Tightening up a drill press?

L6steel

L6steel

Joined
Sep 23, 1999
Messages
5,855
Is there anything you can do to a drill press to make it more accurate, to take any of the wobble out of it and such?
I rigged up a plexiglass plate on mine, like Varmint Al did on his lathe, today to help me do more accurate counter sinks and counter bores with a dial indicator and when the plate contacts the indicator the needle bounces some. Sure would be nice to be able to tighten the press up some to make it more accurate. Here's a pic of the set up in case anyone else might wanna try it, works great.
dialindi.jpg
 
Mine used to be pretty bad, then I replaced the chuck with a keyless one from Grizzly. That thing was/is like a new drill press. No runout.

The stock chucks on the Taiwan drill presses are not known for precision. :eek: ;)
 
I'd guess chuck or shaft assuming the bearings are ok
Shaft is a bit troublesome assuming you're up to a complete tear down. fixable is you can get somebody to machine one for you
Have you run the dial indicator on the shaft?
Mike Hull is likely right on. If the shaft runs true the chuck is all it can be
 
Ohhh, I didn't mean my drill press was shot guys!
I was just looking for tips on how to make even a brand new one better. I just replaced the chuck with a new Jacob's chuck from MSC. Had the thing in the shop for 6 months cause I couldn't figure out how to safely remove the old one and in answer to a post I made here someone told me to use a wedge to pop it off the spindle but I didn't know where I'd get a wedge. One day I was diggin in my tool cabinet and came upon a ball joint tool so I figured why not. The chuck just popped right off, lol. I can tell a big difference since putting the new one on.
Just didn't know if maybe there was something you could tighten up or something to make them more accurate.
 
The two best things to do to make your import drill press calm down, it change the chuck and change the belt. Put one of those twist-0-flex belts on and it'll run a lot smoother. Also, what I have done in the past is take off my pulleys and turn them down on the lathe a bit. Sometimes those cheap pulleys are almost as bad as is they come right out of the casting!
 
I worked in shop where we bought an import band saw and tuned it up. turning the wheels on a lathe (one was so far out we had to bush the center), shimming them, changing the pulley on the motor to one that's actually round. I bet if you went around your drill press with your dial indicatr you'd find a couple places you can squeeze some performance by a little shrewd lathe work or replacing a couple parts with some of better quality.
I've never done a drill press but after the awesome performance with the import band saw I'll always give a serious look toward tuning a cheaper import tool rather than buying a higher priced tool and still having to tune it some.
I also rebuilt a used table saw to a great performer.
The belt idea is a must. They're a little expensive but you'll never regret doing it. You'll probably start looking to use them on more of your motors.
Anybody have a source of the belts at a good price?
I can also use another.
 
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