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Seldom found, the Wiskum watchmaker's lathe was manufactured during the late 1940s and early 1950s by P.Wiskum, Ny, Ostergade 3, Copenhagen in Denmark. Finished in a typical-for-the-time black-crackle finish - used on many contemporary products as a sign of high quality - the Wiskum was a light, "Geneva" type lathe with a round, 250 mm long bed with a flat section to the back. The maker describing the bed material, and other metal parts, as being of "Swedish steel" - and dimensioned so as able to take fittings by the German maker Lorch - a common feature of many "Geneva" lathes that allows considerable freedom to find suitable accessories such as a screw-feed compound slide rest. With a 40 mm centre height, the headstock held a spindle running in cone bearings and bored to accept 8 mm collets. The lathe was offered as a boxed set, probably in several forms, with the most complete holding - in addition to the usual wire, box, cone and wax chucks and tailstock runners - 3 and 6-jaw chucks; both push and lever-action tailstocks; a high-speed grinding and milling spindle; a compound slide rest; saw table; milling slide with a mounted high-speed spindle; safety pulley set; pump-centre faceplate; roller filing rest; a hand T-rest and a very large dividing plate to mount on the headstock If you have a Wiskum lathe of any type, the writer would be delighted to receive pictures and details.
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