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Thread: The Mother Of All Drill Presses!

  1. #81
    Boolit Master
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    What our nation accomplished in tooling for WWII is nothing short of amazing but we had something going for us then ..... time.

    Today things move so much faster.

    Our manufacturing base was really budding by Dec. 7, 1941 and though I am no fan of FDR one has to admit his administration did a fantastic job marshaling production from some pretty unlikely sources into the war effort.

    I attended college prior to coming home to farm and ranch and would not trade that knowledge for anything, but "we" have made a horrendous mistake encouraging our youngsters towards college in such crushing numbers. We should be giving them better guidance and undeniably many more of our young need to be going into the trades. Better for them and better for the country.

    I have a feeling that the war reserve you are familiar with likely has been squandered. Also today's snow flakes looking at what is likely "old school" machinery and being clueless of what to do with it.

    With respect to manufacturing, the advent of CNC allows one to produce parts at a much faster pace with much less man hours but our adversaries share this advantage and with a greater participation of their populations in the trades, we would find ourselves on the short end of that stick as well.

    We have arguably the finest military on face of the earth, but in a protracted struggle our fine defense capabilities could make an amazing sprint only to sputter to a stop when the call for repairs goes out and the need for new equipment occurs.

    Three 44s
    Last edited by Three44s; 04-27-2017 at 10:26 AM.

  2. #82
    Boolit Master
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    I could type pages on that subject alone. Anyway Mark, enjoy your new to you drill, be sure to post some pictures when you take a bite with that 2 7/8" drill. In fact, I'd make a point of doing that just to test it under load. Another word of caution. Often the coolant sump on these goes sour over the years. You might consider filling with just water several times, flushing it out, and add some bleach just to kill any mold or bad stuff lurking in the base before refilling with some fresh water soluble oil. Lots of us old machinists have got some nasty infections from coolant sumps with bugs growing in them from our exposed cuts. Have fun with it, I sure would,
    Chris

  3. #83
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    Chris,

    That's real good advice. The fellow who ran it for the county said he did not use it because of the mess. They used some stuff from an aerosol can ... the empty can is on the tombstone. I don't think that would very economical.

    But the concept of cuts and "nasty" water is not something I had considered. I can sure see where that would be a bad deal since the drill generates lots of sharp edges.

    Thank you and Best regards

    Mark

  4. #84
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    I'd stay away from those sprays or squeeze cans for all except tapping small holes, and it's expensive to use those as well. Water soluble cutting fluid works well for removing heat from drilling larger holes, lubricates at the same time. On smaller things there is a cheap way to go with this that doesn't cause a mess. At the grocery store they sell those cheap plastic spray bottles. Fill one up with that soluble oil already in the coolant system, and use it where it's a small hole, or where you don't have that much heat. Using the plastic squeeze bottle makes a minimal mess. Doing that also prevents contaminating the coolant sump with a bunch of stuff that doesn't belong there and will be difficult to remove or clean out. A gallon jug of Trim soluble oil from MSC, or others is around $30, and should be enough to mix in a cleaned out sump with 20 gallons of water, it will last for a very long time. When you have the mix right, the coolant is a milky blue. The water evaporates, just add more water, you are good to go again. I liked to clean out coolant sumps about once a year. After filling with water, used the built in pump to clear it out, on about the third cycle, add bleach and let it set overnight. That spray can that the guy from the county was using tells me they weren't drilling very big holes to often, that aerosol can could never be enough drilling bigger holes.
    Chris

  5. #85
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    Saw the pics, and you got yourself a serious hole borin' machine ! Good luck and I hope you get lots of use out of it.

    Randy
    "It's not how well you do what you know how to do,,,It's how well you do what you DON'T know how to do!"
    www.buchananprecisionmachine.com

  6. #86
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    Chris,

    I don't think they did much big hole drilling either and I thought water soluble oil and water would be hard to beat for cooling and lubrication both in cost and effectiveness.

    I also see our tombstone is designed with a pretty good drainage system to recirculate the coolant but it's fairly dirty as it came to us. If it's not well maintained you are not going to get good results, i.e. You are going to be wading in your coolant in no time!

