Inside a radial drill press

This is a Pratt&Whitney Morris radial drill that I pulled from this scrap yard.

I dont know much about radial drills, I began researching them and this brand in particular, and took a chance that the insides were good. It was a $1500 chance, it worked out.
The machine is from the Hanford nuke site, and had little use before being drug outside. as is typical. Opened up first time since new.



This is what is behind the big aluminum front cover. Lower left, quill counterweight connected to the quill with a chain. This also has a ratchet safety brake on the quill, in case the counterweight chain fails. The quill is heavy, and has 10" of normal travel.
Lower right is the hand and power feed gears. In the lower center is the feed clutch.
Upper gears are the spindle drive, that is driven by the large bevel gears, on the splined drive bar.




This is the lower worm gear drive for the arm lift, the long screw up to the column top is stationary, the nut rotates by the worm and separate motor.
The arm lift also has a captured safety nut that idles along with the driven nut. If the driven nut should fail, the safety nut will catch the arm.





The machine is lubricated by two oil pumps, this is the drive for the gear type oil pump at the top of the head, nice American machine tool.
This machine is much easier to clean up then the B&S mill that was from the same yard.

Precision quill, uses three ball bearings at the nose, and a Timken bearing at the back end.


The back showing spindle drive

3ft arm, 9" column Mt4 light duty 3hp drill, weighs 5250 lbs without tilting box table.

Great pictures! Thanks for posting!

Wow, it's like new inside ! But we better get you into some bargaining classes, shoulda been able to beat them down lower than $1500 ?

Not a chance! It was a hoarder that now regrets selling it, others have tried to purchase the Carlton gear tilt table, only to be run off.
For me it was an interesting exercise that took nearly a year, for the elderly owner to clear a path to the machine so it could be extracted.
The price was more disturbing then the $500 for the mill, but the chance of the machine being good inside, and the value of the Carlton tilting table, made that bet a little less risky.
Now, not to press my luck, this is the last rusty machine for me, unlikely any more machines from the early nuke weapons program will show up.

No, I am not going to buy the DoAll Zepher!

The milling machine before,


After,

Holy crap, that’s a lot of work on that mill!

L7

donie said:

Not a chance! It was a hoarder that now regrets selling it,

Click to expand...

Oh yeah, we all know people like that. Usually they die surrounded by tons of rusted-out crap that their grandkids have to pay to truck to the dump ...

After,

Click to expand...

Next time I buy a machine, can I loan it to you for a few months ?

donie said:

Not a chance! It was a hoarder that now regrets selling it, others have tried to purchase the Carlton gear tilt table, only to be run off.
For me it was an interesting exercise that took nearly a year, for the elderly owner to clear a path to the machine so it could be extracted.
The price was more disturbing then the $500 for the mill, but the chance of the machine being good inside, and the value of the Carlton tilting table, made that bet a little less risky.
Now, not to press my luck, this is the last rusty machine for me, unlikely any more machines from the early nuke weapons program will show up.

No, I am not going to buy the DoAll Zepher!

The milling machine before,

After,

Click to expand...

That's nice work. I'm looking forward to seeing the drill when you've finished the job.

Regards Tyrone.

Thank you. The drill is proving much easier then the mill, the parts are larger, and less of them.
The truck ride, and amazingly skilled fork lifting by the previous owner, caused the arm to break free from the column. In this photo, down low, the column lock handle is broken off, but is in the sump at the base.



Once I get the lock handle fixed, the column and arm should rotate around freely on the inner columns large Timken bearings.
The weather is very hot, I believe this is helping free up everything, Yesterday, I got the motor to move, and with a pipe wrench on the motor coupling, began slowly getting things to turn, and squirting light spindle oil into the bearings and gears. I was able to start the motor and run the first reduction gear box, leaving the head in neutral. The 3hp GE motor has the industrial age look, and is built heavier, and more serviceable, then later designs, but perhaps not as efficient.

