Great old Monarch lathe vid.

[jabberwoki]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qlS_944oZE

[Uncle Buck]

Incredible machines in my opinion they have no equal among manual machines. A place I worked a few years back dictated a core part of their product line be turned on manual lathes with bed lengths of roughly 20' and corresponding swing of 30" or so I would estimate. There were most of a dozen such lathes in their machine shop. All of these machines were Monarch brand. Most 1960's vintage if I was guessing.  They added one or two during my time with the company. They had to first locate a used one meeting the specs needed. Next the machine was sent to Monarch and they were fully restored, every last nut, bolt and screw. Fully restored these machines were incredibly beautiful. I wouldn't even want to hazard a guess the total cost to put one into production work. I didn't even know Monarch was still in business, but they wore new Monarch tags and signage. Anyway that was what I was told during discussion. I have never seen the equal of these lathes, by that I mean manual lathes not CNC, and that is saying something. My job takes me into a huge number of machine shops and manufacturing facilities.