Awl--
Here's a bit of an odd project I finished today.
I got snuckered on a 3 gang dp, with two variable-speed Rockwells (split pulley), and a 5 speed Clausing. Over a year later, and I still haven't got the Rockewells to run properly--just too much g-d drama with these things. The table, tho, is like 500#, with drained oil channel, etc. Nice.
So I had an extra HF-type 12-speed bench drill press (of which 8 or 9 are superfluous), but slightly different sized column, too big for the flange on the 3-gang table. So I had some 3" od by 1/2" wall alum lying around, so I made a splice/adapter for the new column into the original flange, and milled a slot on said splice/adapter for the inside weld of the new column--very well/precision made, btw--the chinese know what they're doin.
So, the base of the HF is now dispensed with, and the small flange at the column base stays, and just sits on top of the drill table flange.
The problem is that with the HF-style dp's, it's the round table that pinions up and down, not the drill head. So now I got this drill head with the belts about 6' 6" high, with a pinioning drill table that will wind up about mouth-height, for most jobs. Proly will be ok for small work, so's I don't have to bend over or squint. I'll proly just have to spit every so often. :) And, for tough material and big bits, I can now just *hang* off the drill handles, like on a cantilevered chin-up bar. :)
But, one redeeming feature of this odd set up is that the drill press table (now a "sub-table", in this case), can be easily swung out of the way, for more work space on the 3-gang table.
So, not the ideal solution, and not a Clausing, but at least I got another functioning drill press in place, albeit oddly, and I will probably be able to get one working Rockwell out of the two, altho my romance with variable speed pulleys has long since been over--replaced the Kalamazoo saw split pulley (effing $1300 to replace!!) w/ stepped pulleys. Really not bad, and will be even better with VFD.
Will also probably get rid of these near-useless 12- and 16-speed pulley systems, and just put simpler 4 or 5 step pulleys on. I think, tho, one problem might be in tensioning the belt in the various steps--there might not be enough travel in the motor to get proper tension on all steps. We'll see....