Soba Tapping Attachment Help

I recently bought a Soba automatic tapping attachment and can't make it work!

It came with no instructions and I cant find any via search engines nor even a YouTube video.

I did half a dozen M10 test taps in 1/8" x 1" strip and it taps fine but auto reverse doesn't work. I'm using the attachment in my milling machine.

If I lift the quill lever to reverse the direction sometimes the direction does reverse but it always leaves the tap behind in the hole.

Any advice/help gratefully received.

Hi

If you go onto the Chronos site you can download a manual for one of these.

Try here

Cheers

Martin

Although it doesn't have the same external appearance, I expect the guts and modus operandi are the same, in which case this vid might be helpful.

Murray

You might need more "throw" on the mecanism to get it to go into reverse.

I have varous tapping heads and the tap needs to feed out far enough to click into reverse, of you don't wind the handle up fast enough it can drop put of reverse and knock.

I do a lot of blind holes, so first pull the tap down and twist the collet to hold it down on the cam to lock it in the freewheel position, that way it does no bottom out and break the tap if you set the depth in that position, then when it freewheels and you wind the quill back up it goes into reverse on the tapping gearing in the head.

Hi Lionel and thanks for the advice.

I'm going to try some more test holes - I daren't use it on real work.

Let me ask a very stupid question...

In which direction is the tap supposed to be spinning on startup before engaging the hole?

Is it supposed to turn in the normal tapping direction or in 'reverse'?

I say this because my SOBA attachment chooses itself in which direction to go.

Thanks again for the advice.

Mine all turn in the normal clockwise direction looking down the tap into the hole, like a drill.

I've not used mine on a left hand tap, but maybe the mechanism is adjustable to set it to run in reverse for left handed taps.

Not sure what make mine are, will have to check, one I think is an old archer tapping head.

Does yours let you pull the tap down so you can twist it to stay in that down position?

I think I may have the instruction card in the boxes for a couple of them will check tomorrow