IT HAS A CLUTCH (Sequel to Tapping Head)

Oh, Wow! I checked tracking on one of my packs of spiral flute taps a few minutes ago, and it showed it had just been delivered. I unlocked the drop box and rushed back to tap some real holes in a real work piece. Oh, Wow! Zip! Zip! Zip! Zip!

I did notice one thing though that kind of concerns me. I got some chips, but mostly I got some long fine wire like chips off of each of the three flutes. On the first two holes I stopped the drill press to clean them off, but after the third one I just tapped the next hole without cleaning the long wires off. It tapped just fine, but I wonder if those could cause some problems if I tried to tap say 10 or 20 or 50 holes without stopping to clean those off the tap.

The holes look beautiful by the way, but I did prep them just like as if I was going to hand tap them with a slight chamfer by hand and a shot of oil.

I've got new tool glow. It really works. Now to make myself some of those fixture plates that I refused to buy before. LOL.

Where did you get your new toy? Inquiring minds want to know.

Dan

Common, unfortunately.

Yes -- if they have done a clone of the Jacobs tap chuck, there are two things to tighten.

First -- the pair of plates which clamp down on the square end of the tap to prevent spinning.

Second -- the RubberFlex collet to hold it concentric and parallel to the axis.

Botb need to be tightened. with the RubberFlex only loosely tightened at first, then the clamp plates, then a firm tightening of the RubberFlex collet to keep the pull from working the tap out of the collet.

O.K. With the clutch set loose enough, that could work -- but remember that the clutch is designed only to tell you when the taps are getting dull, so you may be wearing them out more quickly doing this.

You don't have any spiral point (gun) taps on hand? I tend to prefer those even for hand tapping.

Understood -- got to play.

This is the second time you have mentioned "a yard and a half" as a price. Please -- what does that translate into? Given the new price of the TapMatic heads, I would guess that this may be $150.00, not $15.00 or $1.50. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.

I'll have to look at it more carefully. It looked to me like just the rubber flex collet tightens on the tap. I'll pull the collet and closer off and shine a light down it and see.

Heck, until a few months ago I never even knew what they were for. Had some come in this afternoon though.

Got a few of my spiral flute taps later today and and they are awesome with this machine. If there weren't already dozens of tapping head videos on You Tube I would be tempted to post one.

Sorry, that's a cash term from a certain shady trade.

Single = $1 bill Fin = $5 bill Sawbuck = $10 bill Double = $20 bill Half = $50 bill Yard = $100 bill

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:-)

Probably not a problem until they threaten to tangle up with something stationary.

The next step -- for holes which you expect to do a lot of -- is to get the combination drill and spiral flute tap, so you can do it all in a single pass. (Well ... no chamfer ... but. :-) I think that there is even a spring-loaded tool designed to go on a drill bit which rides in the flutes and chamfers the hole at the end of travel. Maybe one of these would chamfer your tapped hole for you with everything else.

That's what the new tool glow will do to you. ;-)

Enjoy, DoN.

Ebay - Came with a JTS Machinery catalog in the box though.

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The plates are adjusted by an Allen screw behind the bulk of the collet closing cone. It is double threaded -- left hand on one end, right hand on the other end, so the plates separate or close symmetrically. The plates and screw are sort of rattle lose in there until you clamp down on the end of the tap.

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The spiral flute were the ones you got, I thought -- not the spiral points. (Unless you got some of each at the same time.) The spiral points are better for through holes, the spiral flute for blind holes -- with the exception of the combined drill and tap which I just mentioned in another part of this "thread", where the spiral tap flutes are the same spiral as the drill part (of course), and with the drill there too, you can't play the game of blind holes. :-) For the 1/4-20 drill tap, there is enough thread to drill and tap through 1/2" plate.

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O.K. I was familiar with "Fin" and "Sawbuck", and "Single" is fairly self-evident, but the others were unfamiliar. Hmm ... from Loan-sharking? Betting?

Thanks, DoN.

Ummm.. something like that.

White slavery?

-- Woe be to him that reads but one book. -- George Herbert

Spiral flute taps are specifically for blind hole tapping. The spiral flutes shoot the chips up instead of down. They work great for this, but be sure to set the stop so that you don't bottom them out in the hole. Clutch or not, they will snap right off.

For through holes or holes that are a lot deeper than the threaded portion, you should use gun taps. They are much more robust and much cheaper.

Paul K. Dickman

That is the same chip I get with them. I get worried about the mess it would make if it broke a tap off in the workpiece, so I generally stand there removing the chips with a toothbrush and applying a new bit of tapping fluid. Doing this on a CNC mill with combined drill-taps, it can go through a BUNCH of holes almost faster than you can keep up with it.

Jon

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O.K. That photo shows at least one allen head setscrew in the right place for the clamping of the square on the taps' shank. Look for another one on the opposite side. Not quite the same as mine, with the pates joined by a single screw, but I'll bet that setscrew reaches the square on the end of the shank -- especially if there is another one 180 degrees around the chuck body.

At least you got the wrenches with yours. I had to pick up spare wrenches and spend a while on the surface grinder getting them thin enough to fit -- especially the larger one with the skinnier flats.

Enjoy, DoN.

Must be a local tradition. The term around here for a 100 is a Ben or a Benjamin.

I sell shade trees for cash. Every now and then some fella thinks a check is the same thing. I remind them that I'm looking for pictures of dead presidents.

Karl

Nope. Its definitely a trade thing. I've heard it all over the country.

So you take cash, but don't take hundreds then?

I'd never heard the term "shade tree" used in that fashion. A shade tree mechanic was one who worked under a tree (or at your house) because he didn't have a place of business.

Locally, the terms "Benji" or "C-note" is used for hunnerts. I learned about them from some ex friends who were using them to vacuum white powders up their noses back in my last life. I'm glad I was never rich enough for any of that crap.

Now, will everyone send handfuls of C-notes to C-less? Thank you.

-- If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do. -- Samuel Butler

And way back when, a $1 bill was a "Chlorophyll George". (Back when Chlorophyll was the new "miracle ingredient" in things like ointment for abrasions and such. :-)

Enjoy, DoN.