I'm building a woodworking drum sander (ShopNotes Vol 15, Issue 86) which calls for a 24" long 3/4" steel rod for the drum arbor. The rod needs drilling and a flat for the pulley set screw. I looked at zinc coated steel rod (about $6 per 3' ) and water quenched drill rod (about $27 per 3' len) at OSH. There will not be significant weight applied, just torsion stress from sanding across 16 inches surface. I suspect the drill rod is overkill for this but would like to hear from you experts. Also, will I have a much harder time cutting, drilling, and grinding the drill rod? Would smaller diameter drill rod do the same job as 3/4" mild steel? Thx.
mild steel or drill rod for 24" arbor
Apr 20, 2006
5 Replies
Drill rod would be overkill and unecessarily expensive. Cold rolled steel would be the material of choice here.
Ken.
Ken: I think you may have missed an important feature of the drill rod. Cold rolled and plated steel has a pretty broad diameter tolerance and may be very difficult to fit into bearings. The drill rod will be tighter tolerance but probably .001-.002 oversize. What this fellow needs is a short piece of C1065 TPG (turned, polished & ground) available from many metal supply houses. Very stuff, very straight and right on the correct diameter. Leigh @ MarMachine
The stiffness is about the same for the drill rod and any other steel. Since the stiffness varies by the cube of the diameter ( IIRC ), don't use smaller diameter rod of any sort.
Dan
snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote: Would smaller diameter drill rod do the same
Get a ground one
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They can and do it.
Martin
Martin Eastburn @ home at Lions' Lair with our computer lionslair at consolidated dot net NRA LOH & Endowment Member NRA Second Amendment Task Force Charter Founder IHMSA and NRA Metallic Silhouette maker & member
snipped-for-privacy@AOL.COM wrote:
He sure does. I tend to be cheap and cold rolled has been good to me even onto fitting bearings - but ,to be sure, precision shafting would be the best choice.
Ken.
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