    Thank you once more for the guidance on what to buy and how to manage the coolant mixture. Using bleach somewhere in the process had come to mind.

    Best regards

    Mark
    Last edited by Three44s; 04-29-2017 at 12:48 AM.

  7. #87
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    Randy,

    Thank you and I am glad you enjoyed the pics etc.

    When I embarked on this project of sorts, I was interested in acquiring a drill press large enough to replace our antuiqe broken press that likely uses mt #2 shanked bits.

    I think we accomplished that ........ lol What I did not count on was the big hole capability, nor the ability to clear such a big work piece, nor the corker .... the ability to line bore yet not spend a proverbial "arm and a leg" for it.

    Best regards

    Mark

  8. #88
    Boolit Grand Master jmorris's Avatar
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    What our nation accomplished in tooling for WWII is nothing short of amazing but we had something going for us then ..... time.

    Today things move so much faster.

    With respect to manufacturing, the advent of CNC allows one to produce parts at a much faster pace with much less man hours ...
    CNC is very nice and with additional automation can make human involvement almost unnecessary.

    That said up until two years ago I still ran some of that old WWII equipment, some still had the tags on them from back in the day. They could do more operations, faster than any of the modern machines that cost well over $100,000 ea.

    Where the problems came in was if you had your regular "button pusher" (what many "old school" machinists call CNC operators) make a mistake and "crash" the machine. Setting it up again wasn't as easy as replacing say tool #7 and typing in a new offset.

    I set them up a few times to have someone crash them, still can't figure out how, it's load, run, empty, return, repeat, in any case for the last few years before he closed down I ran the old machines myself, when they needed a run. Not that I would have wanted to do it every day for 25 years but it was pretty neat to make a few hundred parts on them that from first to last were only .0002" different from one another.

    I would have bought them myself if I had the room indoors to keep them as all five still worked fine when they sold for $120 at auction. All went from the building directly to the scrap yard.
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails image.jpg   image.jpg   image.jpg  
    Last edited by jmorris; 04-29-2017 at 09:03 AM.

  9. #89
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    jmorris,

    "Button pushers .... " That works me!

    I think the technology is fine but the way we have gone with it isn't.

    Here's a parallel: When we train pilots we teach them to fly .... period! We don't give them a computer and have them push buttons and sit back and enjoy the marvels of flight. All that cute fuzzy stuff comes later if at all. A button pusher would be doomed if there was an equipment failure or some occurrence outside of the parameters of the computer.

    We should be training true "old school" machinists first and transitioning them on to CNC second. That way their brain is engaged. Of course, that costs more money and businesses likely make the decision that it's cheaper to crash their equipment a percentage of the time and pay button pushers less.

    Best regards

    Mark

  10. #90
    Boolit Master
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    I ran a radial arm drill press that was about 2 to 3 times heavier and about 50% larger than your new purchase.

    Mostly I drilled thousands of 1" holes in tube sheets. Most of the tube sheets were 48" in diameter and were 1" thick. They were stacked 4 deep and were tack welded together.
    There were so many holes drilled that the margin wore off of the drills after a while. We had no drill grinder so I had to sharpen them by hand.

    There are only a few pointers that can offer.

    1. First the machine has to be bolted down to a good concrete floor so you will not turn it over when the arm is 90 degrees to the base.
    Otherwise you might have to make some sort of cross arm base that will keep the center of gravity inside the dimensions of the base.

    2. If the column rotation lock is manually powered it is possible that it will make the arm move when you lock it causing the hole to be mis-located. Figure out how your drill press behaves when you lock the column rotation.
    3. I caught people chewing tobacco (and probably with colds too) spitting into machine sumps. Get your sump cleaned out and dis-infected and make sure no one spits in it again.

    4. Those machines have a lot of exposed metal to get dirty and rusty. You might find an old tarp or equivalent to keep it clean in your barn environment.
    EDG

  11. #91
    Boolit Grand Master jmorris's Avatar
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    Of course, that costs more money and businesses likely make the decision that it's cheaper to crash their equipment a percentage of the time and pay button pushers less.
    Yes, pay a few programmers for many operators and as long as your not doing a lot of one offs, it's cheaper.

