Installing needle bearings on a press??

[bangerjim]

You will want to drill then REAM for a tolerance fit. I seriously doubt will probably not find a standard A-Z/fractional drill of the right size. and then there is the truth to drilling "triangular" holes! That is why you always STEP DRILL. If you step drill (6-8 sizes) to just under the size you need for the bearing and then ream to tolerance-required size for your bearings, that will get you there.

This IS normally a machine shop function (milling machine) and not something normally attempted by a sloppy quill 30 year old foreign-made drill press.

Best of luck to you in your quest.

banger

[Petrol & Powder]

I agree with the prior posts that recommend against needle bearings.
If, (and it's a big if) you really feel a need to correct the wear issue, larger pins or bushings are the answer.

I don't think a drill is going to result in a perfectly round hole and a finish reamer is going to be called for.

With the proper reamer, you may even be able to get away with reaming the holes slightly larger and then fabricating new pins. You still would have the problem of making the pins out of steel of the proper hardness but I think it would be possible.

[Kenstone]

Bushings would be a better choice.
Needle bearings require a hardened shaft or inner race.
You have neither,
jmo

[elmacgyver0]

I have no idea who/how this 60 year old press was maintained, but the point of wear is around the top right pressed-in shaft. Getting lube in there requires laying the press on its side or upside down and flooding it with oil/lube. It's my guess it got a squirt of oil while in the bolted down position and rarely got lube into where it was needed.

Now knowing this pivot point needs close attention, I would anticipate any future issues will be component failure vs wear related. Although I can not really feel or identify any binding, under pressure the worn link hole has to be inducing some torque to the press parts and alignment. If I am going to use it for swaging, it needs to be squared away. Otherwise it's just fine for general reloading purposes.

60 years? I would say it did pretty well.
If you can get the bearings to fit tightly it will probably be good for another 60 years.
Bronze bearings should also work.
Good Luck with your project, it is always gratifying to restore old equipment to working order.

[oley55]

When considering reamers, should I be looking for straight or spiral cut flutes?

My top 1/2" (5/8") holes are in 1/2" thick steal and the bottom 5/8" (3/4") hole is through 2" thick steel.

[jetinteriorguy]

I would call RCBS and see what they say, they have a pretty good warranty and excellent service. If they have replacement parts they’ll most likely send them to you at no cost. If no parts support then who knows what they’ll do, but I wouldn’t be surprised they’ll do something about it.

[SODAPOPMG]

Being a machinist 20+years here is my advice
Forgot about bearings or bushings
This is not a do it yourself job unless you have a milling machine, without one all you are going to do is destroy the press
What you want to have done is ream the holes just enough to make them
Round again this might require the use of a boring bar first
Then you make a new pin to fit the holes
This will fix the press
Bearings need to spin or they will just wear out at the contact area
The Corbin press has much more rotation at the linkages than a reloading press

[Pressman]

First question is why? Are you going to load 10,000 rounds a year for the next ?? years. No, there's no primers available.
Does the tiny amount of wear affect the operation of the press, can you feel any binding as you move the handle?
Take it apart and coat the shaft with white lithium grease and use. Does it feel better?
How much is the work going to cost? Machine shops have a shop rate of $100.00 an hour and that goes up. You can easily spend a $300.00 mountain of cash fixing a flea sized problem.

There is only one regular reloading press with roller bearings in the linkage and that's the Herter's Model O Super, and it has one bearing in the lower link where it connects to the pivot block.

Just my thoughts on the worthiness of the project.

[nhyrum]

Being a machinist
What you want to have done is ream the holes just enough to make them
Round again this might require the use of a boring bar first
Then you make a new pin to fit the holes
This will fix the press

You know (to the OP) there's a guy on YouTube named Adam booth, that goes by the handle abom79, that does a lot of work like this, and he does some mighty fine machining. I could definitely see him making you nice, new, beautiful holes and new hardened pins. Not sure how much he charges though

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

[oley55]

Thanks to all for input and suggestion. For certain I need to do a lot more thinking and investigation. My reading of bearing manufacturer information on needle roller bearings confirms what has already been stated, hardened shafts or inside races ARE required.

