeled as was one of the below listed lathes, "Hardinge, Elgin, manufactured by Hardinge Manufacturing Company, Elgin Tool Works Division, Ravenswood, Chicago, USA." Ravenswood and Berteau Avenues are in my neighborhood. One of these days I will take some pictures of the factory buildings as they are today.
Hardinge Elgin 5c lathe. If you have ever wondered exactly what the relationship between Hardinge and Elgin was, look at the nameplate that was on this lathe. I removed the nameplate and the forward/reverse and low/high plates from this lathe in order to do a proper job of painting it. The old paint on the lathe was removed, bad defects in the castings were filled, Sherwin Williams primer and industrial enamel were applied--but not everywhere--no paint was put where paint does not belong. I won't put the nameplates back on perhaps until I sell it. I do use the lathe. It would be difficult to keep the nameplates in the condition they are in on the lathe. The lathe is on an original bench of the best design that I have seen. The bench end legs are one piece cast steel tied together with a couple of steel T-bars in the rear and with the 2.125" thick maple butcher block top and lower shelf. The butcher block top is held together with through bolts across the width and glued. There is a steel drawer and a wood shelf to hold 56 collets. This lathe has been sold. I leave it up for your information.
ALL ORIGINAL VINTAGE ELGIN LATHE. This vintage Elgin literature illustrates an Elgin 5c lathe. Also find photo of one of the lathes that I use. You will see little difference. My lathe is as close to what Elgin offered new 60 years ago as you are likely to find. Note the 60 position dividing head, the 4 lock stop positions, the dual T-slot compound, the #2 Morse taper tailstock. It is in extremely clean condition with very little wear for a 60 year old lathe. I have owned it for 20+ of its 60 years. I bought it from the owner of a technical training school. It was his personal lathe. It was the only lathe left in the cavernous building that housed the technical training school. He had bought it new and was selling it because he was quite old and was retiring and giving up the building--having already given up the technical training school long before. Having just sold my more modern Hardinge lathe illustrated above, which had a better drive system, I have gone back to using this lathe. I will leave the photos up because my web pages are as much about providing information for you as about selling equipment. Just below find my solutions to improving the drive systems of these older flat leather belt driven lathes.
BELT TENSIONER FOR FLAT BELT DRIVE HARDINGE OR ELGIN LATHES. Will work with other lathes as well. Should work with most lathes as is. I left the hardwood arm that holds the wheel long so that it may be repositioned for use on significantly larger lathes. The 1 11/16" wide steel wheel weighs 4# 10 ounces. It runs on 2 needle bearings on a shoulder screw shaft. Take a look at the lathe belt without the belt tensioner in use. I installed that belt myself. It is a new leather belt installed as tightly as I could manage on the fixed position cone head pulleys. Note how much the belt is further tensioned with the belt tensioner in use (the lathe wheels and belt are moving in this photo). The belt tensioner needs to be clamped to the tabletop to keep it in position. This belt tensioner dramatically reduces belt slippage and increases the driving power of flat leather belt driven lathes. I offer it for sale only because I can make another for my own use. The asking price will cover my time and materials. $350.
RUBBER FACE FOR YOUR LEATHER BELT. The leather belt on this lathe is decades old. A new leather belt would not perform any better. Adding a rubber face dramatically increased the driving power of this flat leather belt driven lathe. The leather provides the dimensional strength, the rubber provides the gripping strength. The 1/16" thick very sticky back rubber that I added to the inside face of the leather belt was designed for a totally different purpose. I had to order 200 linear feet minimum. Although my leather belt was properly sized for my cone head pulleys, there was plenty of room on the inside for this rubber. It was not necessary to remove the belt to install the rubber. It only took about 5 minutes to install the cut-to-width rubber. The rubber does a great job of reducing slippage and increasing the driving power of flat leather belt driven lathes. I offer it because I have some left over from the job for which I originally bought it. I can supply it in sizes up to 5" wide by most any length. I made a jig to cut it and I can cut it to width for you. The price for enough for your lathe will vary. If I can supply you with cut-offs (cut-offs are typically 2-4' in length and about 1-2" wide), you will save money. When I provide you with not cut-to-width rubber cutoffs, I do not charge for the extra width. Price for cutoffs is $.50 per square inch. Price for full 5" wide new stock is $.75 per square inch. $20 for cutting-to-width for smaller lengths, more for longer lengths. Order a little extra length to make sure you have enough; do not stretch the rubber. I recommend that the width be slightly less than the width of your belt; you do not want the very sticky back protruding beyond the edges of the belt. It does not matter if you use a Clipper belt lacer, a glued joint or hand stitching; I put the rubber right over the joint to give a continuous gripping surface. Rubber lined belts run very quietly and have lots of driving power. You will find yourself cutting at higher speeds and taking heavier cuts. I have now added a rubber face to the above lathe; wow, what power!
