Low speed power drill

[grsjax]

It gets hard on the old hands drilling lots of very small holes with a pin vise.  Are there any good low speed power drills available?  I was thinking of using a Black and Decker 6v cordless screwdriver with a microdrill chuck but don't know if that would be adequate.

[reklein]

The little pistol grip cordless screwdriver is the way to go. Spend the $50 and get the one with the locking chuck. I got the cheaper one and the chuck pulls out when you try to retract the drill bit. Get a micro drill chuck from Micro-Mark. They have plenty of torque too. Bill

[grsjax]

Thanks for the input.  I went online and got a cyber monday deal on a 3.6v Craftsman pistol grip drill.  I also ordered a micro chuck that is supposed to hold drills from 0 to 1mm.  I would like to have gotten one that would go up to 3mm but none of the ones I found online had good reviews or they wouldn't hold drills smaller than 1/32".

[reklein]

sounds like you made a good choice. I find mine really handy. What are you bulding?   BILL

[grsjax]

Trying my hand at building MS whaleboat.  Lots of holes to drill for the chench nails.

[BareHook]

Micro-Mark also sells an electric screw driver that matches up with their mini drill chuck

[reklein]

The nice thing about the Black&Deckers and the craftsman etc. is that they have enough torque to drive an inch and a half screw to the head in pine.Yet they have a pretty slow RPM. Not sure what it is but its managible. The Dremels are so high rpm that one has a hole in the wrong place before you know it. BILL

[grsjax]

Just an update.  The Craftsman 3.6v screwdriver works well with the micro chuck.  One issue I had was the hex of the micro chuck had a bit of looseness in it.  Not a real problem but it bothered me.  To correct it I put small strips of clear tape on 3 sides of the hex, that solved the problem.  BTW the no load speed of the screwdriver is 200rpm.

Edited December 9, 2013 by grsjax

[michael mott]

 I just started to salvage an old broken Dremel 750 minimite cordless after seeing the fine pencil like drill Ed Tosti was using.

 

Getting the chuck off the motor was a devil , however they assembled it it was powerful enough to pull the spindle out of the armature windings on the little 4.5 volt motor.

 

Then I added a flywheel and will fix it to a 12 volt Sagami can motor from the world of model railroads.

 

 

I will use the telescoping brass tubes to form the body. The motor does not have a lot of power but with the brass flywheel it will have enough torque for small drills.

 

I got the idea from Gerald Wingrove a few years ago he used a small model locomotive motor for a mini drill.

 

Michael

Edited December 13, 2013 by michael mott

[michael mott]

Finished the drill today, it is not quite as powerful as i would like but the drill works fine for those very small drills.

 

First picture shows the the additional ball race and flywheel.

 

 

The second shows the second to last sleeve which is the same diameter as the can motor the hole lines up with the locking hole in the flywheel and also the 2x56 set screw. The largest sleeve has a wooden end piece that the wires exit from .

 

 

last one show the # 80 drill and some holes in some boxwood, there is no vibration and it runs soothly.

 

 

All the tubes were assembled with loctite except the solid end brass keeper next to the chuck, which was soldered with soft solder..

 

All in all I am pleased with the salvage.

 

michael

Edited December 14, 2013 by michael mott