Looking to have been made between 1910 and 1930, this little gap-bed, backgeared and screwcutting lathe is resident in Keyna. Almost certainly of English origin, no trace of it can be found in Model Engineer magazines of the time - leading one to suppose that only a handful can have been built. With a centre height of perhaps 4 inches and taking around 12 inches between centres, the lathe is complete with the maker's built-on countershaft. Unusually for such a small machine, the drive system is fitted with a fast-and-loose pulley - this handy system has a single flat belt running from a remote countershaft to a pulley free to spin on the input shaft of the countershaft. By means of a belt-striker mechanism, the belt can be flicked across the "fast" pulley and so the spindle started and stopped with ease.
Although many similar models were by various manufacturers during this period, the writer has never seen another tumble-reverse lever located on a curved plate held to the outer face of the headstock face by two bolts.
There is a chance that the lathe might be an early one by Arthur Frith; the complete carriage assembly and the leadscrew support brackets in particular looks to be very similar--though both headstock and tailstock are very different.