Drill Presses & Chucks
Last updated on Sunday, April 07, 2013 07:45:36 AM Eastern US Time Zone

Mill Drill, Floor Drill Press, Drill Chucks, Z-axis DRO, Indicating 1, Table Work Stop, Table Clamp
Toe-clamp Set, Super Chuck,  Bench Drill Press, Indicating 2, Fence, Machine Work Light
Micro Chucks, Miniature Drill Press, Dremel Drill Press, Mortising Attachment

Drilling a hole through metal is one of the most basic machining tasks. However, there are many interacting
variables associated with successful execution thus requiring careful consideration of: the material to be drilled,
setup rigidity, bit design, bit material, sharpness, length, RPM, feed rate, chip removal, heat, & lubrication.
Drill bits, Reamers & Counter Bores   How to drill a hole   Guide for Cutting Speeds & Feeds for Drills   Machinist Calculator

CAUTION: Always clamp the piece to the table before drilling. Do not hold by hand. Standard drills will grab
soft metals like brass, lift the work piece, even with a small vise, & dangerously spin them at high speed.
Clamp or bolt down the part. Assure that the drill press head & table are locked onto the column, too.
Using a mill with a clamped part & fine down feed is a safer method to drill soft metals. Wear Eye Protection  

Rong Fu RF-25 Mill Drill

The DRO-equipped Rong Fu RF-25 mill is also an excellent drill press. It is massive, rigid, precise,
powerful, has a 110 to 2600 RPM speed range, & is equipped with a large (75 lbs.), strong,
high-clamping pressure milling vise. A wide variety of precision work-holding fixtures are available.
R-8 Accessories   Mill Accessories   Drill Bits

An R-8 mounted Super Chuck (⅛" ~ ⅝" or 3mm ~ 16mm), turning at a high speed, on the RF-25 Mill.

Floor Drill Press

Sixteen speed, 16.5" swing, floor-standing Jet drill press. The low, 200 RPM speed is good for drilling
larger holes. Its uses a removable MT2 (Morse taper) to JT3 chuck arbor. This type of arbor arrangement
 allows mounting the Jacobs ball bearing, 0" ~ ½" (0mm ~ 13mm), Super Chuck. The low-cost chuck arbors
come in a large number of size combinations allowing adaptation of almost any chuck to a given spindle.
An adjustable work-stop peg fits into a table slot. See the Jet JDP-17 drill press manual.

1/64" to ¾" capacity keyed drill chuck with a JT3-MT2 arbor. This large chuck is 2.95" in diameter (Taiwan).

The arbor eject access slot in the floor drill press is exposed by extending the spindle & rotating the chuck.

Arbor ejection wedge.

Drill Chucks

Thirteen drill chucks of various sizes & arbors in a wooden holder.

Drill Press Z-axis DRO

Installed a scale onto the large floor drill press spindle while retaining the Jet's depth stop gage.
Two inches of the eight inch scale were hack-sawed off & the end diamond ground with radii corners.
The top end free floats like the RF-25 mill Z-axis modification & retracts best by the spring when dithered.

Eight inch scale with adjustable surface mounting brackets.

The original aluminum depth stop was not square so it needed to be milled first.
Sometimes cast parts have angled sides so they can be easily popped out of their molds.

A ¼" plate bracket was made. The M3-0.5 mounting screws are located in between the OEM mounting bolts.

M3-0.5 screws hold the scale's transducer to the stationary bracket.

Now that the mechanical stop is milled square, the stop nut makes even contact thus making the stop more
robust with increased repeatability. Note the washer in between the two stop nuts helps adjustment & locking.
The washer works well enough that I placed one in between the adjustment nuts of the bench drill press, too.

The Jet also has a third nut that can hold the spindle extended to a set depth. It too now has even contact.

This bracket attaches through a W-sized hole to the Jet's ⅜-16 depth gage bolt & spindle bracket.
The scale's original clamp & screws were retained to capture the scale's end.

If the M3-0.5 screws are too long they will touch & interfere with the slide's movement.

Spindle fully extended 4.4" (111mm) travel. Displays imperial or metric units & zeroes at any location. The
 bottom edge of the transducer aligns with the zero thus functionalizing the mechanical inch & metric scales.

Indicating 1


Indicating the large drill press table.

Alignment animation.

Table Work Stop

Adjustable aluminum table stop to keep the part from turning. Place the part or vise against it before drilling.

Exploded view showing the stop's construction.

Table Clamp

Vise-Grip adjustable table clamp. The clamp foot has a removable rubber boot.

Exploded view of the steel T-adapters & hardened washers that hold the clamp base securely in the table slot.
The T-adapter keeps the slots from being worn & gouged by the smaller base under heavy clamping pressures.

Jorgensen No. 1623 drill press table hold-down surface clamp (USA).
Specifications: 3" opening capacity, 1¾" throat depth, 9/16" Acme screw, 2000 lbs.normal load limit, cast iron.

Clamp disassembled. The cotter pin allows quick installation & easy use.

The original table height adjustment (plastic) handle cracked so a longer aluminum one was fabricated.

Toe-clamp Set

The slots for both the bench & floor drill presses require ⅝" T-Nuts using ½" studs.

Super Chuck

The imported chucks supplied with most tradesman drill presses can have a relatively high total indicated
readout (TIR) & marginal gripping power. Upgraded both drill presses with Jacobs chucks (USA). The Jacobs
Super Chuck is of superior quality having low TIR & the ball bearing design affords very high gripping power.

