1921 and Patrick announce their basic "Popular" and "Special" models. The "Special" was a top-of-the-range offering with an unusually heavy stand, a proper geared apron (providing power sliding and surfacing) and an especially long bed. Note the robust swivelling milling slide and toolpost grinder.
More than one version of the Popular was manufactured, some having a detachable headstock others with bed and headstock cast as-one.

Extremely rare in this condition, a beautifuly original and unrestored 4 1/2" x 16" gap-bed screwcutting Patrick from the 1920s. This model is without backgear, an omission that, whilst it saved the original owner money, resulted in a compromised lathe that lacked versatility.

Treadle stand. Although small electric motors were widely available pre-WW2 they were expensive, often adding 25 to 40% to the cost of a new machine. One slightly cheaper option - and essential where there was no electricity supply - was the ubiquitous treadle drive.

Although of sound construction - and heavy build - the lathe was still built with an eye to economical production and penny-saving: no micrometer dials on the feed screws, only three gib strip adjustment screws on the top slide and a solid tailstock barrel.

Almost certainly built in the late 1920s or early 1930s, and showing some improvements over the earlier model, this 4" x 16" gap-bed, backgeared Patrick has a headstock pulley to take inch-wide flat belt in place of a round-rope "gut drive", a more robust, rectangular-form apron with a geared drive direct onto the leadscrew and a heavier changewheel bracket. It has also been neatly adapted to carry a Boxford top slide--the carriage and leadscrew handwheels are also not original. Note the swing bracket on the changewheel drive to allow the insertion of an extra changewheel to generate left-hand threads.

Patrick "Wonder", "Popular" and "Standard" lathes
At least two versions of the little Patrick plain-turning "Wonder" lathe were produced, one with simple cantilever bed in a 2-inch centre height and the other with a bed having feet at both ends. Each of the types was manufactured with a separate headstock - or with bed and headstock cast as one - with a number of different between-centres capacities offered as indicated by the advertisement reproduced below. All models appear to have shared components and were designed along very simple lines to give the hard-up enthusiast the chance to own a small but robust machine with a useful range of movements. Although not backgeared in standard form (though this was available as an extra) and having only two flat-belt or round "gut" drive speeds, the headstock had unusually long bearings that promised a long life. The slide rest was of the compound variety and hence so much more useful than the "single-swivelling" type so often found on machines intended to compete at the bottom end of the market. The economical construction of the compound, built with steel-bar ways, was very similar to that on the contemporary Drummond "Little Goliath" lathe and subsequently on the very popular the Emco Unimat SL1000 and DB200 of the 1950s and 1960s. The lathe was available as an ordinary plain-turning model with the compound slide rest positioned by hand and locked down, or driven down the bed by a leadscrew placed centrally below the bed ways and activated by a large handwheel at the tailstock end (the remains of such a machine being shown below). This arrangement, though simple, provided the operator with a sporting change of getting a decent finish and was a good deal easier to operate than  a carriage handle operating driven by a gear that engaged directly against a bed-mounted rack. Unfortunately, instead of employing the well-separated front and back  faces of the bed to guide the saddle the Patrick used the narrow and close-together inner and under surfaces of the gap between the front and back ways.  As a consequence, the saddle rested on the full width of the front way - but on only part of the rear..

A simple Patrick plain-turning lathe from the 1920s--note the distinctive tailstock and shape of the handwheels. Unfortunately, instead of employing the well-separated front and back  faces of the bed to guide the saddle, the Patrick used the narrow and close-together inner and under surfaces of the gap between the front and back ways. As a consequence, the saddle rested on the full width of the front way - but on only part of the back.

The economical construction of the compound, built with steel-bar ways, was very similar to that on the contemporary Drummond "Little Goliath" lathe and subsequently on the very popular the Emco Unimat SL1000 and DB200 of the 1950s and 1960s.

The Patrick illustrated above and below is not completely original, nor complete: the headstock pulley has been changed from one using three narrow Vees (to take a round-rope leather "gut drive) to a standard aluminium V-type to take a Z-section belt - though later Patrick lathes did use cast-iron flat and V-belt pulleys. The carriage handwheel may not be the maker's - and the screwcutting changewheels are not in place.

Because the lathe had a rather generous centre height for its overall dimensions, the makers had to indulge in some creative engineering to get the cutting tool up to centre height. Their interesting solution, instead of using just a thicker cross slide casting, was to mount the top slide on a (square-based) raiser block fitted with a circular T slot that allowed rotation through 360 degree. 
Note that the block under top slide is bolted down across one diagonal only.

The square edge to the bed might mean easy production and a simple regrind - but the narrow, wingless saddle (only as wide as the cross slide) had a minimum bearing area against the rear shear and would have been both less stable under heavy cuts and likely to have promoted quicker wear than one designed along traditional lines.

The tailstock barrel was threaded on its outer surface and passed through a threaded handwheel. The handwheel was retained by a two-part circular thrust washer located in a grove machined in the surface of its forward boss; an almost identical arrangement was employed for many years on the very popular Myford ML7.

Rear view of the tailstock showing the circular, two-part barrel retaining washer and the simple - and horrible - screw-in barrel clamp.