Buffalo No. 15 Drill Press Restoration

[wildo]

Wow! That is a cool setup, 110octane! Thanks for the info, very informative!

 

[The Liberal Arts Garage]

For the spindle taper: wire brush gently, take a wide straight partly worn
out file and go around it lightly; often a tough looking taper is quite good
good enough..........BLJHB

 

[Theo Timber]

Good day. I am new here. That drill press looks really great. You did a thorough job there sir.
Here is something I learned from an old guy many years ago. A damaged taper can be repaired by filing down the high spots and then spinning the tapered shaft inside the chuck with grinding paste used to seat car valves. One can secure the chuck by gripping a threaded stud in the jaw and then bolting the stud to the table. Be sure to use a stud with a non threaded end to ensure that the chuck is well centered in order to avoid run out after the grinding was done. The non threaded end will be inside the chuck. We did this to cure a loose chuck problem on a big drill press and it worked well.

 

[wildo]

Update on the drill press. This was a super fun project and I learned so much from doing it. I sure am glad that I did this one prior to starting the lathe restoration because lots of the things I learned from this drill press were applied to the lathe restoration. Because a couple parts on the lathe did need some black paint, I restripped the less-than-stellar paint job on the drill press head and repainted it using the HVLP sprayer this time. The finish is far better than the brushed on paint.

I did do a pretty extensive masking job so I could also spray the letters with the Baldor color-matched paint.


The spindle assembly was completed. It was a lot of fun pressing those bearings in place:


I two-toned the Baldor motor and reinstalled the nameplate using drive screws:


The drill press is now more/less complete. There's a few things I'd like to tidy up, and a couple places where the paint needs touched up, but for all intents and purposes it is complete:






Run out was measured to be .004" which is probably twice as much as I was hoping for. However, taking into account the fact that the spindle sleeve was literally rusted to the bore in the head, had to be pounded out, the bore honed, and the spindle sleeve polished- I'd say that's probably not too bad. A drill press isn't exactly a precision instrument anyway. This will be nice for general drilling, and once I eventually get a mill, drilled holes can be cleaned up on the mill if more precision is needed.

I guess that's it for this one. Getter Done, as Keith says.

 

[110octane]

Great job! It is arguably rare to find a light commercial drill press (not counting the very expensive "sensitive" drill presses) that has less than 0.003" run out. This is based on my experience.

 

[LeakyCanoe]

Most impressive...kudos on possessing both the machine and the spirit to bring it back to life again.

 

[raymondf]

Interesting discussion... I rebuilt a Buffalo 15 floor mount DP years ago and loved it. Great machine. I've got another one now - beat up, abused, and tired - sitting in the shop waiting it's turn to come back to life. So this is a very good discussion, particularly your photos showing components.

So, thinking, another option to repair your taper is simply take the spindle to a shop and just have them grind a new, good taper on the existing end. The process would involve removing a little material along the existing damaged taper until you reach good material all around - removing maybe not more than .030 or so. then face off the end to comply with the minimum diameter measurement needed to mount a new chuck. Grinding produces a smoother finish, resulting in less run out than turning with a lathe. This would shorten the quill by a few thousands, but that is negligable and you would never notice the difference once reassembled.

In any event, one other thing you can do is put the existing spindle, as is, on a pair of centers and run a dial indicator along the length. This will tell you if the spindle is tweaked off the axis or not, and by how much...

 

[raymondf]

I have a buffalo 15 also and need a new tapered chuck. Do you where and what to buy one its a 1/2 in drill chuck 5/5 taper spindle . any help would be great . Unknown if its a Jacob or Morse chuck Ray

 

[wildo]

I have a buffalo 15 also and need a new tapered chuck. Do you where and what to buy one its a 1/2 in drill chuck 5/5 taper spindle . any help would be great . Unknown if its a Jacob or Morse chuck Ray

Once you figure out the spindle taper, you can easily find a chuck on ebay, or from any of the many tooling suppliers like KBC, Shars, or MSC

 

[wildo]

Looks like it has been just about two years since I finished this up. The Teco drive has been working very well, and I've had zero issues with the drill press. It's an important piece of equipment in my shop and I've been really happy with it!