As I stated in the beginning, "IF (a big if)" remains true.

[country gent]

a set of oil lite bushings might be the best of both worlds here. open up the holes and machine the bushings to fit then soak in med to heavy oil for a couple days install and relube surfaces. The bushings will soak up and hold a lot of oil
We would bore and turn a bunch up for a machine and stack in a 5 gallon bucket then cover with 80 weight oil by a couple inches. a wire over the edge of the bucket to touch the oil ( just an indicator) a couple days later there would be 1-1 1/2" gap between wire and oil. They sucked up a lot of oil.

[1hole]

Ball or roller bearings don't gall unless they have already been destroyed and run dry. After all, the balls/rollers are made to roll between the inner and outer race, they don't slide.

I'd not use an interference fit of more than 1 or 2 thou on those swinging links. More squeeze would do little to hold the races in place and it would greatly increase the risk of splitting the links. In fact, if it were mine I would make the holes a slip fit and anchor the bearing in place with a "Crazy Glue"; it's strong enough for that task and is softened for easy removal with the heat of an LP gas torch.

That said, I believe you're over thinking the problem. IF it were mine I'd likely leave it as is and see if I really could "wear it out". OR, IF I really wanted to tinker with it, I'd mike the present hole and pin diameters to see what thickness of auto parts house brass (or copper) shim stock would fill the gap. A proper size ribbon of brass wrapped around 90-95% of the link pin's surface would be an easy and inexpensive shop made "bushing" to make and install - or replace. (And, yeah, I have successfully done that, but not on a reloading press.)

Finally, a drill bit's tendency to chatter and cut triangular holes is usually too little to see in deep holes. Bit chatter can be largely controlled by maintaining sufficient contact pressure to keep the bit's cutting edges firmly seated in deep holes. And cone (stepped) bits work GREAT on really thin stock because they won't grab and screw themselves in like twist bits do but we can't bore deep holes with them.

All of this is IMHO of course, YMMV.

[SweetMk]

I would call RCBS and see what they say, they have a pretty good warranty and excellent service.

If they have replacement parts they’ll most likely send them to you at no cost.

Just for grins, yesterday, I looked up the RCBS warranty program,,

They make it VERY clear, that an RCBS item will ONLY be considered for warranty if:
You are the original owner
and
The item is mailed back to them pre paid postage
and
The original dated invoice showing certain info,,, BLA, BLA, BLA ,,, is included
and other demands.

Who has an invoice from over 18 months ago,?
Who has an invoice that is over one year old (to about ten years ago) that has not completely faded?

I kinda lost interest in RCBS many years ago, when a Hornady die caused my RCBS Partner press to bend!!
RCBS refused to discuss it, and said it was the fault of the Hornady die (the expander ball was a couple thousandths oversize)
Well, Hornady offered me a brand new Hornady press, and a new set of dies if I sent THEM the RCBS press..

The Hornady guy went on to say, keep the old dies, and try them in the Hornady press,
if the Hornady press is damaged, they would send me ANOTHER press, for free, also.

I have a new Hornady Classic press,, now.
The old dies could not damage the Hornady press.

I talked to that guy at Hornady, at a future date,,
He said he had a LOT of fun at the next shot show,, with that bent press,,
Maybe, that is why RCBS no longer makes that cast aluminum press??

(the die was a 243 Winchester)

I buy RCBS, but, it has to be a GREAT deal, otherwise, I buy "red",,,

[bangerjim]

Ball or roller bearings don't gall unless they have already been destroyed and run dry. After all, the balls/rollers are made to roll between the inner and outer race, they don't slide.