HARDINGE LATHE BED. I bought this because it was so very clean. Because I picked it up in person, I was able to evaluate the condition. I put a straight edge on it and found it to be flat. I measured the thickness of the ways. They are a full 5/16" thick, which means that the ways are in original condidion. That is the original frosting, or scraping, on the ways. The ways have not been, nor do they need to be reground and rescraped. This bed is beefier than your usual cataract lathe bed, therefore more stable. You may use your Cataract head stock or a more modern through the base V-belt driven headstock on this lathe bed. All accessories you need to complete the lathe are readily available on the used market. Let this be your great condition foundation. The fast/slow and forward/stop/reverse levers that are missing from this lathe are, in fact, seldom used unless you have a lathe on the original base cabinet and all the mechanical linkages and electrical controls are functioning. The needle bearings for those levers are in good shape and are still in the holes. I packed the bearings with grease and machined Nylon plugs to fill those holes. All the paint is stripped off; the bed is ready for repainting. Overall length of base is 38". The inverted V-bed is the standard Cataract shape--tapering from 2 9/16" to 3" at the base of the ways. I bought this for my own use, and will put it into use one day, unless you buy it from me before I get around to the work. You could not have your lathe bed reground and rescraped for less, and it would not be as well done as this factory original piece. It is also a lot of work to strip the paint off of a lathe. $300
2 taper spindle mount arbors for Hardinge grinder attachment. I sold the grinder. I have these 2 spare arbors available for $100 each. These are illustrated below on the right. The taper spindle is about 1.065" long, and tapers from about .324" to .269". If you want to see images of the grinder that these fit click on the image below to see a larger version of it and then substitute numbers 1 through 7 in place of the 8 in the url in the address window and hit enter--or, if you do not understand that, I can send them to you.
Grinder Pulley designed to be mounted on an overhead shaft as seen in the photos of the lathe (on bench) below. The clamp is designed to be clamped around a 1.25" diameter shaft. A split ring adapter sleeve would be easy to make to mount it on a smaller diameter shaft. $125.
Lathe bench with drawers. The lathe itself has been sold. It was uneconomical to ship the bench. Although it has been used for several cataract bench lathes during the time that I have had it, it could serve for virtually any benchtop lathe, or for that matter for just about anything else. It is a fairly ordinary commercial workbench. The metal drawer on the left is about 20X20" inside dimensions, with a sliding tray inside. The wood drawer on the right is about 18X26" inside dimensions and is presently set up to receive Hardinge collets in front and miscellany in the rear. The bench top is 28" deep, 60" long, with metal fence around 3 sides. It is 34" high. There is a full length underneath shelf about 9" off the floor. The legs are metal. The top is about 2" thick maple. $250 picked up as illustrated with both drawers. The wood drawer is one I custom built. I utilized very long and high weight capacity ball bearing slides that cost me over $100. If you leave the drawer with me, the price is $150.
Taper spindle toolholders and diamond laps. 20 pieces total. The 2 on the far right hold 1/8" and 3/32" shafts. The 2 next to them stabilize flat disks. The one with a grinding wheel on it has a screw in the end. Most of the others are diamond laps. The shafts taper from about .200" to .150" over a 1" length. $300 for the lot. These came in with a lot of Hardinge equipment, but I do not know what they fit.
Hardinge or Elgin crossslide/compound for 9" swing Cataract split bed lathes. The latest model made for split bed lathes, complete with mounting hardware. This mounting hardware is an improvement over the T-bolt through the split bed, which can turn out of alignment with a heavy cut. I completely disassembled, cleaned, lubed and adjusted this compound. There are 2 sets of ball bearings per lead screw. The gibs are straight, not tapered. There is wear on this compound, but there are adjustable double nuts on the leadscrews that allowed the play to be removed. I have disassembled other Hardinge compounds, and I can see no significant differences between this one and the others, except for model differences and the others did not have the adjustable double nuts. This compound is not labeled. The person who sold it to me called it an Elgin and showed the late model Elgin lathe that it came off of. Whoever the manufacturer, it is extremely well made. This late model compound with the adjustable double nuts is rarely found configured for the split bed. Most of these late model compounds are configured for the later dovetail bed lathes. $1000. Buy it with the Hardinge STD 4-toolbit rotating toolholder illustrated in the last picture and listed below and save $100 off the package.
