BoleynWorkshop

Inside the Boleyn 2026

Welcome to Inside the Boleyn 2026 and another riveting year of classic machinery and my own maroon rabid ramblings. January came and went with zero attendance mainly due to the weather and recovering from an eight week virus induced complete lack of motivation. However I soon perked up when the enquiries began to arrive in my inbox and regenerated some interest. It doesn't take much to be honest. Manuals for the Major and Elf from Derek Pyatts old stock have been sent off to various parts of the UK and I have been looking into reprints from his master copies which he kindly sent to me when he decided to cease supplying them himself. I also spent a weekend sifting through his kindly donated archive of Coronet and Record Power literature and what a weekend it was. My family was as good as dead to me as I pored through the workshop manuals, brochures, price lists and correspondence that he had collected from the glory days of the 50s 60s 70s and early 80s. In fact most of the second half of the 20th century. OK I'll admit every day is a glory day for a Coronet owner. I finally found a use for the box files that were an impulse buy off of fb marketplace (another guilty pleasure) and sorted the collection into six parts. Manuals, brochures and catalogues, attachments, price lists and correspondence, miscellaneous and lastly the Record Power which sort of feels like a dirty secret that the family don't speak about. I added my own collection to the archive at the same time though it seemed a measly contribution compared to Derek's.

Other enquiries have been about bearings for a Coronet Home Cabinetmaker, drive belts and bearings for various machines and a very interesting enquiry about the height positioning of the tee bar on a Major when turning. The owner had been taught turning by a "turner" who had advised him to set it above the centre of the work so the chisel was pointing down on to the work. My advice would be to not just accept the advice of a well meaning acquaintance but to check out one or two manuals written by an expert. Advice that I could have done with myself accepting when starting out if I'm honest. I was very fortunate to have been advised by Derek himself on many matters over the phone while standing over the machine I was working on.

I was asked to supply some roller bearings and guide blocks for an Imp owner which I assured him I had in stock but to my great shame my workshop is currently such a tip that I simply could not find them. I know they're in there somewhere, sound familiar?

I was contacted by a multiple machine owner Julian with who I've had correspondence before in the past. He has a large collection of machines of various models and various attachments which he is sorting through with the intent of putting up for sale, retaining a selected few for himself. They will eventually be listed up on my For Sale page with his contact details for perusal at leisure. We had a very enjoyable chat about Coronet machines and his lorry.

Keep looking in for updates and in the meantime keep it Coronet!

March 2026

In classic early Spring fashion enquiries of the Coronet variety are quietly filtering into my inbox. I have photos to post in Readers Machines of David Wetherell's Coronet Major and his Imp and several manuals to send off. I have finally tracked down somebody who worked at the Coronet factory and is willing to talk about it. I was perusing the Coronet thread in the Axminster Tool forum when I saw a post re the factory and replied to it. Despite the website's best efforts to keep us apart we managed to make contact and I will be asking many important questions in due course. I feel obliged to point out that the Axminster Tool Forum is not a list of people who are tools and happen to live in Axminster though I'm sure there must be a few.

During my recent annual therapeutic visit to the Motherland and Egypt in particular I spotted a fine looking MILF lurking in lower El S'Haby Lane, Luxor. Although it technically did not need fixing as it was performing at the time, I couldn't pass up the opportunity for this cracking bit of mature to join the proud MILFS of the Boleyn Workshop. Enjoy.