High end drill presses... Do they exist?

[Jim Becker]

Technatool, the Nova lathe folks have a new drill press coming out that looks quite interesting. (announced recently) Direct drive, screen control with intelligence to help you choose the optimal speed for a given drill bit, etc. Modern look, too, similar to their lathe heads.

[David Malicky]

If money was no object, this is a great drill press that we added for 2016:

http://grizzly.com/products/Variable...de-Table/G0808

Thank you, Shiraz. Had that come out a year ago, we would have bought it instead of our RF45, and your price is reasonable considering the features and Taiwan quality. The power lift and VFD are excellent -- we were looking for both of those, and couldn't find either on a Taiwan machine. It looks like this is made by Rong Fu? (My only suggestion is to equip it with nicer XY handles -- RF's standard handles are out of place on a machine this nice, but those are easy to retrofit later.) I think you have a home run!

[Michael Koons]

Looks very cool Jim. Would love to see it come out. The articles and video are from 2013.

[Shiraz Balolia]

Thank you, Shiraz. Had that come out a year ago, we would have bought it instead of our RF45, and your price is reasonable considering the features and Taiwan quality. The power lift and VFD are excellent -- we were looking for both of those, and couldn't find either on a Taiwan machine. It looks like this is made by Rong Fu? (My only suggestion is to equip it with nicer XY handles -- RF's standard handles are out of place on a machine this nice, but those are easy to retrofit later.) I think you have a home run!

We are on the same page! I had asked for better and larger hand wheels. The main shipment may have those, but we relied on the prototype we had on hand for the stock photos. That machine is going to my shop as soon as the techs are done writing the manual on it.

Thanks.

[Bruce Page]

Technatool, the Nova lathe folks have a new drill press coming out that looks quite interesting. (announced recently) Direct drive, screen control with intelligence to help you choose the optimal speed for a given drill bit, etc. Modern look, too, similar to their lathe heads.

I will some times sand dowels to size in the drill chuck, it sounds like it would shut down if it senses your hand to close, or, if you're drilling into something it doesn't like. It's a little too smart for me.
I do like the direct drive.

[Phillip Gregory]

We are on the same page! I had asked for better and larger hand wheels. The main shipment may have those, but we relied on the prototype we had on hand for the stock photos. That machine is going to my shop as soon as the techs are done writing the manual on it.

Thanks.

I bet your shop is pretty impressive with the equipment you have access to. Do you happen to have any pictures?

[roger wiegand]

Seems to me that the problem with 99% of drill presses are that they aren't designed for woodworking. I really don't care about 0.001" runout, what I want is a convenient way to clamp things down, square them up, achieve repetitive accuracy when drilling a series of holes, be able to drill holes 2" apart without having to rely on centering a bit on a pencil mark on the workpiece, etc. Seems I spend an inordinate amount of time building jigs to allow me to drill holes accurately, without any of the kinds of fences and stops that are routinely built in as part of table saws or miter saw stations. Give me a big table -- supporting an 8 ft long board on a 12" x 12" table is always a contest, a way to dial in a hole 3" from one edge and 4" from another without measuring and marking the workpiece and I'll be pretty happy. For bonus points give me a way to set depth of cut by other than trial and error--but I'd be happy with height adjustment that didn't work in 1/4" clunks.

I've built jigs that let me do a lot of these things (except I still always have the problem of being unable to neatly or reproducibly clamp my jig to the table on my Delta DP--the non-flat bottom of the table always means the jig is in danger of slipping), but if someone who designs the wonderfully clever systems we see on other tools build a woodworking-optimized drill press for under about $2K I'd buy it in a heartbeat. My problem is not with the precision of the spindle or the ability to control rpms to +/- 1, but rather with just being able to position and hold the material so that I can readily get the hole where I want it without an hour of fiddling, that is lost when some part of the jury rig slips.

[Michael Koons]

Bingo Roger. I think what I need is a drill press like you describe with reasonable drilling depth and speed variations and a true quality build. I don't need a laser, I don't need digital readouts. I'd go as far to say I'd pay more than $2k if it met the quality requirements.

[pat warner]

" but rather with just being able to position and hold the material so that I can readily get the hole where I........."
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Lots of iterations, but I got there.
A 2-stage drill press fence with a quick-stop.
With it, I can drill to ~.001" on center without surprises.
And I use quick acting toggles, hold downs and crowders, to keep the work immobilized.
I look forward to using it rather then: "Oh no,, not another boogered dislocated hole."

[Jim German]

Thats an awesome looking fence. However for $1285 you could just get a used Bridgeport with a DRO.

[roger wiegand]

"
Lots of iterations, but I got there.
A 2-stage drill press fence with a quick-stop.
"

Beautiful piece of equipment! How do you reproducibly position it with respect to the drill? I haven't figured out how to deal with way the table rotates on the pillar, throwing all of the measurements out the window.

[pat warner]

" how to deal with way the table rotates on ......."
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If you change the table ht. or its rotation, for multiple operations on the same hole(s), you're looking for trouble. Rethink the schedule so there is only one table setting for one set of holes. Start x getting roughly the same length of drilling tools. Or drills of such a length that quill travel is not problem.
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The fence pivots and slides on machined ways. It is anchored with a shoulder bolt on one end.
Starting out (calibration). Rotate the fence so it just touches a precision .500" steel dowel in a good chuck (mine = Albrecht). And lock/clamp the fence down. Now, with a .001" feeler gauge as a detector, screw the fence in & out (big knob) trapping the feeler between the fence face and the pin. When the feeler is slightly pinched you're no more than .0005" away from the pin. Your quill, given very little run-out, is now .250" from the quill center, a reasonable and known starting point.
There is ~1.5" of parallel travel in the slides. If you need more than the adjustment allows, start out with parallels to locate the pin further from the fence. Place the parallel between the pin & the fence. Done

[Rick Lizek]

Be careful with Delta. We had a 20 inch Delta drillpress and trunnions broke. It was only five years old part and the trunnions were discontinued. We got them through Renovo who been making discontinued delta parts .