I Bought Another Drill Press.

[dr_clyde]

A friend needed this out of his shop, he gave me a fair price, and I couldn't refuse.

I could use a radial drill once in a while, but I couldn't justify the floor space for a big fella. Enter this little baby!

Its a LUX 832. 8" column, 32" arm. It is a clone of a Victor, which is most likely a clone of something else. It has a #4 MT spindle, decent speed range, flood coolant pump, power feeds, and is a good size for the occasional weird thing we need to drill. I occasionally need to drive a larger tap than I want to spin by hand, and this should help with that.

Its not a "heritage" machine of any sort of pedigree like a Carlton, ATW or the like, but it is in good working order and is on my floor making chips, so I guess that counts for something. I'll keep me tided over until I find a nice Carlton or ATW Hole Wizard.

 

[dutchgray]

Nice machine, I wouldn't have room for one of those anywhere otherwise I would probably already own a radial arm drill.

 

[toplessHO]

every Craigs list ad has them listed as "Radio Arm"

 

[Strouty]

I was just discussing a radial arm drill about two hours ago, kind of funny to see this post.

 

[2oolhound]

Looks like a nice tool.

 

[Rabid Badger]

That is a serious drill press.

 

[BDT/NWMN]

That is a baby whale of a drill press.. It appears to be a very heavy, well built machine.

 

[tarmy]

There is a “you ****” in there someplace!

Nice pick up...

 

[matt_i]

Excellent! Just be careful swinging the head 90 degrees to the table, strange stuff can happen that's not good. Looks like 80-1500 rpms (?) The low range is handier than the upper in my opinion!

I can't tell if you have it but the Jacobs Ball Bearing Super-Chuck that's 3/4" holding capacity is a nice accessory! Some larger reamers don't have 1/2" shanks....

 

[tomjacob]

This is too heavy

 

[Steve from Socal]

That is a nice compact drill,

I have a big Cincinnati radial and, the design of your drill with the motor on the spindle is a nice feature.

It is big enough to drive some large drills/taps, small enough to be useful in modest shop space.

I agree with Matt I bolt the base down if you intend to do off table work.

Steve

 

[MushCreek]

We had its twin at one place I worked, until the maintenance goons dropped it trying to move it.

 

[dr_clyde]

Excellent! Just be careful swinging the head 90 degrees to the table, strange stuff can happen that's not good. Looks like 80-1500 rpms (?) The low range is handier than the upper in my opinion!

I can't tell if you have it but the Jacobs Ball Bearing Super-Chuck that's 3/4" holding capacity is a nice accessory! Some larger reamers don't have 1/2" shanks....

That is a nice compact drill,

I have a big Cincinnati radial and, the design of your drill with the motor on the spindle is a nice feature.

It is big enough to drive some large drills/taps, small enough to be useful in modest shop space.

I agree with Matt I bolt the base down if you intend to do off table work.

Steve

Noted on the floor mount. Fortunately the arm is short enough that it’s not able to exert as much leverage as a bigger drill, and the base is pretty heavy in comparison. I’ll see if I can get it anchored with the 6”’ risers under it.

Matt, it does have a 3/4” Jacobs Chuck on it. It didn’t come with one, so that had to come from my tool crib. My buddy was running a 20N Super Chuck on it, but he wouldn’t let that big 1” capacity chuck go with the machine, despite my best offers. USA Super Chucks are one of the best ever made, I run them whenever I have any sort of heavy drilling to do.

 

[Junkdrawer Dog]

every Craigs list ad has them listed as "Radio Arm"

Hahaha...just like, when they first came out, a friend told me he bought 4 new "radio tires" for his car!

 

[matt_i]

Matt, it does have a 3/4” Jacobs Chuck on it. It didn’t come with one, so that had to come from my tool crib. My buddy was running a 20N Super Chuck on it, but he wouldn’t let that big 1” capacity chuck go with the machine, despite my best offers. USA Super Chucks are one of the best ever made, I run them whenever I have any sort of heavy drilling to do.

#20N, that's the model number I could not recall I agree fully on the Super Chucks....have many "old" ones in good shape that are still going strong.

One of the best features of the radial is the power downfeed. Not the weak thing that's attached to a Bridgeport (and friends) milling head for light single point boring-head work, but serious downfeed for MT-shank drills.

I had a big Gilbert for awhile but sold it due to the giant size and it was an "old" design with the motor on the opposite side of the column taking up an extra amount of space. I found the Giovianni Breda offering to be a good compromise.

 

[toolmiser]

Isn't it Radio Alarm?

 

[davethorik]

Isn't it Radio Alarm?

That's the saw, not the drill.

 

[vanapplebomb]

Those radial arm drills are cool. We had a shop here in Holland that used to make big old radial drills. They were a bit different, because they didn’t have round columns, but rather large vertical box ways with a big hinge on roller bearings for the arm to swing. Western machine tool works, what a classic. Went out of business in the late 1980s.

 

[dr_clyde]

Those radial arm drills are cool. We had a shop here in Holland that used to make big old radial drills. They were a bit different, because they didn’t have round columns, but rather large vertical box ways with a big hinge on roller bearings for the arm to swing. Western machine tool works, what a classic. Went out of business in the late 1980s.

That’s badass. Do you know where in town the factory was?

 

[matt_i]

I'm in danger of polluting your thread here but I have a Western 12" metal shaper in my shop.

Western was very innovative, in my opinion, added a lot of fresh ideas to "old designs". I've never seen that design of radial drill before.....But, I can see how it would be easier to scrape the box way column on the drill into alignment rather than to try to deal with alignment problems with the round column which would probably require shimming. The drill doesn't need any major rigidity other than vertical.

The shaper has full pressure lube with a spin-on oil filter to all of the sliding surfaces and gears. Beautiful tube work for the oil lines inside the box that nobody would ever see.

 

[Jack84]

Nice machine.

 

[Lookin4'67Galaxieconv]

"little" and "big" are most definitely relative here!

 

[ClappedOutBport]

Nice press Doctor. I expecting another damn homeowners press until I saw your name.