Saturday 25 January 2014

Hand cranked drill - a quick restoration

Before shot...



After....


So I was given this old hand cranked pillar drill a while back and every now and then I've grabbed a quick ten minutes here and there and done a bit of a restoration. It was pretty much all in working order but had been left for a while and I felt it deserved a bit of a spruce up. It's an interesting type of drill in that it has a lead screw and a clutch mechanism so as you crank the handle the drill chuck turns but also steadily lowers through the work until it hits the depth limit and the clutch kicks in...it's kinda hard to explain but once you've had a go you get the concept!



So I stripped it down, cleaned it up and gave it a few licks of paint with the airbrush as I've picked up a cheap compressor and am getting to grips with airbrushing on various little jobs like this. At some point in it's life someone has hacked a great lump of the main drive gear and "turned" (with a file in a vice!) a section so that a pulley has been fitted...it must have been a failed experiment as they have then bolted a handle back on through the pulley! At some point I might turn up something more fitting in the lathe...but actually the arrangement works. I haven't been to precious about getting this finished to a really high standard as I am going to keep it and use it.



The chuck was a bit tricky...when I received it the 3 chuck jaws were rattling around inside the chuck housing and when I finally got the well seized beast open found that the chuck jaw springs had rusted to nothing. After a bit of jiggling and cutting and pliering I found I could get the jaws set using 3 springs from a ball point pen and it's now fitted and working well.

Will have to mount it to a base at some point but all in all I'm pleased how it's turned out.