Foot actuated drill press

[Robin Cruz]

For some time Ive seen David Marks use his old drill press with a foot driven press. You dont see drill presses with that today. Was there an OSHA issue or something that stopped drill presses being sold with that feature? Seems like a very handy feature.

[Frank Drew]

I really like a foot pedal on a drill press and tried to retrofit a homemade version on my Grizzly, with only so-so results. I don't know about safety concerns, but the ability to hold the work down with both hands while operating the plunge with your leg is a great advantage, IMO.

[Peter Quinn]

Strictly speculation here, but I think DJ Marks DP is a fairly old industrial machine. I have seen modern production models that have pneumatic hold downs and pneumatic driven or power driven heads which have replaced the older mechanical foot driven mechanisms for production work, but these tend to be rather expensive and require significant air volume.

I think the issue is cost rather than safety. Most small shop or consumer models would be hard pressed to meet their price points if a foot pedal were included. I though for a while that DJ Marks had an assistant just off camera operating the levers for him? Can you hire an assistant?

I think multi head horizontal line boring machines have replaced the foot powered models for production wood working in most cases, thuse get rather expensive and can be tricky to set up, possibly more time consuming for single projects or hobbiests.

[Bob Slater]

I have a foot switch I added to my Taiwanese drill press. I like it, because I figure if something goes really wrong, I will at least be able to get my foot off the thing, rather than hit a switch on the side as the machine sucks me up.

[mike holden]

Uhhhh - Bob - the foot operation is of the quill. This allows you to place both hands on the work and use your foot to lower the drill bit. Not turn the motor off and on.
Mike

[Neal Flatley]

I have a Old Delta with the foot feed. I like the feature, but there are 2 issues though.

1 When you operate the foot feed, the quill handle also spins, which can smack you if you're not carefull. :eek:

2 In order to get the mechanical advantage to pull the quill down, the foot pedal has to be failry long, thus going through a fairly wide arc of travel when you use it. As a result, when it is in the up position, it can be high for a short person. If you adjust it too low, it will bottom out before the quill goes through its full travel.

Neal

[Lee Schierer]

All I can think of is someone standing on one foot while patting their head and rubbing their tummy.

I would think you could mount a drum on the quill shaft say 6" in dia. and wind cord or wire rope around it and mount a treadle on the floot hooked to the end of the wire. Pressing down onthe treadle should pull wire off the drum and lower the quill. Releasing the foot pressure should allow the quill to retract if the quill spring is strong enough.

[Michael Lutz]

I second what Neal said. My old Delta has the same issues with the foot petal. My quill spring also is not strong enough to return the quill back to the starting place.

Mike

[Jeffrey Makiel]

It seems that when operating a foot pedal there would be some loss of the control of downward pressure. For example, when drilling sheet steel and sheet plastic, a light touch is often needed. Or, if you are drilling to depth without using the depth stop. Or, if a bluegrass country song comes on the radio.

-Jeff :)

[Peter Quinn]

It seems that when operating a foot pedal there would be some loss of the control of downward pressure. For example, when drilling sheet steel and sheet plastic, a light touch is often needed. Or, if you are drilling to depth without using the depth stop. Or, if a bluegrass country song comes on the radio.

-Jeff :)

I'm laughing so loud I nearly fell out of my chair! i'm picturing a guy at work on an assembly line pushing down the pedal on his press to about a 220 beat bluegrass song then explaining to the boss "Well, the holes are all over the place but I sure did get it done quick!":D

[Pat Germain]

Strictly speculation here, but I think DJ Marks DP is a fairly old industrial machine.

Pardon the name drop, but I asked David about his drill press. It is indeed an older industrial machine he picked up used, like most of his tools. He said people often him ask about it; and if he has three arms, or what. ;)

[Andy Rose]

I think I'm getting the idea why we don't see the foot operated quill any more. But I like the idea of a power switch being
foot controlled. There are plenty of times I don't really want to let go of the quill handle or the work piece when I need to kill the power fast.

[Gary Curtis]

I bought a 1950s version of a Walker Turner drill press. A local electrical motor shop rewired it for me, and I had foot switch installed. This modification could be carried out on any machine and cost $25.

A foot-actuated pedal would be nice if I were doing assembly line production work. As it is, my quill is a kind of stiff and and it is annoying to crank it up and down, but I don't do that enough to be a bother.

Those old heavy cast iron machines sure are nice to operate.

Gary Curtis

Northern California

[Alan Schaffter]

I thought about a pedal operated quill, but the problem I see is you would only want a pedal to move 4" - 6" vertically at most (I wouldn't want to lift my entire leg up in the air to operate the quill). I don't think 4" - 6" of throw is enough to provide sufficient mechanical advantage to easily operate the quill.

For instance, my Delta DP requires 1 1/3 rotations of the quill feed for full quill travel. After doing the math, a cable drum mounted on the quill feed would need to be a very small, 1.4 inches in diameter, for full quill travel with 6" of pedal (cable) travel (4/3 pi D = 6"). I think the return spring tension on the quill would make it very difficult for the linkage and small drum to work properly.

Also, you would probably want a damping action on the return (only), so if your foot slipped off the pedal the quill feed would not spin freely (which can cause the chuck to be knocked off the quill shaft. )