Another Seneca Falls? I'd like to have seen that. I bought a Seneca Falls Star in Vic. with full accessories including universal milling attachment, except the milling shaft and u joint. 36 inches between centers and weighs 500 lbs with legs. She's a gymnast. But, there are still faint scrape marks on the ways. I'm not sure the milling attachment has ever been used. Only real issue is someone bored the spindle nose off kilter.
I think there are more machines close to seaports. Cheaper to ship.
Dunno about that. Rail used to be cheap as, or cheaper, than postage. Anything too big to fit in an envelope used to come by Rail if you ordered it in. At least in the 1900's on to near the present day. The West Coast, and to an extent, the rest of Canada, as an outpost of a 'greater civilization', saw a lot more of the British tools as a side effect.
Prices on decent quality home shop tools spiked way stupid high for a short period, and drove folks to look overseas for cheaper. For the longest while, you could write off to South Bend and send them a deposit, and they would ship you a 9 inch lathe and accessories for well under a thousand dollars. IIRC, I can recall the sum of $263.00 being advertised in the post WW2 era. A guy making workmans wages could reasonably look at that and think it affordable.
In contrast, when South Bend finally keeled over and died it's natural and inevitable death (the real SB, not the Grizzly Tools owner buying the rights to slather the logo on his import stuff), they were asking in the region of $15,000 American, for that same basic machine, which they were still selling, without ever having modernized it at all. I may still have the price quote they sent me somewhere in my junk. It was a shocker, as it was damn near what I was making in a year, at that time.
Myford did the same before they died off. Late 1970's, a friend of mine ordered in a new Tri Leva ML7, with a box of extra goodies, and he paid a bit over $2K delivered. About a third of the price of a working mans car off the lot. When Myford died, they wanted over $20,000 for a Super7. Plus more money if you actually wanted chucks, etc. All while to put it into perspective, a decent basic car could be got for that or less. A fellow that had toured the Myford plant while they were still operating, described it as a "bunch of old guys coming to work, waiting to die".
I like my wee Myford, and like as not, will have it, or one like it, until I have to sell it so they can wheel my cranky old arse into a home, but I am under no fantasies about it being the be-all to end all. But it's a decent enough tool, and I am happy to have it.
Cheers
Trev