Hardinge cataract crossslide/compound model 9B for 9" swing lathes. Made in Elmira, NY, so it is a late one. It has slight to moderate wear. This may be held onto a split bed lathe with either your original T-bolt or with a better holding modern yoke. $450 without the yoke or $550 with the yoke.
Hardinge cataract crossslide/compound for 7" or 9" swing split bed lathes. Made in Elmira, NY, so it is a late one. It has little wear. The extension on the longitudinal feed screw will allow this compound to be coupled with a threading attachment without the need for a rear T-slot in the bed. There is a neat 1/4-20TPI hole on the compound top and another on the left end of the top crossslide; these could be useful for the addition of stops or whatever. The T that rests against the lathe bed is not original. A T-blot is required to hold this onto your split bed lathe. This compound is a little bit smaller than 9" Hardinge compounds, so it must be for a 7" swing lathe, but it will work on a 9" swing lathe with taller toolholders. The last image shows it to the left of the above listed 9" Hardinge compound. Note that longitudinal screw extension on the 7" compound; that can be extremely useful. $450
Hardinge cataract mounting yoke for use with modern crossslide/compound and older split bed lathes. The one in the foreground is the one I am offering. The one mounted on the lathe is painted to match that lathe. The one in the foreground would need to have the lock nut shortened for use on this particular lathe. The 2nd photo shows one in use. $100
Elgin double crossslide. Rack and pinion transverse movement,with adjustable stops to control extent of movement. Shown on a Hardinge/Elgin 9" lathe--which it was designed for. One tool holder. This is a direct copy of the Hardinge crossslide. $500. In the last photo you see it being used with a swiveling lever action tool holder, which is not included with this cross slide. All my compounds were aligned for turning/boring/facing operations and I did not want to have to realign them. This worked quite well as you can see; there was zero chattering on the bevel of this 8" diameter part. I cleaned up this crossslide for my use; as you can see, it is cleaner in this last photo.
Hardinge spacer blocks, go between Hardinge lathe bed with rear T-slot and thread chasing attachment designed for a T-slot bed that was farther back. These are custom made. You could make your own if you have the skill and the time and the equipment. These may be had for $300
Hardinge rear T-slot thread chasing striker plate. Illustrated out-of-position in order to show the rear T-slot bed and Hardinge name plate. Mild steel with hardened, ground and polished insert. RARE, $150. The Striker plate contact screw is also available, 1/4-26TPI, hardened to just the right amount, RARE, you could make your own, of course, but not for $50.
Hardinge Taper attachment for thread chasing lathe. You may tilt that hardened striker plate in either direction and cut internal or external tapered threads. This is the only one seen by either the octogenarian Hardinge collector or myself. Before I put it on my web page it was fun to ask visiting Hardinge afficionados what it was. None had ever seen one before or even knew that a taper attachment had ever been made for the Hardinge thread chasing lathe. EXTREMELY RARE, $600.
Hardinge thread chasing attachment component, "banjo." Holds the gears between the spindle gear and the rear T-slot mounted shaft. $200.
3c 40 tooth spindle gear for Hardinge thread chasing attachment. Attaches with set screw to spindle. $125. Note: A customer told me that his 3c lathe requires a gear with a 1" inside diameter. This has a .9" inside diameter. It is plenty beefy; it can be bored out. The gears do mesh nicely with Hardinge gears. If you need it, you will find a way to use it.
Rear bar stop for Hardinge thread chasing attachment. $100.
60 tooth gear for Hardinge thread chasing attachment. 1.746" ID. 0.355" thick. $150.
Adapter for Hardinge thread chasing attachment. I made this to allow me to use a Hardinge thread chasing attachment on a bed that had some holes in the tail end for a different thread chasing attachment, but not located in the proper location for my thread chasing attachment. The screw is a Hardinge screw. The screw is 3/8-24TPI. The 1/4" dowel pins are spaced 2" on center. The threaded hole is 1/4-28TPI. The top cutout is the width of the T-slot and allowed me to properly position the headstock. $150.
Hardinge tailstock for the Hardinge/Elgin lathe split beds as illustrated on this page. Newly cleaned, lubed, adjusted, primed and painted. No paint was put where there should not be paint. #1 Morse taper. It is in great working condition. There is virtually no wear on the feed screw. 3" travel. $250
Hardinge 5c 7" faceplate, $200
Hardinge lantern style toolholder with straight holder, left hand holder, boring bar holder with boring toolbit, cutoff toolholder with toolbit. The cutoff tool bit or blade is ground on one end to cut threads. This is what was typically used on the old split bed Hardinge lathes in their day. How do you beet the flexibility of such a toolholder? $220. Note: On my tool web page is a lantern style toolpost that is half the size of this. Perhaps it was made for a 3c or 5/4/3c 7" swing lathe compound. There are also more toolbit holders to fit this toolholder.