Back on risk taking rescuing machines out in the weather look here,



upper left, the feed clutch, depth dial, and feed stop, round device with handles.
The oil running down the side, with dirt, indicates water has entered that area, and has displaced the oil.
I was able to, determine from publications on the drill, the only problem would be the bearings in the hand feed wheel would be damaged, and they are.
The quills sleeve bearing area machined in the head, is much higher in the casting, and remained dry.

I was interested to see the spindle had it's own little balance weight. Over here similar drills usually had a whacking great clock spring to balance the spindle. I've had some fun with those over the years. Big, nasty, scary things !

Regards Tyrone.

Some of the radial drills have a large clock springs, and that was a concern on this machine because the water came halfway up the feed clutch, where that type of spring quill balance is used.
Both types have the ratchet safety, if the spring fails, the quill can only fall an inch. The various manufactures point out the safety features built into the machine. It would seem early vintage radial drills could be very dangerous, the arm, motor and head on this small drill weighs a ton, or close to it. A failure of the lifting nut or screw could cause the arm to crash down.
The controls are set up so when raising or lowering the arm, you have to move over out of harms way, to the column and to work the pin locking up-down lever.

Over here the drills I worked on all had a " safety nut " on the elevating screw that only came into operation when the main nut failed. Sounds like your drill has the same style of device. I never knew a main nut to fail but I suppose it must have happened at some point.

In the UK it's the H&S law that any radial arm drill has to have a " Jet Brake " on the drilling spindle. That's an electronic gizmo that injects DC current into the AC spindle motor and stops the drill instantly, within a rev. It's activated by a car radio aerial type probe that is fitted near to the spindle. If you come into contact with that - BANG - the drill will stop. It's illegal to operate one without that style of brake.

It saved a workmate of mine's life when the drill got hold of his overalls. He just ended up badly bruised with a couple of broken ribs.

What prevents over run of the arm up and down the column on that drill ?

Regards Tyrone.

Ive had a couple of those WW2 style radials.......the elevation is driven by the spindle motor,and if the spindle motor is reversed,the kick out stops on the elevation dont work,well they do work ,but the wrong end .....and things can get busted......Seems every WW2 radial had the gear tilt table ......last I sold was a Bickford ,the buyers went broke a bit later,and the drill and table were auctioned separate,IIRC they got $3500 for the tilt table ....The drill was bought by a similar machine hoarder ,and has sat out in the weather for years now ....great shame ,it was just about new from the army.......PS congrats on the mill ,looks brand new .

Thank you for that information! Having only used the radial drill at a local school under close watch of the instructor, my experience is just slightly more then zero with this type of drill, getting caught up in the machine would not be good.
The size of the large head, and the height of the box table seems to make the machine awkward for drilling smaller holes. But, the radial drill can do other operations that I am looking forward to exploring.
There is an electrical switch limit switch at the top of the column, nothing at the bottom, but it is stated the overload clutch on the lifting motor, will prevent damage to the machine if the arm encounters an obstruction.

"
Ive had a couple of those WW2 style radials.......the elevation is driven by the spindle motor,and if the spindle motor is reversed,the kick out stops on the elevation dont work,well they do work ,but the wrong end .....and things can get busted......Seems every WW2 radial had the gear tilt table ......last I sold was a Bickford ,the buyers went broke a bit later,and the drill and table were auctioned separate,IIRC they got $3500 for the tilt table ....The drill was bought by a similar machine hoarder ,and has sat out in the weather for years now ....great shame ,it was just about new from the army.......PS congrats on the mill ,looks brand new ."

I thought the the spindle motor also lifted the arm, but, there is a separate motor in the big compartment in back, harder to see because of the sun.
The machine appears to be post ww2, has a US Airforce tag, I will poke around the component and find a date code or two.

Century, made by McIlvanie in Yakima Wa, no kidding!


Junque art,

Yes! I feel better!
go behind here, and take a leak!

The drill you saw most of all over here was the " Asquith OD 1 ". Every company I worked for had them, they were made in their thousands and sent all over the world.

