Different tap holder

[elk hunter]

A recent plea for help regarding a broken 6-48 tap made me think of the basic rules for tapping ; drill the proper size hole, use a sharp tap, plenty of the proper lube clean the chips out frequently, and make sure the tap is going straight down the hole. All are important but the last one is sometimes hard to do if you're tapping by hand using a typical tap handle.

I do most of my tapping in the mill and use the pictured home made tool to turn 6-48 and 8-40 taps. I also have a larger version that has a 3/8th inch drill chuck to hold taps up to 3/8inch shank size. The tap handle, if I can call it that, is held in a collet or drill chuck in the quill and slides up and down on 1/4 inch rod that guides and keeps it straight. The body has a 4 inch diameter round handle made of 3/8th inch rod, the tap is held in the bottom of the body via a small bushing that is drilled to hold a 6-48 tap on one end and a 8-40 on the other. The bushing is cross drilled so the socket head cap screw can secure the tap from the side of the lower body. After locating and drilling the hole I put the tap handle in and tap the hole prior to moving to the next location. I have tapped #6 holes up to five diameters deep using this tool to keep the tap straight, this would be nearly impossible without such a tool.

This tap handle is very sensitive, and has saved me a lot of aggravation. You can quite easily tell if you bottom out in the hole or the tap is not cutting properly.


Hope this is of some help.

Regards,

Elk Hunter

[deltaenterprizes]

I like to use the smallest handle I have for small taps, that way you can feel it if the tap binds before it breaks.

[briang]

That is very cool, thanks for sharing.

[Four Fingers of Death]

Good idea!

[andremajic]

Any chance you could post some larger pictures? Maybe disassemble it with pictures of the individual parts?

I'd love to make one.

Someone had shown me once to drill and tap holes by using a drill press, and switching out the drill bit with a tap, and hand advancing the belt on the machine to tap, but I like your idea a lot better. Seems like a sensetive tool.

Andy.

[Char-Gar]

In 1966 I bought a B-Square tap wrench with the floating rod that goes in the drill press chuck. It has very large handles and works just like the gizmo that is the subject of this thread. In use you replace the drill with tap wrench and the tap enters the hole at the same exact angle. I have never broken a tap or had a crooked hole with this set up.

[JIMinPHX]

A similar trick that I sometimes use is to chuck a dead center (pointed rod) & jam it into the back of a standard tap holder to keep things straight. The T-handle type tap wrenches often have a center hole already in them. If not, then I add one. With the flat tap wrenches, I sometimes slide the handle back off the tap shank a little & let the point of the center pick up in the two V's in the tap handle. Either way works well for keeping things straight. For the really small stuff, I often disengage the spindle drive, grab the tap in the chuck & just spin the chuck in by hand. You can also buy commercially made spring loaded tension/compression tap holders.

...just a few different ideas, none is best in every situation, each has it's time & place. You can never have too many tools in the draw or too many tricks up your sleeve. ;-)

As others have said, thank you for sharing.

[elk hunter]

Any chance you could post some larger pictures? Maybe disassemble it with pictures of the individual parts?

I'd love to make one.

Someone had shown me once to drill and tap holes by using a drill press, and switching out the drill bit with a tap, and hand advancing the belt on the machine to tap, but I like your idea a lot better. Seems like a sensetive tool.

Andy.



Andy,

You have a PM.