Spacers to extend the range of the Hardinge D9 height adjustable toolholder or D9 copies. They are surface ground. They are .200", .165" and .110" thick. They allow you to use smaller tool bits and still be able to bring the bits up to center height or they allow you to use the toolholder on a compound or whatever where you need more height. $30 each or 3 for $75
Hardinge D2 toolholder. This toolholder came in mounted on a Hardinge Model D revolving crossslide--listed just below the double crossslides above on this page. Like the D9, it accepts 3/8" or smaller tool bits. I photograph it next to a D9 toolholder so you may see the relative size and other differences. $80
Hardinge, Elmira, NY, USA, STD 4-toolbit rotating toolholder. This toolholder fits the T-slots of the compound with which it is illustrated and an older Elgin compound; it does not fit into the T-slots of a Hardinge 9B compound. I completely disassembled, cleaned, lubed and adjusted this toolholder. It is beautifully designed and made mostly of hardened steel. It is in perfect functional condition. Because there is no height adjustment, spacers may be required for use with some compounds. The compound upon which it is mounted requires a .062" spacer, which is included. The toolbit slots are only .369" high, requiring that you mill about .010" off the top of your 3/8" toolbit shanks; this takes minutes and does not compromise your toolbits because the bottom of the toolbit is your reference side. 2 screws hold down the toolbit; the 3rd screw serves as a stop. $300. Buy it with this compound and save $100 off the package. The compound with mounting hardware is listed above.
Hardinge bench center, with 24 position dividing head with 5c collet drawbar, with screwfeed adjustable tailstock, 5 T-nuts. $500. I have 2 of the dividing heads. The cleaner one is illustrated on the bench. In the 2nd photo you see the bottom of the cleaner one on the left. Those round keys are ones I made for use on my Clausing milling machine. They are not included. The original keys looked like those on the bench tailstock on the right. The dividing head in the center is not as clean as the one included with the lathe; it was used on a grinder and the grinder marks are visible. It works fine and if you choose to buy the bench with it instead of the cleaner one, the price of the bench is $400.
5C UNUSUAL ADAPTER. Fits into Hardinge 5c head stock like a collet and is drawn tight with the collet drawbar. Useful for adapting any number of items to a 5c head stock. Inside diameter is 1.25" with an inside depth of 2" with a set screw. Made of steel with a high tech finish. Very high quality. NEW. $125.
NEED A COLLET RACK? Think outside the box. Draw a centerline down the middle of your rack top, then draw appropriate sized circles as illustrated to place your collets equidistant from each other. Intersecting lines are the centers of the holes to be bored.
SET OF 5C COLLETS WITH HOLDER, 1/16" TO 1" BY 1/16", MISSING 15/16". 10 are Hardinge, 4 are Neal, 1 is Royal. All in usable condition. $75.
AVAILABLE 5C ROUND COLLETS: 1/16, 1/8, 9/64, 5/32, 11/64, 3/16, 7/32,17/64, 9/32, 19/64, 5/16, 13/16, 11/32, 21/64, 23/64, 3/8, 25/64, 13/32, 7/16, 15/32, 1/2, 33/64, 17/32, 35/64, 9/16, 19/32, 39/64, 5/8, 43/64, 23/32, 3/4, 49/64, 25/32, 7/8, 1 1/16, 1 1/32. I willing to trade for these 5c round collets: 1/64, 3/64, 5/64, 7/64, 29/64, 31/64, 27/32, 1 1/64, 1 3/64, 1 5/64, 1 7/64. I am willing to trade for square, hexagonal and unusual collets as well.
1/4" 3C COLLET The Inside diameter at the bottom of the collet is 1/2", which is the maximum diameter of a 3c collet. 26TPI threads. $30.
6" 6-JAW BUCK CHUCK. Tru-adjust. With inside and outside jaws. I tru-adjusted the chuck with the inside jaws installed. I then installed the outside jaws and it ran fairly close to true. The outside jaws were welded to something. The welding residue may be ground away. Without chuck key. Without backing plate it is $350. You see the chuck mounted on a backing plate that was sold with a similar chuck. I have a new backing plate available--listed sparately below. Whether you buy it with the backing plate or not, the screws to attach the chuck to a backing plate are included with the chuck.
Backing plate for Hardinge 5c taper spindle nose. Compatible with the above Buck Tru-adjust chuck. $200 with the chuck, $250 separately.