The arm/column over run safety device on those was dead simple. The elevating screw hung through a driving gear inside a motor driven gearbox on top of the column. The drive from the gear to the screw was made purely by friction caused by the weight of the arm and drilling head hanging on the screw. If you inadvertently rapid powered the arm down onto the job or the bottom of the column the weight of the arm diminished, friction drive was immediately lost,and the screw ceased to turn.

To prevent an over run in the up direction there was a sloping cam on top of the arm that made contact with a similar cam pinned to the elevating screw. When that contact was made the screw was lifted slightly, again friction was lost, and the screw stopped turning.

Pretty basic idea but it worked like a charm.

Regards Tyrone.

There was an Asquith at a gov auction a few years back, it was impressive. There are some photos of really old Asquith, and other early radial drills on the net, the safety features probably evolved as people got hurt using them. The 50s advertisements for all makes emphasize the safety features.
In this area, horizontal bandsaws, and drill presses are hard to find, every farm shop needs those for general maintenance. The old camelback drills are very hard to find.
I could hardly believe it when I walked around the 10" Oster pipe threader, and found this drill!
I learned this on the rusty mill, a higher ambient temperature goes a very long ways to help freeing up stuck machines. The outside temp yesterday and day before was 105f or so, the drill sitting in the sun got so hot, it would burn your hand. I left my grease gun in the sun, it was so hot I had to have leather gloves to use it. I pumped hot grease into the motor bearings, and the drive shaft end bracket bearing, and the whole thing broke loose. If it was cold outside it would not go that easy.

Next, I will use the "controversial mix" of Acetone and Auto transmission fluid, together with a brass brush and de-rust the machine 50 to 100 hours of scrubbing time there, and a point where one could or should think about taking on such a project. I will most likely put 200 or more hours in the machine.

Getting ready to close up the works, this photo shows the quill counterweight and safety. If the chain fails, a finger on the quill engages a notch in the horizontal ratchet.
The drills that use a large clock spring for quill balance, can have more compact heads, the counterweight is the size of a loaf of wide deli bread.

If the clock spring broke, and big as they were they did break. It was hit the emergency stop or the " Jet-Brake " probe ASAP. As far as I know there was no similar mechanism to prevent the spindle coming down under it's own weight.

Regards Tyrone.

The way this machine is designed, if everything failed the spinning hand feed handles would be dangerous also. I am finding getting into the machine to repair it, is helpful in understanding it.

Keeping this drill project in the immediate rotation, and still taking advantage of the hot weather, the quill is completely free, using Velocite spindle oil mixed 50/50 with kerosene to carefully as I could free the quill from the outer sleeve.
I think one advantage of having to repair a machine, that I do not have hardly any experience running, is a big leap into understanding the machine. The radial drill presses, are much more then just a drill press.
The American Tool Works, machined the head stocks for the Pacemaker lathes, in their own Holewizzard radial drills. Good reading on that here.
http://www.vintagemachinery.org/pubs/1004/21729.pdf

I have found only a sales brochure for this Morris, but many of these drills share some features, one I was reading about is the spindles, there is a reference to the quill having inner and outer sleeves, it really took me looking at one to figure out what that is.
The quill, instead of a sliding fit in the cast iron of the head, it has a long hardened and lapped steel sleeve pressed into the cast iron head of the machine for a sliding bearing, and this makes for very little deflection of the quill when fully extended.
The spindles use multiple precision angular contact bearings at the nose location, this Morris uses a single Timken at the top location for pre-load on the nose bearing group. I have not seen price list from the early 50s, these machine must have been expensive.
This what the quill looks like extended, a lot of fine scratches, from breaking loose, but I have since polished it with only flannel, and a very small amount of Mothers polish its smooth and good to go.


When I took this photo it was 107f outside, the machine was hot and the quill broke free.

Looking at the condition of the ejector slot I'd say that drill hasn't done much work in it's previous existence.

Regards Tyrone.