email: tony@lathes.co.uk
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Caladonia Lathe


Looking remarkably like an Emco Unimat DB200/SL1000 this "Caladonia" lathe is of unknown origin. While the box-form headstock and its support base look as though they have been machined from a block of steel - thus hinting at home-construction - other items, including the cast-iron bed with its cast-in name and the rather well-finished and detailed tailstock, suggest the possibility of series production. Fit and finish appear to be of a very high standard with widely spaced bed rails and even the plate supporting the electric motor properly shaped. However, all the feed screws - carriage, tailstock spindle or tool slide - lack any form of graduation on the machined bosses of their knurled-edge feed wheels.
Instead of using simple and cheap Unimat-style screw-on tailstock fittings, the Caladonia has a proper No. 1 Morse taper socket - though apart from a screw mating with an alignment keyway there appears to be no way of locking the spindle.
One improvement over the Unimat is the carriage assembly where, instead of a simple cross-feed-only arrangement of the cutting tool, on the Caladonia the saddle is formed as a simple, flat-topped plate with, mounted on top and so able to be swivelled, a screw-feed tool slide fitted with a two-slot toolpost.
55 mm in diameter, the 3-jaw chuck appears to be replica of that used originally on the Unimat lathes
Should any reader know more about this little lathe, the writer would be interested to hear from you.



email: tony@lathes.co.uk
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Caladonia Lathe