Center drill for lathe

coolidge said:
This is brilliant, I have been thinking it would be great to have a live tooling head on my G4003G and now my mind is abuzz with ideas! That these drills have clutches the opportunity for tapping is also in play...(Coolidge wanders off mumbling to himself)
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That is good thinking on the clutch....Completely missed that myself....the drill head is self locking so I figured tapping was out(not being able to rotate by hand) But I can see where being carefull with the clutch setting it could probably be done.
 
Great idea/design but I would have one concern, are those holes on the top of the unit all that the motor has for ventilation? It might be worth consideration to cut some unobtrusive slots underneath or on the back side to allow for better air circulation/cooling. Heat build up is the bane of motors.

Just a thought,

-Ron
 
That big block of aluminum probably dissipates a lot of heat as a heat sink. Machine some fins in it then it would look even more beastly!

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rgray said:
That is good thinking on the clutch....Completely missed that myself....the drill head is self locking so I figured tapping was out(not being able to rotate by hand) But I can see where being carefull with the clutch setting it could probably be done.
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I just tapped a bunch of holes with my Makita cordless drill installing a DRO on my lathe so I have tapping on the brain. The clutch works great especially for small taps. Speaking of which I brazed together an extended reach hex drive tap holder for that job. It would help if the drill was mounted on a slide that I could unlock so the drill was free to move in/out while tapping with a forward/reverse switch wired up. If I could figure out how to index/lock the spindle I might go more powerful than a drill motor and have some fun with some end mills!
 
ScrapMetal said:
Great idea/design but I would have one concern, are those holes on the top of the unit all that the motor has for ventilation? It might be worth consideration to cut some unobtrusive slots underneath or on the back side to allow for better air circulation/cooling. Heat build up is the bane of motors.

Just a thought,

-Ron
Click to expand...

Yes....they were supposed to be on the bottom :whistle:. Probably better on the top as heat rises...the fan on the motor is still there to push air....I intended more venting but used it alot before finishing and it never really seems to get hot. So I never added any more. I'm sure it gets hotter than I think it does...as touching the aluminum block to see how hot the motor is.. is probably not a good indicator...The only openings are those three holes and the ones where the wires enter....they are extra large with the idea that they were air intake holes....

Like so many other unfinished things around here...sometimes I feel like the king of unfinished projects.
 
Oh great! yet another project I have to build and I haven't even picked up my lathe yet!

Great idea on re-purposing the cordless drill.

It seems I always have an extra one lying around too. Not because the drill breaks, but because the batteries get knackered and it's usually just as cheap to buy a new drill. I know at least one is going to get a new life....


:thumbzup:
 
great white said:
Oh great! yet another project I have to build and I haven't even picked up my lathe yet!

Great idea on re-purposing the cordless drill.

It seems I always have an extra one lying around too. Not because the drill breaks, but because the batteries get knackered and it's usually just as cheap to buy a new drill. I know at least one is going to get a new life....


:thumbzup:
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Yep ...My first li-ion battery fail....Been thinking of building another...maybe on a rod so the assembly slides and lockable so the crossfeed can still be used for the drilling.....It's a bummer when the drill bit is just alittle to long...sometimes zeroing the DRO ....moving over....installing drill bit...then returning to zero works....other times it's not enough....and it could have been done if the cross slide was angled away from the center....then zero does no good... angle the cross slide....reset to square.....and drill....wishing I had the foresight to have angled first.
 
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