Category: Clausing 20″ Drill Press

Having replaced the spindle bearings and fixed the issues with the Reeves drive intermediate shaft of the Clausing 20″ drill press, it is now time to reassemble the machine and put it into service. While they were apart and everything was disassembled, I degreased all of the castings and gave them a coat of KBS Coatings “top coat” in battleship grey (which really turned out to be more of a grey-blue). Even though the color wasn’t what I expected, it has grown on me.

Cleaning up the 4″ center column was a bit more of a chore. Thirty+ years of grime and surface rust left it severely gummed up. After struggling with a brush and various cleaners for a while, I decided to just chuck the column up in my LeBlond, supporting the far end using a steady rest. I then set it to a few hundred RPMs and attacked the grime with green scotch brite pads and mineral oil. It worked a treat. In the future, I wouldn’t tackle this job any other way.

Having safely transported and disassembled our second-hand Clausing 20″ drill press, we’ll now replace the spindle bearings and tackle the borked up Reeves drive intermediate shaft. The spindle bearing layout consists of an upper ball bearing (I believe a MRC 205SFF) and a lower double row angular contact bearing (MRC 5205SBF) that are pressed into the quill. The spindle shaft is pressed into the inside of the two bearings. It is splined and can move vertically in an upper spindle pulley assembly as the quill is rotated up or down. In my case, the upper bearings in the pulley assembly spun fine and don’t seem to have much impact on runout so I left them alone.

I was however getting several thousands of an inch worth of runout at the spindle nose and heard some suspicious grinding, so decided to go ahead and replace the two lower spindle bearings held in the quill.

I am very pleased with my Kearney & Trecker 2HL vertical mill. It is a marvel of mechanical engineering –robustly built and full featured. (In other words, more mill than I deserve).

As great as it is, one area where the Kearney & Trecker falls down compared to Bridgeport-style knee mills is the absence of a quill that can easily be extended from the head for drilling purposes. Instead of the familiar lever, the K&T sports a front-facing hand wheel that engages the rack and pinion assembly inside the head to lower the spindle. This setup is exceedingly rigid and works fine if you take the time to set it up (save for the occasional broken clamp collar). However, when casually knocking out a few holes, it is really easy to break bits or to drill too far because you can’t feel what is going on with the bit pressure.

To recover this casual drilling capability while letting the K&T do what it does best, I’ve decided to seriously upgrade my drill press game. I have a small CNC mill that can be used for precision drilling purposes, and can always use the K&T for larger work when I need to take my time. What I lack, though, is a more capable drill press with a large table that can stand in for the mill for everyday drilling where power, feel and ease of setup are the operative goals.