Mike_GruiZinga
Member
- Joined
- Nov 6, 2009
- Messages
- 17
OK this was a big project, but I'm really satisfied with the result. I wanted a benchtop drill press....
This facebook marketplace ad caught my eye.
$75 later and it was mine. My brother picked it up on the east side of the state and dropped it off to me. We had to disassemble it to lift it out of his car. It weighs around 400lbs.
It took some time to sleuth out what it was. Turns out its a 1941 Avey Number 2 "Half Heavy" made in Covington Kentucky. They made all sorts of drilling machines and this is one of their smaller units.
Its got an integrated 2spd 3 phase motor (1hp)
The two speed gearbox in the head, as well as some belt options, allow for 8 speeds, originally from 1200rpm to 12,000 rpm. All shafts and the quill are ball bearing supported to handle the speeds:
The motor speed switching is done via this neat old contactor that is hidden in the column of the machine.
These are the quill bearings, with my hand for reference
So i tore the old girl down and removed all the varnish, paint, and rust.
I used evaporust, aircraft stripper, and lots of wire brushes to get everything clean.
I found some old drawings for her, and was able to source all new bearings. Most the old ones were in good shape just dirty/rusty. I figured new was in order while it was apart though.
There were a lot of ancillary boxes and **** hanging off the castings. I welded closed all the extra holes.
Lugged it all into work where we have a small paint booth. I did some light autobody filler on her
Epoxy primer
Topcoat is Nardo Gray from Audi/Lambo. Its a single stage:
Started reassembling her.
I bought a Hitachi vector drive VFD and hid it behind the back cover of the machine, where that contactor used to live. This was necessary to be able to run the 3phase motor from my single phase 240v service. This VFD is really neat. Sensorless vector VFD's are wild for anyone used to old gutless drives. These provide the motor with constant flux by varying the volts/hz ratio. That means you get full power across the entire speed range.
Cleaned up the tags:
Designed and machined up a steel fixture plate. This uses the same 5/8" dog clamps as my welding table. Its also setup with 1/2-13 holes to accept typical machine shop workholding.
The 3/8" Jacob's original to the press was not really my favorite, and it had a bent jaw. You can still get rebuild parts for it, but instead i sourced this 1/2" capacity ball bearing vintage jacobs keyless (actually a Llambrech, made in Spain)
This chuck is my favorite part of the press
Finally the controls. I wanted to use the original momentary switch gear. I wrote a program and flashed the VFD with a neat control scheme via its USB port.
Far left is the high/low shift lever for the gearbox. In from that, the black momentary push button starts the machine in forwards. Press again, and the spindle decelerates and reverses. When speeds are low, this accel/decel happens very slowly, which allows me to tap holes, for example at 35rpm. The red button is for stop, or press and hold to engage the braking resistor for a quick stop. The knob on the far right controls the speed.
I swapped pulleys and set the VFD for 0-100hz command, to give me a speed range of approximately 0 to 1800rpm. I designed up a custom nameplate for the controls and had the local trophy shop laser etch it
The last step was the belt guard. I used a slip roll and some thin stainless to make this.
I spent a couple of months on it, but I hope it lasts a lifetime
This facebook marketplace ad caught my eye.
$75 later and it was mine. My brother picked it up on the east side of the state and dropped it off to me. We had to disassemble it to lift it out of his car. It weighs around 400lbs.
It took some time to sleuth out what it was. Turns out its a 1941 Avey Number 2 "Half Heavy" made in Covington Kentucky. They made all sorts of drilling machines and this is one of their smaller units.
Its got an integrated 2spd 3 phase motor (1hp)
The two speed gearbox in the head, as well as some belt options, allow for 8 speeds, originally from 1200rpm to 12,000 rpm. All shafts and the quill are ball bearing supported to handle the speeds:
The motor speed switching is done via this neat old contactor that is hidden in the column of the machine.
These are the quill bearings, with my hand for reference
So i tore the old girl down and removed all the varnish, paint, and rust.
I used evaporust, aircraft stripper, and lots of wire brushes to get everything clean.
I found some old drawings for her, and was able to source all new bearings. Most the old ones were in good shape just dirty/rusty. I figured new was in order while it was apart though.
There were a lot of ancillary boxes and **** hanging off the castings. I welded closed all the extra holes.
Lugged it all into work where we have a small paint booth. I did some light autobody filler on her
Epoxy primer
Topcoat is Nardo Gray from Audi/Lambo. Its a single stage:
Started reassembling her.
I bought a Hitachi vector drive VFD and hid it behind the back cover of the machine, where that contactor used to live. This was necessary to be able to run the 3phase motor from my single phase 240v service. This VFD is really neat. Sensorless vector VFD's are wild for anyone used to old gutless drives. These provide the motor with constant flux by varying the volts/hz ratio. That means you get full power across the entire speed range.
Cleaned up the tags:
Designed and machined up a steel fixture plate. This uses the same 5/8" dog clamps as my welding table. Its also setup with 1/2-13 holes to accept typical machine shop workholding.
The 3/8" Jacob's original to the press was not really my favorite, and it had a bent jaw. You can still get rebuild parts for it, but instead i sourced this 1/2" capacity ball bearing vintage jacobs keyless (actually a Llambrech, made in Spain)
This chuck is my favorite part of the press
Finally the controls. I wanted to use the original momentary switch gear. I wrote a program and flashed the VFD with a neat control scheme via its USB port.
Far left is the high/low shift lever for the gearbox. In from that, the black momentary push button starts the machine in forwards. Press again, and the spindle decelerates and reverses. When speeds are low, this accel/decel happens very slowly, which allows me to tap holes, for example at 35rpm. The red button is for stop, or press and hold to engage the braking resistor for a quick stop. The knob on the far right controls the speed.
I swapped pulleys and set the VFD for 0-100hz command, to give me a speed range of approximately 0 to 1800rpm. I designed up a custom nameplate for the controls and had the local trophy shop laser etch it
The last step was the belt guard. I used a slip roll and some thin stainless to make this.
I spent a couple of months on it, but I hope it lasts a lifetime
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