drill chuck replacement

Atlas Knife Company

Atlas Knife Company

Joined
Feb 16, 2010
Messages
3,668
I need to replace the chuck on my Porter Cable drill press. It's just too wobbly for my liking. I don't need the $200 super precise chuck, because I bet the spindle isn't all that perfect either, but I'd like something at least a little better than what's on it now. Plus, tightening it is a pain, it's junk.

I only use most bigger bits on it, I have separate drill presses for smaller bits. 5/8" capacity would be nice. I keep seeing keyless, but not sure they have the grip of keyed chucks.
 
Whenever I replaced a chuck in the past I usually went with Jacobs, but that might be the $200 one you referred to.

~Chip
 
I think I have a couple Albrechts laying around that might change your mind about keyless.
 
I assume you have taken it off, cleaned and lubed it and reinstalled? Mine was starting to get wonky, but it just needed a good cleaning.
 
I suggest take apart & clean it too. Maybe inspect its jaw surfaces for wear or peening.
A good plainbearing chuck I think is plenty good for larger sizes.
 
I have several laying around on #2 Morse tapers. Do you know what your chuck taper is? Drill chucks are something I have a few too many of at the moment, I wouldn't miss one of them and would part with it for pretty cheap if you are interested.
 
12345678910 said:
You can always put three flats on the drills for less slippage
Click to expand...

Unless you have accurate equipment for doing this the drill will become eccentric and all accuracy will be out the window. Each facet needs to be exactly 120 degrees apart and the depth of each flat needs to be within a few ten thousandths.
 
The "Super Chuck" (no-pun) I have starts at 3/8"s and goes to 1". But it mounts to a Jacobs #5 taper, which is probably a no go. I've never used it, it was packaged with one of the two lathes I purchased to rebuild, so I could turn the money into knife making tools. If I need to go that big, I will probably use a collet on the mill rather than a chuck, so its available, I am pretty certain it was never used in a drill press, just a lathe's tailstock. Google "Jacobs no.20N" for details.
 
I used to use Albrecht and Jacobs precision chucks on my machine tools. But I only needed a few of them. But then I had to tool up multiple machining centers with multiple chucks and was looking at getting about a dozen precision drill chucks and decided to give some of the less expensive off-brands like Techniks a try. I found the runout and tool life similar and adequate. I figured I'd use a collet chuck if high precision is needed.

Over the years I have finally settled on Maritool for all of my drill chucks. https://www.maritool.com

I've been using them for years with good results. I usually ream from a collet chuck, but will use a drill chuck sometimes. We were doing a run of something in the shop a couple weeks ago and ran the reamer in one of these. I measured the runout at under a .001. A little tug had it a couple tenths, which is fine.

If you're looking for a Morse taper #2 this is it: https://www.maritool.com/Tool-Holde...R-2-DRILL-CHUCK-TOOL-HOLDER/product_info.html

They're inexpensive, integrated and high precision. And even though they're keyless, there is a wrench if you want to crank it down.

I have given up on expensive drill chucks as a waste of money for most applications, these work just fine. And keyless chucks are self tightening and can hold tight enough to dent the shaft of the drill. The only down side is you can't use them in reverse, they'll loosen. This can also be a problem on a high speed machine whose spindle can come to a very rapid stop, the centrifugal force during a sudden spindle stop can loosen the chuck.
 
Didn't even know Maritool made those!! Cool!!! Might need to replace the shitty Jacobs on my Delta...

I've got two Albrecht chucks, both of which are keyless, and I've yet to feel anything that operates as smoothly as they do. Certainly more accurate than any of my machines are capable of. One of them is a sensitive drill, and I search high and love for uses for it.
 
Found'em. They have a little surface rust from storage but both still clamp smooth. If you want one I'll clean it up for you. I'm sure we could work out an amicable trade. We do not use chucks in our machine tools anymore, mostly because we drill solely with carbide and have switched to collet holders. I just couldn't bear to see these get tossed out and figured I could use them eventually. If you can't see, the smaller is 1/32-1/2 and the larger is 1/8-5/8. Both are JT taper mounted on a MT. I can pop whichever off the MT for you.

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Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
Unless you have accurate equipment for doing this the drill will become eccentric and all accuracy will be out the window. Each facet needs to be exactly 120 degrees apart and the depth of each flat needs to be within a few ten thousandths.
Click to expand...

A mill, surface grinder, or tw SG attachment with a cheap 5c spin indexer would do it.


Also common to buy reduced shank drills with them already done.
 
Gotta check Maritool, they rock. Thanks to Nathan for that link years back!

I have a Shars chuck, it was a sort of compromise price wise (still $100) but I love it... make all of my folders with it and now only use my mill collets for actual milling. It's one of my most used tools and I wish i had bought it a ways back.
 
Daniel Fairly Knives said:
Gotta check Maritool, they rock. Thanks to Nathan for that link years back!

I have a Shars chuck, it was a sort of compromise price wise (still $100) but I love it... make all of my folders with it and now only use my mill collets for actual milling. It's one of my most used tools and I wish i had bought it a ways back.
Click to expand...

I've got a couple of 5/8" Shars keyless (one for my mill with an R8, and one with a morse taper for my lathe tail stock), and for the money (I think they're about $35-$45 now days?), I think they're pretty high value. Especially if you're not building watches or spaceship parts.

I'd love to have an Albrecht or similar, but it's just not in the budget at the moment, and for what I'm using a drill chuck for, it's not going do much better than the Shars. Not appreciably anyway.
 
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