The spindle nipped up on the lathe. I think I'd better tear it down and check that it is not scoring the journal, and probably scrape the plain bearing back in before I use it any more. My lathe had been lubed with grease (except the headstock nose bearing) when I got it, so I need to make sure that the rear bearings are also correctly lubed.
It is obvious from the hammer and punch marks on the nuts that someone has been here before, who didn't bother with the finer points of maintenance like using the correct tool for the job. Lucky I bought a set of C spanners a few months ago.
The tear down starts on the LH end. There is a fine thread on the spindle which mounts a split nut as a backstop for the thrust bearing preload nuts to act on. This nut has a conical surface.
On my lathe, their was also a conical washer, but that was located on the other side of the thrust adjuster. I guess that was incorrect assembly.
I need to release the nut on in the gearbox behind the nose bearing, but it has a sheet metal cover.
To get that cover out of the way, it looks like I need to remove the three screws on the bull gear, and shift it to the left. There is also a grub screw on the spacer which has to come out.
The thrust bearing house slid out with a nice tight sliding fit.
The bearings will have to come out, as they are full of grease. Boley specifies VG68 way oil for the rolling element bearings. Martin from the CNCEcke has offered me his dummy bearing so I have a shaft support to locate the spindle for the 100 time you need to install and remove the spindle during scraping.
http://www.cncecke.de/forum/showthread.php?41731-Restauration-Boley-4L-Drehbank&highlight=boleyI am glad that the back gears look in very good condition.
Mark