Drill Press quill stop

[LCHIEN]

I'm feeling pretty good about this mod I just made to my Drill press.

A few years back several people found a deal through here and Lowes for Hitachi B16RM 15" floor drill press. http://www.sawdustzone.org/showthrea...hlight=Hitachi

I liked the drill press almost 100% except I never liked the quill stop. I always liked the one mounted in the hub of my old delta but that drill press was too small.

The Hitachi had a vertical threaded "D" rod (The D describes a flat on one side) that had a couple of thumb nuts and a washer... the two nuts are so that you could lock them and the washer had a matching antirotation flat so that you could tighten the top not without rotating the bottom nut. The problem was that a 3"+ quill stroke always left the nuts as far as possible from the desired stop position and even though it had a coarse 2mm thread it took a lot of spins to move the nut and then the other. The washer with its flat tended to catch and not slide down so that slowed it more.
Here's the OEM arrangement: (as usual, click on the photos for a bigger version)


I saw this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xT5SrJO4TgM
It details how a man used some off-the shelf Quill stops - yes a jig made for that purpose - to replace a similar rod on his drill press, In it he explained that Bridgeport tools standardized a 1/2-20 threaded rod for this purpose on their big machine tools and a big enough market had provided some inexpensive sprung, split threaded clamps. In it he explained how to modify the clamps by rethreading them

In my case the existing rod was 16mm 2-mm pitch and no easy way to rethread the stop or the rod. I'd have to get a 14mm tap drill and special 16-2 metric tap. And it might be close to breaking out being more than 5/8". Besides it would only give me 2mm (.080") stops as the quill stops won't rotate too much.
So instead I bought 3 feet of rod (needed just 6 inches). The end of the old stepped rod was a bit more than 3/8" (9mm) but that's too large to drill into the end as I was going to put a bolt in it. So I drilled and tapped for 1/4-20 and used a 14/ x 3/8" plastic sleeve to fill the gap. Old and new rods:


Installed: ( and you can see how the split clamp opens wide enough to go around the rod rather than having to be threaded on.


and from a little farther back


I can put one quill stop on the top instantly anywhere and one on the bottom if need be to limit up travel. Works so great I can cry.
I am limited a bit by 20 threads per inch giving .050" stop resolution but it is solid. I can rotate the stops some to get a bit more vertical resolution if need be. I "lost" the scale on the rod but it was never much use, so no real loss. The black stop block is a cast piece of solid steel, not stamped like on some recent drill presses that give many tens of thou of slop if you push on it.

I think the rod cost me 10 bucks shipped thru amazon and the two quill stops were from ebay for $20 incl shipping. Total almost 1/3 the cost of the Drill press but worth it!
Got 2.5 feet of rod left if anyone needs any. Its the fine thread 1/2-20 UNF, not the usual 1/2-8 UNC I think.

[LCHIEN]

Here's the hub style stop from my old Delta DP:

The little thumb lock allows rotating the hub stop when the quill is in the desired position. Very fast and you can do it with one hand.

With Either stop its easy to set the position - just put in the desired position and apply the stop.
If I want to drill deeply but not break out, I use a piece of measurement bar like you can get for setting up routers etc and put it between the drill point and the drill press table and lock the stop.
To drill the pretttiest holes, I lower a brad point until the point is poking into my drill table just a little and lock the stop. I drill the piece and flip it over and see a tiny hole from the brad point and place the point of the drill bit on the tiny hole and enter the wood with the brad point outer flutes cutting the wood rather than breaking out fibers when it breaks thru.Get perfectly aligned top and bottom entry holes this way with no breakout.

[leehljp]

I like that idea and haven't seen this type of stop before. Thanks for posting the picts. I looked an eBay and will purchase one there.

[LCHIEN]

This ebay search will work - lots of results:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=quill+stop&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.H0.Xquill+stop+bridgeport.TRS1&_nkw=quill+stop+bridgeport&_sacat=0

Look for the ones that say bridgeport milling machine
the prices range from 5 bucks to 35 bucks for what looks like the same thing so chose carefully.

[cwsmith]

Pretty good idea, and very nice work on your part.

I have a Ridgid 15" drill press which uses the hub-style stop. While I like that, many people prefer a rod stop. Your post is very helpful.


Thanks, and Merry Christmas,

CWS

[LCHIEN]

One more improvement

I put a ruler on the drill press housing such that zero was at the top of the stop block.
The underside of the quill stop indicates on the ruler to the side as shown.
The quantity it shows is the distance to the bottom of bit travel.
When at the stop, consider that it shows zero distance remaining.
So, as you can see in the pic, I have 3.25" quill travel to the bottom of the hole.

This is actually more helpful than the scale attached the original stop rod (see first photo in first post of this thread).
In that arrangement the Scale read at the stop block (zero, in the picture shown), a measurement I can only justify as the depth the quill has moved. The actual depth value would be the value read less the resting distance from the bit to the top of the workpiece.

The ruler - a HF 6" stainless steel pocket rule cut to length and glued in place. $2 less a 20% discount plus a free 25 ft tape measure.

[LCHIEN]

I am still using this frequently and its the best tool mod I've ever made.
I do drill press hole depth control much more often now that its so easy.

Still have 30 inches of 1/2-20 UNF threaded rod if anyone needs some.

[poolhound]

I have the ryobi 12" DP which has a hub style spot. It is convenient but I find it doesn't stay put very well unless I really crank it down. Not sure if I could adapt it to use this rod style. If anybody has ever modded the Ryobi to improve it I would love to hear what you did.

[LCHIEN]

There are quite a few 1/2-20 Bridgeport-style quill stops available on both eBay and Amazon, most for around $10.

[dbhost]

Wow, this thread is such a zombie it is looking for brains to eat....

I'll play though.

My Northern Industrial DP has the hub style and it works, but I frequently just ignore it and use depth stops directly on the bit if I have one to fit.

The problem is that I learned to use a drill press on an old military surplus I am pretty sure since it was painted with the same paint as battleships, Rockwell from WW2 era. There was no depth stop on it, I mean there was a place for one to be installed but it was missing...