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Hmm... not good news Dave, maybe it is natures was of telling you to look for a slightly more robust and less technical lathe, something without electronic speed control. The tooling will fit your next lathe :)

No lathe I am afraid. Her who must be obeyed is not happy about buying another one.

What about all your tooling and inserts, it has to be used for something! How about doing a basic belt drive conversion and running it of a variable speed drive. It will make a huge difference and is a lot cheaper to do than pay for a new machine.

I will have to have a think about it and see what I can come up with.

I fitted a 240v 3 phase motor and inverter to an old Myford I used to own and it transformed it, more torque, step-less speed control and the ability to reverse at the flick of a switch, the motor, drive and remote pendant were around GBP240.00 from memory and the motor came with a pulley and taper lock.

I have spoken to the electrical guy at work he is going to take a another look at the electrics so I need to strip them back of the machine. He suggested I up grade it any way and to fit a invertor with forward/reverse speed control and a new motor.
I just have to supply him with a suitable AC motor and he will sort the rest of the kit out. So if the existing electronics can not be made to work Ill buy a motor and he will build the system for me. I think it was the tears dripping onto his desk that swung it.
Mean while the P14 is coming along nicely.

Sorted. The terminals on the new board were marked up incorrectly. The sparky at work made me a new drawing that makes sense. I have had it running on a bench in my shed. Just needs putting back together. I'm still tempted to go with a new motor and an inverter. May be.
The P14 is looking better after a good clean. I was given a spare stock with it I have stripped it just needs some tidying up and a couple of coats of boiled linseed oil. One mistake I have made and it did not dawn on me until I got home from the range I fired new shop bought ammo through it. After shooting the ammo off I gave the cases to a probationer I am looking after. Must have had a senior moment.