Fullers with a drill press?

H

Hoplophile

Joined
Feb 23, 2001
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Is there a way to make fullers in a blade with a drill press?

I don't have a forge or hollow grinding capabilities.
But I do have a drill press.
 
Somewhere on his site Dan Fogg talks about making a hand scraper to carve fullers using a lathe tool as the cutting edge.
 
Use a dremmel tool. go slow, and be patient.
You could use an air die type of ball grinder in a drill press to cut a fuller, but the lower speed of the drill press is going to make it a week long job.
 
I've never tried it, but wouldn't using a ball end mill and the depth stop on your press work? I think you could at least rough out the fuller this way and then smooth out the fuller by hand. Set the depth stop so the bit only cuts a few mm into the blade, plunge cut, move the blade, repeat. Certainly not as good as an actual mill, but it could work, especially if you used a cross-slide vise. Every maker I've ever met had to start out with less than optimal tooling. I would never recommend a drill press for actual milling as the spindle is not meant to handle side-loading, but a successive series of plunge cuts could work fairly well for roughing (it would just take a lot longer).
 
I am getting ready to make a Kabar clone with fullers with a milling machine and I am still going to practice on scrap steel. After the end milling I will chase it with a 1/2" ball die grinder stone.

If you play around and expirement with your drill press on scrap steel you may be surprised at how it turns out. I did alot of freaky strange stuff back when I had a cross slide on my drill press. Usually it was a matter of going slow and keeping a steady hand. If you tune those cross slides well they can get fairly tight and allow you to do alot of stuff. The more you use it the more you will want a milling setup though.

My drill press was so old I didn't care about the spindle bearings.
 
NDallyn said:
I've never tried it, but wouldn't using a ball end mill and the depth stop on your press work? I think you could at least rough out the fuller this way and then smooth out the fuller by hand. Set the depth stop so the bit only cuts a few mm into the blade, plunge cut, move the blade, repeat. Certainly not as good as an actual mill, but it could work, especially if you used a cross-slide vise. Every maker I've ever met had to start out with less than optimal tooling. I would never recommend a drill press for actual milling as the spindle is not meant to handle side-loading, but a successive series of plunge cuts could work fairly well for roughing (it would just take a lot longer).
Click to expand...

I would think it would work fine and then just clean it up with the dremel.
I do know from bad experience that a drill press wont take side loads.
 
On his website, Don Fogg shows a simple jig that he made to hold a carbide insert so that he could scrape it along the blade to make a fuller. Here's the link to Don's Fuller Tool.
 
I do have an X-Y table and know not to put side load on the drill shaft.
With how expensive end mills are, I may just hold out for a small wheel attachment for my KMG.
Thanks for the guidance guys.
 
Actually you can find HSS endmills pretty reasonable on ebay or from some suppliers. As long as the blank hasn't been hardened HSS works fine. You could get one and set your table up so only the one axis is tight as possible and still move. Keep the arbor as short as possible and make light cuts always going in the right direction very slowly. I would think it would depend on how tight your setup is.

Grizzly 1/2" ball end mill $8 http://www.grizzly.com/products/g9882
 
I, of course, only looked at the Cobalt TiN coated endmills at McMaster Carr.
To be used on Admiral 5160 annealed flat sock. Will HSS be fine or do I need TiN coating?
2 flutes, 3, 4?????
 
HSS is fine if you can can keep the speed down and take small bites. I like four flute mill bits since they don't chatter as much and a make a cleaner cut. But I also run all my milling jobs very,very slow. I have more time then money to buy new tool bits.
 
I think you are catching on now......................

Practice on a piece of scrap. Take a high speed, shallow cut with a lubricated tool and you might surprise yourself.

I saw someone do something similar on a router table to some .25" thick copper with a .25" carbide ball cutter and it worked like a charm. I admit that copper is not steel but it's metal and required some care and shallow passes. I was thinking that a Dremel-type tool in a modified router type holder might get the fuller started. Mr. Caswell showed a small wheel fixture for doing this in a different thread also.

Syn
 
B Finnigan said:
I am getting ready to make a Kabar clone with fullers with a milling machine and I am still going to practice on scrap steel. After the end milling I will chase it with a 1/2" ball die grinder stone.

.
Click to expand...


the ones i did were on a 3/16 stock with a 1.25 (i think) ball endmill i ll look it up in the morning if you want i also uses a cant of i think 22 degrees on the head stock to keep the mill from making a lines in the bottom of the fuller

also i found a dremmel tool with the little super fine stoneish disc (the thick grey ones) work well for cleaning up milling lines

ive done now 3 kabars and will help if i can
 
Angle grinder disk the thickness you want mounted on a arbor (1/2" bolt and nut with two big washers) Preshape/round off edge of disk, mount blade to block of wood, adjust hieght of table and grind. Clean up with various grit wraped around a shaped hardwood or micarta rub stick (inch and a half long works good) with light oil lube.

Once the groove is established you can clamp another piece of timber to your table as a depth guage and slide work in and out till you are happy with grind. Let the disk do the cutting and you will avoid undue side pressure.


peter
 
I'm trying to lighten up a couple blades as much as possible, so I'm thinking a WIDE fuller.
Butcher Block--1.25"?????? Was that end mill prohibitively expensive?

16 spd HF drill press, and HF XYtable.

I was thinkin to do plunge cuts then connect them with a dremel or die grinder. Shop has an air compressor too.:D
 
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