Jacob's chuck...

[Jonathon Spafford]

Does anybody know if you can pull a chuck off a drill/drill press and use it for turning... if so, how do you take it off???

[Mike Vickery]

The chuck on you drill press would not work. You need one that had a Morse taper that matched your lathes tailstock ( usually MT2). You can buy a good one fairly cheap for about $30
http://www.littlemachineshop.com/products/product_search.php?critFast=jacobs+chuck this link has MT adapters you may be able to use for your existing drill chuck.

[Dennis Peacock]

If your DP is like mine, it will have a chuck on it that can be "forced off" but you will find that it is a #3 MT and a female. You need a chuck with a #2 MT and be a male fitting to slide into the lathe tailstock. Check with Harbor Freight. They sometimes have them on sale for about $12.

[Corey Hallagan]

One of those "gems" from the cheap house (harbor freight) is their 9.99 drill chuck. I have used it several times on my lathe and it works just great.

Corey

[John Shuk]

Most DP chucks have a Jacob's taper. It is different than a Morse taper. There are different sizes so you need to know what size JT it is so you can get an adapter. You just have to get a block of wood and knock it off with a mallet. I bought a Keyless chuck from Woodcraft and got a Jacob's taper to #2 Morse taper from Grizzly for about $28 all said and done. Works very nicely.

[Curt Fuller]

One other thing, if you're buying a Jacobs chuck with a Morse taper to fit your lathe, get one that has the taper drilled to accept a drawbar. Using a Jacobs chuck in the tailstock is pretty safe but in the headstock it can be lethal without a drawbar to keep it tight in the spindle. Most are drilled to accept a 1/4" coarse thread but some of the cheaper ones aren't. A guy in my turning club has a permanent divot in his jaw from having a #2 morse taper Jacobs chuck holding a bottlestopper work it's way lose and fly into his chin at 1200 rpms.

[Randy Privett]

Jonathon,

Depending on which drill press you have, you may have a #2 Morse taper in your drill press. I have two drill presses that have Morse Tapers, one has a #2 and the other has a #3. To remove the drill chuck, extend the spindle/quill all the way out, you should be able to see an oblong hole all the way through the spindle. If you have this you will have to have a drill drift to insert in the hole. Hit with a soft mallet or whatever to force the drill out of the spindle. These are usually a tapered fit, you could be lucky and it be a #2 Morse. Hope this helps.

Randy

[Robert E Lee]

What Randy said. You might have to turn the spindle to find the slot clear thru.
Bob

[Bill Boehme]

What Randy said. You might have to turn the spindle to find the slot clear thru.
Bob
Me too! The answer is YES if you have a good older DP or higher quality machine. A DP will often have an arbor that has a MT2 on one end and a J6 on the other (sometimes a J33) and a Jacobs chuck with a tapered socket to match. There is no reason to remove the chuck from the arbor -- you just use the wedge shaped drift tool pictured in the post above to remove the arbor and chuck together and then just insert it into the lathe. They are cheap enough so you could just buy a second arbor and chuck for your lathe for about $30.

Bill

[Pat Salter]

I used mine for a while til I got tired of haveing to go back and forth. Finally spent the 9.99 at HF. Now i'm thinking about getting another. Some christmas ornaments I make I like to use two differant sizes of drills. would just save me time because it's quicker to change out the chucks from the tail stock then change the bits from the chuck.