I was turning some steel Sunday afternoon on the Colchester and the coolant stopped flowing. I got around behind the lathe and opened the door where the coolant pan was revealed. What I noticed is that the pump was belly up and wasn’t drawing in the coolant. Turns out that the hose is very stiff and prevents the pump from sitting on it’s feet in the pan.
A gentleman (Jimmy) was there and we both started thinking of how we could improve this and concluded if the hose could be held (or fixed) to the side of the pan, it would allow the pump to sit on the bottom of the pan and not move around and turn upside down again. So we sketched a part out on the sketch pad and began milling a fixture out of a small aluminum block.
The pictures and video should describe the rest. Works great now and no problems with coolant flow. Please let me know if there are any questions. The part has a 1/2-20 bolt acting as a set screw on the back of the piece. It simply holds the fixture to the side of the drip pan and has plenty of clearance behind the pan.
I modeled the piece in Fusion 360 and made an animation so you can get a good look at what it’s like in 3D. See it here. https://youtu.be/x-txnJar5cY