I'd not use an interference fit of more than 1 or 2 thou on those swinging links. More squeeze would do little to hold the races in place and it would greatly increase the risk of splitting the links. In fact, if it were mine I would make the holes a slip fit and anchor the bearing in place with a "Crazy Glue"; it's strong enough for that task and is softened for easy removal with the heat of an LP gas torch.

That said, I believe you're over thinking the problem. IF it were mine I'd likely leave it as is and see if I really could "wear it out". OR, IF I really wanted to tinker with it, I'd mike the present hole and pin diameters to see what thickness of auto parts house brass (or copper) shim stock would fill the gap. A proper size ribbon of brass wrapped around 90-95% of the link pin's surface would be an easy and inexpensive shop made "bushing" to make and install - or replace. (And, yeah, I have successfully done that, but not on a reloading press.)

Finally, a drill bit's tendency to chatter and cut triangular holes is usually too little to see in deep holes. Bit chatter can be largely controlled by maintaining sufficient contact pressure to keep the bit's cutting edges firmly seated in deep holes. And cone (stepped) bits work GREAT on really thin stock because they won't grab and screw themselves in like twist bits do but we can't bore deep holes with them.

All of this is IMHO of course, YMMV.

When I mentioned "step drilling" above, I certainly did not mean those cheap multi-step drill-things like HF sells for cutting holes in sheet metal and thin electrical boxes! I mean drilling (a standard industrial machine shop technique) with a small drill to start and increasing to larger drills in steps of sizes until you are just under the hole size you need.
Then finish with either a reamer (adjustable or fixed) or a boring head in a milling machine. This is absolutely NOTHING that can be done successfully in a cheap wobbly-quill drill press.

And you CAN drill deep holes doing it that way! I do it all the time with extreme accuracy and PERFECTLY round holes all the way thru thick materials!

banger

[oley55]

Thanks Banger, but I swallowed my (Old Pop knows more than all of his boys) pride and talked to my youngest son. He still has access to a military machine shop and he is going to drill, ream and press in the bushings for me. So much for me learning it on my own, I guess....

For those interested, the attached pics show the displaced metal at the top right pivot pin and the (more than I recalled) shine on the lower toggle pin. Interesting that where metal was displaced there is little to no pin shine and where the pin shows shine/wear there is no sign of metal displacement.

At any rate I am proceeding with the impregnated bronze bushings in the top of the link arms and in the bottom toggle.

[bangerjim]

oley55 - - glad you found someone with access and skills in a machine shop! Should be a piece of cake with the right accurate tooling.

I would use bronze bearings if I were doing it too!

banger

[EDG]

That little flap of displaced metal you are so concerned about is nothing but a burr from the original manufacturing of the press.

It appears that RCBS drilled and reamed the link and the reamer left that thin burr when it exited the hole.
I have seen that on millions of holes. You should deburr it with your deburr tool and forget it. It is nothing.

RCBS should have deburred that edge of that hole and you would never have seen that. You are worried about nothing at all.

[Three44s]

That looks like a thin brass or bronze bushing to me and its displaced and worn some.

Three44s

[john.k]

The only reason for roller bearings would be a user with severe arthritis,who couldnt exert pressure with a wrist ...or somesuch......In fact a very servicable bearing for slow movement is hard steel on hard steel....with just a smear of oil ,such bearings last a very long time.......Pressed cup needle rollers are also OK ,but IMHO ,reduction in applied force is not an issue with a normally abled reloader.......one issue with needles is the need for a very stable base,holding correct alignment to avoid edge loading the races/rollers.....Not in a loose link press linkage.

[1hole]

When I mentioned "step drilling" above, I certainly did not mean those cheap multi-step drill-things like HF sells for cutting holes in sheet metal and thin electrical boxes!

Banger, when I said cone type step drills are limited to thin stock that was what I meant. And, if you think Harbor Freight is the only source of step drill bits (or anything else made in China) then you haven't noticed what's being sold in Lowes' and H'Depot's tool racks lately.