Boxford Restoration

Here is just a quick entry to show another of my hobbies / past times.

I've got some sort of obsession for vintage machines, its just something about the quality and attention to detail that you just don't find in today's world. I'd much rather spend the time restoring something that was built to last rather than buying something that isn't going to see me through the job.

Over the years I have had some experience with old machinery, from kitting out my garage whilst working at home, to expanding into a business premises where I've had most types of machines you could image relating to engineering. I think my obsession is deep routed from some sort of past life, I'm intrigued by an era thats long before my time and I feel really passionate and almost protective about it. I have used these experiences and emotions to start another project that will be explained in a new blog entry soon.

Anyway, onto the machine in question :)

This is a Boxford AUD MK2. The machine was kindly made available to myself through good friend of mine. Originally the lathe was in a secondary school, where it would have been used to teach children the basics of turning. Most schools and colleges have disposed of this era of machine now and have either opted for a newer type or removed that part of teaching all together. Luckily this has been in my favour and I have come by a number of machines that have escaped an industrial life and have been reasonably well looked after or under used.

Mechanically, the machine was very good. Cosmetically there was work to be done... I set about this project as I do with every project of this type and stripped and cleaned every bit of it. It was at that point I decided to restore the paintwork. Around 3 years passed and the machine was in bits in boxes :( Eventually, every part had been removed, cleaned, serviced, primed and painted with 2 top coats.

This is how the machine looked afterwards:

The machine looked wonderful, the paintwork is 100%. True to my character, I soon got bored and part exchanged this for my next project ;) "And the rest is history"....