looks and sounds great, this was a fun journey to follow!!!!
She's a beauty! Great work (and writeup).
I can't sell it now. With the time I put into it, I'd make about a buck an hour ;-) Honestly, I was just looking for a heavier-duty drill press to replace my little Craftsman benchtop... next thing you know...And now....what will you let it go for?
Thanks Rick!Outstanding job Tim!!
Did you think about adding a safety collar under the head? What is the column diameter?
Rick
Two things I believe were causing stiffness in the Vari-Slo system were binding in the linkages (There were a couple stiff pivot points), and stiffness in the pulley slides due to the grease hardening up over time. The ease of speed adjustment from before to after was quite significant.I think the problem with mine is that lack of grease on the Vari-Slo pullies. Maybe one day I'll tackle it again. My metal working skills are significantly worse than my limited woodworking skills.
Thanks @SabertoothBunny!I'm impressed
I'll definitely check it out. Thanks @Yelverton!Just to hijack this thread a little bit - if you enjoy tool restorations, I strongly encourage you to check out Hand Tool Rescue on YouTube. There's minimal talking, just quality videos of restorations of a variety of tools, mostly power tools despite the channel name. This restoration would fit right in there. Awesome work.
Exactly why I restored a drill press @Wilsoncb! I can't afford the Shelby. Though that would be fun. I'm partial to the 1965/66 actually.Nice job! Looks like you need to find a ‘67 Mustang Shelby that needs to be restored.
The Reeves drive units I have seen are single belt assemblies and therefore must have a wide belt to transmit torque. The vari-torque I'm looking at appears to have a standard 1/2" belt on a reduction pulley assembly incorporate that would permit the floating pulleys to remain in a high speed/low torque position. Probably the reason they were discontinued was the added cost of production for the intermediate pulley and idler assembly. I have a Ryobi benchtop with a variable drive, but I've never tried to drill anything in a slow speed mode to see how it behaved.That is SO cool - why didn't companies continue to use this version of speed control?
(thinking of the Delta DP-300 where the "reeves drive" [it is a CHEAP imitation] LITERALLY tears itself apart!)
MReally nice work. Thanks for sharing