Hello Chuck

What type of drill chuck do you use? Apart from a Jacobs keyed chuck on my bench drill the other four I have are all keyless. I have an old but nice 3-16mm Albrecht, a 1-10mm Rohm and a couple of Far East copies of the Albrecht in different sizes. They all work fine on my Metal lathe and Mill.

I ask because I found some rather hysterical comments on FB about how one must use keyed chucks on lathes that “reduce those softer brown materials” as keyless chucks are completely useless in this role? I confess to having one of these myself and haven’t noticed any issues to date, have I just been lucky?
Anyone have any comments on this?

I use a 1 - 10mm keyless chuck on my lathe, probably a far eastern one,

not had any problems with it.

I

.

No further comment required

MichaelG.

Keyless checks? Not yet given them house - room apart from one, a no choice on my first 18v battery drill bought recently. Slowly moving with the times!

Large Jacob's on Myford tailstock and another similar on Fobco drill but an even better one for drilling on the Sharp mill. This chuck is same capacity as all the Jacob's but seems superior quality in that it will hold much smaller drills. Made by locals, CVA in Hove, many years ago. Site now EDF Accounts HQ. All of the chucks are key - op. , including a few odd spares, mainly much smaller capacity and not yet broght into use.

Not found fault with the one keyless, seems to work OK, same as the keyed type.  The Dore - Westbury currently has a self centering 4jaw, lathe - type rather than "drill."

Edited By DMB on 05/09/2021 17:05:16

Ever used a Jacobs style chuck and trapped a bit of flesh between key and chuck - That hurts !!

Yet to try that!

What else do you expect on twitface?

Keyed ones are usually kitted out permanently with centre drills and countersink and the keyless for twist drills on the lathe . The makita cordless screwdriver and bodge 1/2” corded drills are keyless (10mm and 13?mm) , the SDS is - rather obviously - SDS.

I only use smaller jacobs-type on my little mill - for maximising headspace, when the ER 32 collet chuck is too big. Could use the ER16 on occasions, but I rarely do.

Can you provide a more precise description of the “softer brown materials”?

Do you count headstock chucks (when used with vertical slide)? Mine are TOS and Pratt Burnerd - but I’ve never used my vertical slide.

Wood!

I've found modern keyless chucks great for general drilling work, including soft brown stuff to 32mm

For more serious work a keyed chuck is still best

.

That’s a relief

MichaelG.

I have both types of chuck. My go to is the Albrecht. Only problem i found was if using it to tap with, it undoes itself on the reverse action. Tap falls out.

Steve.

Saw brown dust probably gets in there and gums them up

Wood dust is also good at soaking up lubricants. When on metal surfaces dry wood dust can also act as a lubricant preventing things like morse tapers working the way they should since they rely on good metal to metal contact giving the expected coefficient of friction. The second point would not make a difference between keyed and keyless chucks as far as the morse taper is concerned but if a keyless chuck does not put as much pressure on a drill shank as a keyed chuck it could be a problem.

Martin C