Help ID'ing lathe?
#1
We have this South Bend lathe at work, farm manager was cleaning up in the shop and threw a bunch of scrap iron on a pile. Told me if I wanted anything just take it. Well, I believe the piece I pulled out was a collet drawbar for the lathe. The picture of it and the lathe are below, I'm going to sell it. Don't have a lathe for it and no place to store it. So, if someone could ID the lathe and let me know what the drawbar is worth, I would appreciated it. The picture of the tape measure and the chuck is to give you and idea of how far the chuck is from the lathe bend.

Thanks,
Bob
   
   
   
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#2
Looks like a 13" South Bend but we'd need better photos showing a lot more of the machine to know. Look for a collet closer nosepiece for the spindle, and get measurements of the diameter of the draw tube to know if it's for 5C collets or 3C. The 13" South Bend lathes should have a spindle bore big enough to accept 5C, but I'm no expert. The draw tube doesn't have nearly as much value by itself without the spindle nose because you can by brand new draw tubes like that from Tools4Cheap.net. It would add value to the lathe itself if you have the other pieces, usually a spindle thread protector/nose piece extractor. You thread that protector collar on over the spindle threads, pop the collet closer nose piece into the spindle nose taper and when it's time to remove the collet closer you unscrew the protector collar and it pushes the nose piece out of the taper.
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#3
Ditto on the 13" swing. There should be more info on the brass red enameled label on the headstock cover such as bed length. On the tail stock end of the bed there should be some numbers which can be used to ID the lathe. Since South Bend went bankrupt Grizzly bought the parts inventory and the rights to the name. They also have the records to ID the lathe, but they will charge you for the info.

Lathe value is a lot like real estate. Location, location, location plus condition. In the Northeast and upper Midwest there is a fair number of SB's ranging from junk to prime condition. In other areas of the country and Canada they will bring a premium. Take a look on EBay and Craig's List to get a feel for its value.

BTW, more pics would be helpful.
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