Högbo machine tools were manufactured by a Swedish company, Högboholms Mek. Verkstad 340 37 Torpsbruk. Although their smallest lathe was a copy of the pre WW2 Atlas 6-inch their little bench-mounted vertical miller was an indigenous design and displayed in its construction all the quality you would expect from a machine tool manufactured in Sweden - and of course, at a price to match.
Surrounded by a coolant channel the 400 x 110 mm (15.7" x 4.3") table had movements of: longitudinally 225mm (8.6"); in traverse 75mm (3") and vertically 140mm (5.5"); the maximum clearance between the nose of the No. 2 Morse taper swivelling vertical head and the table was 180mm (7").
Accessed by a large, hinged cover at the rear the drive system was completely enclosed within the body of the machine and consisted of a 1400 rpm, 0.5 hp 3-phase motor driving, via two-step V pulley, to a 3-speed V-belt countershaft. The latter was well constructed and employed SKF ball bearings contained within an eccentric mounting - an arrangement which provided a quick and easy means to tension and release the belt to change speeds. The spindle ran in taper-roller bearings and was fitted with either a No. 2 Morse taper nose, or adapted to hold Type "WW 16.5" collets.
For a small machine the main column was especially robust and sat on a hollow base casting that doubled as sump for the built-in coolant pump that took its drive from a separate V pulley on the motor spindle.
For all its quality of construction and heavy build (it weighted a not-inconsiderable 150 kg - approximately 331 lbs) the machines 'bête noire' was the lack of a quill feed on the vertical head ; without this facility many of the smaller and more complicated jobs a machine of this type would have been called upon to perform would have proved almost impossible - or required the used of time-consuming set-ups involving angle plates, brackets and swivelling machine vices.
If any reader has information on other Högbo machine tools, especially more details about their lathes, the author would be very interested to hear from you.