Drill press

[BrentK]

Is it necessary to own a drill press or can you drill out the blanks with your lathe with a drill bit chuck. Any input will be appreciated. Thanks in advance
Brent Keever

 

[DCBluesman]

Many folks prefer to drill on the lathe. It can be more accurate and repeatable than on an inexpensive drill press. The only thing is, it takes a little longer to set it up.

 

[jtate]

I have one of those infamous cheap drill presses and it's not very useful at all. Even the addition of a wonderful PH pen drill vise hasn't helped. I've reverted back to using the lathe for drilling. I really like that best. I hold the material in a chuck of some sort on the head stock and the drill in a jacobs chuck in the tail stock. The material (usually wood) spins and the drill bit centers in it. The tail stock handwheel lets me advance the bit slowly or quickly and I can set the speed for the drilling process ot advance by setting the lathe speed.

I am also planning to use the lathe as a disc sander. I found plans for how to build a bed for the material to rest on. The bed, of course, sits on the lathe bed. The sandpaper is mounted to a piece of MDF on faceplate.

My plan is to reduce the equipment in the workshop to the most efficient and effective tools. It will be like woodworking poetry.

 

[barrels]

I use a drill press myself. I have a Rikon 17", has lighting,nice large working surface and good scales for proper level control. I have had very good successes in accurate drilling this way.

 

[rlharding]

I have tried the lathe and prefer the pen vice. You may have noticed that I posted about an unworkable pen vice recently. It works great now. I took it apart, removed the interlocking wheels, removed the upper rod without the handle, removed all the nuts and though it is a skeleton of its former self it works great.

 

[leehljp]

For close tolerance blanks and precision drilling and segmented blanks, the lathe offer much better consistency overall. The DP is quicker to set up and use, and with a good eye and clamp/vise is still very accurate.

I use both methods. Lathe when I know I want precison, and the DP when it doesn't matter if it is off by a 1/16 in or so on the exit.

 

[toolcrazy]

Originally posted by leehljp

For close tolerance blanks and precision drilling and segmented blanks, the lathe offer much better consistency overall. The DP is quicker to set up and use, and with a good eye and clamp/vise is still very accurate.

I use both methods. Lathe when I know I want precision, and the DP when it doesn't matter if it is off by a 1/16 in or so on the exit.

Ditto here.

 

[redfishsc]

I've sold a few grand worth of pens and made 100 more that haven't sold yet and I do not even own, nor borrow, a drill press. And even if I had one, I wouldn't use it to drill blanks.


I purchased the Barracuda 4-jaw chuck from PSI, it came with EVERYTHING you need to drill pen blanks. I would have done a bit better to buy the 'Cuda 2 since it's "key" operated rather than lever-operated, but my 'Cuda works great.



Like all things, it takes a bit of time to get used to the flow and feel of things, and every material is different. Acrylics, especially TruStones, drill very easily. So long as I don't get in a hurry, do not split any.

However, woods like African Blackwood and Brazilian Tulipwood are more difficult to drill b/c they cake up around the drill bit.

I made a baker's dozen of pens from red oak recently from a historical tree for a church, and the oak drilled like a dream.