    To keep the thread closer to topic this is a bad photo but one of the big ones he had. For scale that's a roll in saw to the right and an 8ft fluorescent mounted up high. It sold for less than it cost to move it.

    Also I'd watch out for tarps or any cover that might trap condensation, especially one you can't see through. So you think it's protected to uncover it a few months later for it to look like you sprayed it with salt water before you covered it up.
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    Last edited by jmorris; 04-29-2017 at 11:27 AM.

  12. #92
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    Jim I would suppose you are not familiar with the carp that can blown in on a machine in a farm environment.
    Sand and dirt is guaranteed if the machine is not protected.
    EDG

  13. #93
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    Hi Three44`s.As far as bleach goes use a quality brand such as Clorox.As far as I`m concerned,anything else is just dumping your money down a rat hole.YMMV.And again sir that`s an outstanding score.
    Good luck.Have fun.Be safe.
    Leo
    People never lie so much as after a hunt,during a war,or before an election.
    Otto von Bismarck

  14. #94
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    EDG,

    Thank you for the input, it is much appreciated!

    To bolt it down vs. using isolation feet is going to be an important decision. We have to build a separate shop for this drill so we have some time on that one. I do anticipate swinging the arm off the base so bolting it down may our only option.

    The arm lock is mechanical on our machine and it needs adjusting. I have the maintenance and operation manual for it.

    I will look out for chewers and spitters!

    I have some rusting that occurred to our buying this drill to clean up. I'll likely get my spray bottle of Corrosion X and give it a good blast where it's needed, then we are planning on covering it. We have a number of gravel roads up wind of us so dust is ever present during our "dry season".

    Thanks again and best regards

    Mark

  15. #95
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    jmorris,

    Your point on tarping the drill is well taken. My first thought was to use a cheap plastic tarp but the condensation issue was on my mind. I will need to cover it but it may have to be a canvas tarp and we will have to uncover it periodically and check to see that our "oiling" is doing what we intend.

    Big machine there in the pic!

    Thanks again and best regards

    Mark

  16. #96
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    Leo,

    Thank you for the input, on thing about it ....... bleach is inexpensive enough there is little point in cutting corners!! LOL!

    Best regards

    Mark

  17. #97
    Boolit Master

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    Definitely bolt it down. If the head is extended to the end of the arm and the arm is rotated because the workpiece will not fit on the tombstone, you don't want the press tipping.

  18. #98
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    ulav8r,

    Yes that would be the scenario we'd be most worried about.

    Thank you for your input and best regards

    Mark

  19. #99
    Boolit Grand Master jmorris's Avatar
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    Jim I would suppose you are not familiar with the carp that can blown in on a machine in a farm environment.
    Sand and dirt is guaranteed if the machine is not protected.
    Actually I am, thus my advice.

    I have an Atlas/craftsman lathe at our farm in a dirt floor barn for emergency use. Being sandy loam country I covered it (not wrapping it up with intent to trap moisture but just covering it) in a heavy duty out door tarp, a rusty machine was the result.

    A good portion of my advice is from mistakes I have made in the past and learned from.

    Dust lives on top of everything down there but rust lives under the silver tarp at the top right of the photo, if you don't get a bucket of cosmoline and keep it coated.



    It would be ideal to have something that kept dust out, could breath and rodents wouldn't tear it up trying to make a home.
    Last edited by jmorris; 05-01-2017 at 09:44 AM.

  20. #100
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    Well, this all gives me something to ponder ..... to tarp or not and if so ..... what with.

    That's why I was thinking something out of canvas to breath?

    I have two issues ..... one will be the interim storage in our hay shed. One of our issues there is barn swallows. They are getting ready to do their digging and dabbing as I type this and they love that hay shed ...... the rafters and beams overhead.

    The second is how to store the machine once we have made a home for it as there will be extended periods of non-use ....... likely.


    I am a big fan of Corrosion X and my thought is to use it and cover with a breathing material.

    We have dust generated on some roads but nothing like jmorris experiences. We are dry country during the summer generally but our winters are noted for wide temperature swings over time. You get a lot of frost coming out on big temperature jumps.

    I figure any way I go it will be wrong but it's a matter of sorting out the least wrong way and periodically treating with a rust preventative.

    Best regards

    Mark

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