Hi folks, I'm looking for tap and die sets (SAE and metric) and would like someopinions on brands, sources, and of course what to look for in a "good"set.A brief web search turned up the cheap import sets for $20,and other sets from $80-200. All these were for "45 pc" sets,SAE or metric.I want neither the ultra-cheap nor the most expensive. What pricewould you expect to pay for a quality set?thanks in advance,-Brent

Brent, I highly recommend you buy as you need. That allows you to spendyour money only on exactly what you use. Buy the best, and when you buytaps, buy all 3 (taper, plug, bottoming). Buy carbon steel, not HSS. Tapscan be sharpened with a Dremel tool, and if you break off an HSS tap you'rescrewed (pun intended). I think you'll find that unless you make lamps youprobably won't ever need that 1/8-27 NPT tap, but you'll always appreciatehaving the best 3/8-16 tap money can buy.I'm lucky. I have had the opportunity to buy a number of machinist toolboxespopulated with tooling from retired machinists. I also lived near BoeingSurplus back when they were still usable. I got a lot of my tap/dies thatway. By the way, I have owned a couple import tap/die sets and the ones Ihad were complete garbage. I can strongly suggest you avoid them like theplague. I like Greenfield, but I'll buy taps from any major manufacturer.For less-used stuff like 1/2" NPT pipe threading dies, buy them on ebay.The...

tap and die set recommendations?

Jun 24, 2004 21 Replies

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David Malicky 22 years ago

To save $, I recommend buy as you need + garage sales + patience.

As for storage, what worked out great for me was to layout/label a row x column grid on plywood for all the taps and drills (e.g., the 1/4" column has holes for NC starting, NC bottoming, NC tap drill, NF starting, NF bottoming, NF tap drill), drill (not thru) holes to match taps and drills, and presto you can drill and tap w/o all the hunting. Well worth the 1 hour of effort. My only mistake was to omit 5/16" on the grid since I always use 1/4" or 3/8" -- then I got a Logan lathe which has 5/16 all over it.

David

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Brent Burton 22 years ago

Thanks to everybody for all the suggestions posted elsewhere in this thread. Lots of good guidance, thanks.

-Brent

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