On 09 Jan 2005 05:20:18 GMT, (RWatson767) wrote:

I am looking at a dealer who does Birminghan lathes. So an Ebay search for
"lathe birmingham" and find his web site.

I am not sure how good they are but where I live it is probably well worth
looking at.

Bob AZ I am looking to buy a lathe and mill but don't have any more

Birmingham is a rebadged import machine tool. Probably now made in
China and Korea where they used to come primarily from Taiwan.

There are a small number of foundrys that make the basic machines and
various importers bring in either the full machine or most of the full
machine and rebadge them for sale. Hales, Comet, Lux and so forth
are other examples.

The various Birminghams Ive seen were decent machine tools, though
nothing fancy. The usual imports of that grade tend to be copies of
Mori Seikies, etc. Yang made a LOT of these machines that were
rebadged.

The standing joke is they are all made by the Red Dragon Noodle and
Machine Tool Co.

The bigger they are, the better they seem to be. Most of the imports
from about 14" and up seem to be rather excellent lathes. Ive worked
on a number of them.
Finding parts is a bit more interesting...

Anyone know who imported the 1/2 scale kneemills under the name Hales?
I need some lead screw bronze nuts.

Gunner





"The French are a smallish, monkey-looking bunch and not dressed any better,
on average, than the citizens of Baltimore.
True, you can sit outside in Paris and drink little cups of coffee,
but why this is more stylish than
sitting inside and drinking large glasses of whiskey I don't know."
-- P.J O'Rourke (1989)
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