Gripping Drills in Chucks

I am seeking some help with problems of drills slipping in chucks.

This seems to have taken on something of nightmare proportions. Whatever chuck and drill combo I choose the drill always seems to slip.

I have used both keyed and keyless chuck but the problem is always the same.

Drill sizes vary between 2mm and 10 mm, now and reqround. I am meticulous about cleaning drill shanks.

I can accept that I am no longer strong enough to tighten keyless type but I don't remember having this problem in the past.

Any suggestions are most welcome.

Maybe the old hands aint what they were

A small metal tube on the end of the chuck key would give you more leverage for less effort

I had similar problems ,getting too old, I pressed out handles on a couple of jacobs chuck keys and made longer handles from silver steel,this way you do not have to keep looking for the piece of tube. If you cannot tighten or release a keyless chuck ,the rubber strap wrench with plastic handle sold at B & Q as a Boa does the job without damaging the knurling on the chuck. Another ,tip Jacobs chucks can be dismantled on a press ,after cleaning the internals and lubricating they work a lot better,Google jacobs chucks and there is a web site show how to dismantle them . It is noticeable that chucks used horizontally ie in the lathe get far stiffer with use than when used solely in a drilling machine ,it must be due to the soluble getting in the works. I now tend to store loose chucks morse taper up so that the fluid drains out .

Do not know how these are named in english (drills with 6 sided shaft?) or in what sizes you can get them, but they will not slip in dril chucks. Niko.

http://www.toolstation.nl/shop/Gereedschap+accessoires/Speciale+boren/Borenset+met+zeskantschacht+7+delig/d80/sd1400/p42721

Edited By speelwerk on 02/06/2014 21:35:34

I''ve found cleaning and oiling the chucks can make a surprising difference.

Neil

Hi Jerry

An old mentor of mine insisted that the best way to tighten any three jaw chuck be it on a lathe or drilling machine

was to

"tighten it using all four holes on a three jaw chuck".

This will grip so tight that then it will need the extension on the key to loosen it.

Swinging on an extended chuck key in one hole only will damage the scroll.

A keyless chuck can be pulled up tight with a strap wrench that is used for removing oil filters a gentle nudge is all that is required no massive force.

Eric

for the key less chuck the yellow"gripper type gloves" are worth it. They're a mesh glove with a yellow( on all the ones I've seen) soft rubber net overlayed on them. Protects your hands a grip like blazes.

Ian

I've found that on occasion too slow a rpm causes the bits to catch and slip i.e. increase the drill speed and see what transpires.

Steve

I'm overwhelmed by the response. Lots of suggestions, some I have already tried, but each one contains a gem or two and I will have to work through my technique (again).

I'll use them as a check list, and tick off each one as its done, the memory is not what it used to be.

Although I try to clean my chucks after each job I may not have removed all the oil from the gripping face of the jaws.

Thank you to everyone.

Jerry

Hi All

This works best when the chuck is fixed in a machine.....

For a Jacobs Chick Try two keys at the same time If you have them, It negates a lot of the internal friction. and you are doubling the force without straining the keys or the chuck gear ring.

Also check if the drill is correctly ground, Is there too much relief causing it to dig in with a heavy chip?

Regards
John

Got a mate who cures the problem of slipping drills, he gets the angle grinder, and grinds three flats on the drill shank, its not too bad in the portable electric drill, but it can be a bit of a problem in the drill press. Most of the drilling is in RSJ about three to six MM thick. Ian S C

Drill bits with 3 flats can be bought and are very good. Hex. shank drill bits are available in the smaller sizes and are useful in battery drills. The chuck key can be extended and a suitable sized wheel soldered on the end, this is good for weak fingers.For larger bits- put in 3 jaw, with grinder in toolpost, Grind 3 flats by indexing off the jaws. Only small flats are needed and will be pretty accurate.

> I've never oiled a drill chuck but I would imagine something very light like Duck Oil would be the one to use.

3 in 1 seems to do the job here,. You need it to flow down between the ring gear and the body of the chuck, but a bit on the jaw slides does less harm than good.

Neil

Read this before adding lube to your keyless chuck !

i was doing some taper reaming and reaming and tapping of my 5"g terrier boiler this eve for boiler bush fittings and found the tightening up of each of the 3 chuck points very useful when using the various bits in the jacobs chuck off my lathe... this discussion was therefore very timely and helpful!

cheers,

julian

Hi Jerry,

Yes I can well understand your point of maybe loosing some hand strength. Sooner or later were all going to go through this. And even the top quality Albrecht chucks will also sooner or later need parts or a bit of maintenance. But to also state a bit of the obvious, the general rule is the cheaper your chucks are then the less precision there built to. That alone makes them far less efficient at transfering the energy into tightening the jaws. Years ago I had a cheap Black and Decker hand drill that would not hold any drill without slipping no matter how much I tried to get it tight. I finally just scrapped the whole drill since it wasn't built to a high enough standard to deserve replacing the chuck. But you haven't said how old or what quality your chucks are.

You did mention a keyless, so even if it was a brand new Albrecht and your hands just aren't strong enough now to properly tighten it, you could if you were a bit careful use a good quality strap wrench on the body. And by good quality I mean one that comes with the proper leather strap. That would provide the most bite and protection. And just like adding a snipe to a chuck key, you would have to be a bit careful about going the wrong way and over tightening. But any of us should be able to estimate how much to tighten a chuck just by feel. It's also been my experience that once a drill has spun in a chuck it's scrap. It's even more likely to spin again for some reason. And the burr raised plus the displaced metal on the drills shank is reason enough to throw it away. They can't be fixed with the equipment most of us own. So for what good quality drills cost today, it's well worth the cost to buy very good quality chucks, or rebuild the worn good quality chucks you might already have.

I doubt it, but just to double check and make sure. You aren't trying to use any solid carbide drills are you? They can and will tend to slip in the normal chuck jaws. They use diamond plating on chuck jaws that are designed for carbide drills to give them some grip. I still have most of my hand strength, and it's a lot slower method. But when I want a very very accurate location and I don't want the drill to wander, I use an ER collet to hold the drill. It's a vastly noticeable improvement, and far more rigid way to hold a drill even comparing it against an Albrecht. Something like that might be worth considering depending on what you have your current drill chucks mounted to. Most drills would break long before they ever slipped in a properly tightened ER collet.

Pete

Hi Peter, and everyone who has contributed to this thread,

I'm approaching retirement age +5. I am sure I no longer have the strength in my hands that I did 5 yrs ago. When I say I have tried lots of potential solutions I think I had tried almost everything that has been suggested above, including buying a brand new Albrecht 1-10 mm.

Now I've gone through a more thorough series of checks and discovered that I have made mistakes that I would not have made in the past.

I found I need to -

1. Forget that my time on this earth is finite,

2. Work carefully,

3. Clean all the mating surfaces.

4. Use much higher rotating speeds, I've gone from 70 rpm with a 6mm drill to 200rpm.

Now I am much more confident!

The first item has possibly been the most significant. It affects all the others!

Thanks to you all.

Jerry