Bench Drill Press

Bench drill press with a replacement Jacobs chuck. Drill press exploded diagram.
The magnetic-based work light was replaced with a fixed-base model.

Shown is a Jacobs taper (JT33), heavy duty, 0" ~ ½" (0mm ~ 13mm), keyed chuck on the bench drill press.
The extra large jaws & key, coupled with high quality, totally eliminated any drill bit slippage.

A washer in between the two stop nuts help adjustment & locking. Copied from the Jet floor drill press design.

Indicating 2


Indicating the small drill press table.

Alignment animation.

Adjustable brass table stop to keep the part or vise from turning.

Fence

Adjustable drill-press fence; a supplied accessory.

Machine Work Light

An upgraded task/machine work light (USA) for the bench drill-press setup.
It uses up to a 100W (maximum) halogen or incandescent lamp.

Machinists call it "autographing" when one drills or cuts the machine instead of the part.


Double-walled shade with a finned aluminum heat sink keep it cool to the touch & extends switch life.
The lamp's head can be directed more effectively than the previous light.
The lamp is used for both the drill press & bench top illumination.

The original base bolts were ¼-20 which were also used to bolt the base to the drill-press head.
The hollow head is only 3/16" thick cast iron so strong, 75% threads were easily tapped.
Now the lamp is very secure when moving the head & there is no magnet to attract metal swarf.

Micro Chucks   

The picture shows a ViseGrip drill press hold down clamp. A Royal micro-sensitive feed attachment with a
Jacobs JT0 keyed chuck (0" ~ 5/32") for small hole drilling (from Enco). Its straight shank is ½" in diameter;
overall drill travel is ¾". Use the highest RPM. Hold the aluminum ring between your fingers. It is mounted
in a ball bearing to decouple it from the rotating shaft. Apply light downward pressure. It has far less drilling
pressure than the drill press rack & pinion.  An internal coil spring automatically retracts the chuck.

Jacobs keyed chuck (USA), 0 to ¼" (0 to 6.5mm) with a JT2 - ⅜"-24 threaded arbor.

Jacobs keyed chuck (USA), 0 to 5/32" (0 to 4mm) with a Royal JT0 - ½" micro-sensitive feed attachment.

Albrecht precision keyless chuck (Germany), 0 to ⅛" (0 to 3mm) with a JT0 - ½" arbor.
Enco has these chucks & JT0 arbors at good prices.


Albrecht precision keyless chuck (Germany), 0 to 0.06" (0 to 1.5mm) with a JT0 - ⅜" arbor.

Miniature Drill Press

Variable-speed miniature drill press (China). The head is cast aluminum but the base is ground cast iron.
The column is solid 1.181 inches (30 mm) diameter chrome-plated steel.
Miniature drill press manual.

The base has two T-slots.

The steel spindle has an auto-ON/OFF digital depth gage with 0.0005" (0.01 mm) resolution.
It retains selected units (inches or mm) but resets to zero after an auto OFF/ON cycle.

When the spindle is extended, the digital gage slide is exposed.

The JT1 keyed chuck has a 1/64" through ¼" capacity. The spindle runs on multiple, sealed bearings.

There is an adjustable depth stop. The original setscrew was replaced with a metal adjustment knob.

The DC motor's speed ranges are adjustable via a pulse-width modulation (PWM) circuit.

Under the cover is a two-step pulley for intermediate (3600 RPM max) & high speed (5000 RPM max) ranges.
The drill press required several hours break-in period to achieve its maximum RPM (about 5300 RPM).
RPM varies with belt tension; the higher the tension the lower the RPM. The round belt eases pulley changes.

Replaced the two, OEM cover-retaining bolts, with knobbed M5-0.8 x 50mm bolts affording tool-less removal.

The bolt for the adjustable column locking ring was replaced with a ratchet lever for tool-less adjustments.

A small, X-Y table accessory (Japan) shown mounted. The knob scales (0.001" resolution) can be zeroed.

Detail of the settable X-axis scale. The index mark is too thick (even though it's a V-groove).

Attach the table to the base with the supplied M5-0.8 T-nuts then lubricate/check/adjust the both X & Y gibs.
Hold a square to the two bases first for a quick initial alignment. Align the X-axis using standard technique.
The dial test gage is indicating off the inner top back edge of the T-slot.

1" precision vise with integrated parallels, attached to the table using fitted L-brackets. The hardened
vise has six (4 side & 2 bottom) M5-0.8 pre-tapped holes. Indicate the solid jaw using standard technique.

An example of four, 7/64" diameter drilled holes having 0.25" depth & 0.200" center-to-center distances.

The two bench drill presses shown for size comparisons.

Dremel Drill Press

Dremel Moto-tool (395 Type 3) mounted into its aluminum & plastic drill press fixture. Not sturdy or precise.
Dremel Moto-tool Model 395 Type 3 Manual

A setscrew was added to the back of the plastic depth gage guide to remove most of the rotational slack.

Hand Drill

Stanley (England) No. 03-803 hand drill.

Drill shown with its accessory handle, attached.

Mortising Attachment

 Jet Mortising Attachment (JMA-581 manual), installed. Only shown for illustrative purposes.

Mill Drill, Floor Drill Press, Drill Chucks, Z-axis DRO, Indicating 1, Table Work Stop, Table Clamp
Toe-clamp Set, Super Chuck,  Bench Drill Press, Indicating 2, Fence, Machine Work Light
Micro Chucks, Miniature Drill Press, Dremel Drill Press, Mortising Attachment

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