Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
(OP)
I have a dilemma and hope you good folk could throw a little light on the choices I have? As suggested above, I can spend around £6,000 on a used Colchester Mascot 1600. Alternatively I can spend approx the same amount on a brand new Longem machine.
As a comparison to the Colchester, I have identified the Longem LG520DS. Both represent a gamble for different reasons. Has anyone got any experience of the Longem lathe? Are the two a fair comparison? Any help or thoughts are very much appreciated.
As a comparison to the Colchester, I have identified the Longem LG520DS. Both represent a gamble for different reasons. Has anyone got any experience of the Longem lathe? Are the two a fair comparison? Any help or thoughts are very much appreciated.





RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
/My favorite is a Binns & Berry, but I think it's a personal choice.
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
I have been selling machine tools for over 20 years
Some points to consider albeit high spec CNC.
A comparable Colchester to the Chinese model you are considering will be over 20 years old.
I believe that a £6000 asking price for the Colchester is excessive considering the recession we are enduring.
Buy a new lathe from a well known distributor/dealer.
There are numerous dealers that will offer you a comparable new machine including XYZ, Excell, Foremost BSA, Dugard etc.
Lastly haggle,haggle and haggle again
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
CNC is the way to go. High speed machining has big advantages. Removing small amounts of material at faster rates, tends to prevent the deformation/warpage of days of old. There are so many new trends/technologies which even extend tool life even on tough/hard materials. Through the spindle drilling has eliminated center drilling and are quite amazing in themselves.
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
You might also look for something like a Holbrook H-15 if you can find one, possibly the finest medium-sized British manual lathe ever built. There won't be many under 40 years old but they are so highly prized that they are usually very well looked after and remarkably accurate. On second thoughts, if you find a good one just tell me where it is and then forget about it.
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If we learn from our mistakes I'm getting a great education!
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
Quite simply the best. I used to operate Harrison alpha cnc/manual lathes, colchester tornado cnc lathes and graziano manual lathes. For manual work the grazzys were the best.
RE: Used Colchester or New Chinese Longem lathe?
don't buy Chinese, I have spent a lot of time in India and they use anything and everything apart from Chinese machines.
If you could stretch to 10K I think you might get a reasonable used HAAS machine, not the best but value for money and I have seen their lathes really producing parts,
best regards,
JohnFox