I bought an arbor press - at last.

[Lil Doodler]

Close up of lower

Close up of upper

You could use a drill on the torque setting to close it quickly

This is how I use it, with a longer lever. I did also modify the back of the lower end to get into a small place.

I wouldn't be too afraid to trim more off of the bottom if I needed to. It doesn't take that much pressure to set most rivets or eyelets.

Edited August 15, 2020 by Lil Doodler

[Lil Doodler]

Here is a much longer / deeper clamp, over 300mm /  12 ".

You would be hard pressed (pun intended) to find a drill press that would give you that kind of clearance

It's very cheap compared to the price of a drill press or an arbor press.

[Spyros]

Lil D I have the same Milwaukee hand drill, they're awesome those 12 volt ones

Those modifications you did to your C clamp, I also did them to a screw bolt to make the clamp for the table mounting of my home made stitching pony...same principle 

Look fundamentally an arbor press is not much more than a drill press without the motor and the chuck, isnt it? with more pressing power probably.  But in a drill press all those specs, throat clearance, durability of the shaft, pressing power, is simply a question of size.   Typically an old school floor mounted home-shop type of drill press will easily have a 50cm (20 inch) swing.  When their motor goes (especially the belt drive ones) they are usually sold for scrap prices.  My old one, I'm sad to say, I just put it out on the nature strip and someone picked it up.  But there some very solid ones with a dead motor out there sold for next to nothing.  I mean at the end of the day they're meant to go through wood and steel, leather is soft.

Then it's just a question of adding a $10 quick release chuck for your bits, and you you can build any manner of tables with fences and jigs for any application, that's what woodworkers do with their drill presses.

Having said all that, I haven't done it so I can't tell for sure, just theorising.    Maybe there's a catch somewhere.

 

Edited August 15, 2020 by Spyros

[Lil Doodler]

Spyros,

Yep, you are right, it should work fine and I did say . . ..

2 hours ago, Lil Doodler said:

That sounds like a good idea if it works. For an eyelet or rivet it might work very well. 

Personally, I've never seen any drill press with a bad motor, much less a big floor drill press model with a bad motor.

I was thinking more about the much smaller bench drill presses that are much lighter duty and much less expensive.

Heck yeah, if I had an old floor model drill press with a bad motor, I wouldn't hesitate to use it as much as I could as an arbor for leather work

[Spyros]

1 hour ago, Lil Doodler said:

Heck yeah, if I had an old floor model drill press with a bad motor, I wouldn't hesitate to use it as much as I could as an arbor for leather work

Little did I know at the time... I was all about woodworking

[RockyAussie]

Starting to look like a bunch of mad inventors here what? Here one post I did on a drill press for embossing as well -

 

[dikman]

I have a drill press similar to yours, Brian (had it for about 40 years) but the "newer" ones I've seen don't look like they're as strongly built. I've recently been using my arbor press to crack Macadamia nuts (!) and I know the drill press couldn't do it. Nevertheless, it's a good idea for using on lighter studs and rivets.

[Lil Doodler]

I've been thinking . . .

As Spyros pointed out, a real advantage of the drill press is the throat and table size.

Using a basket weave stamp on the arbor press with a guide/fence I was able to quickly put down an accurate, almost flawless pattern on a leather project. However, because my arbor press is small and the work area is small between the ram (where the tool was being held) and the supporting arm, I was limited in how large an area I could work.

If I had a floor drill press with a large table that had a material guide and a "pinned"/stationary chuck that couldn't rotate, putting basket weave on a larger project would be quick and easy.

Set up a stool, so the table is a foot or so below eye level, add good lighting and work the handle! I'd case the leather so the drill press doesn't have to apply much pressure.

Edited August 15, 2020 by Lil Doodler

[Spyros]

So what are the jobs that require a lot of pressure from the arbor press?

Edited August 15, 2020 by Spyros

[Lil Doodler]

from the web . . .

• Inserting or removing bearings, seals, studs, and bushings – probably the most common use
• Installing dowels, alignments pins, threaded (key) inserts, t-nuts, and roll pins,
• Bending, joggling, and forming small sheet metal parts in combination with custom made dies
• Die cutting
• ***Embossing or punching holes in leather, cloth, plastic, gaskets, and thin sheet metal – this is a cool and underutilized use
• Broaching (keyways and other misc.)
• Flattening or straightening out small bumps in metal
• Pressing inlays
• Pressing guitar frets – this is another cool one
• Light riveting
• Inserting and removing gears and pulleys
• Compressing springs – careful here
• Tie rod ends and Ball joints
• Crimping cables and wires into a die
• u-joints

Some use a pointed die in the arbor press to destroy hard drives

Blacksmith work in forging

cracking nuts has been noted lol

In the jewelry industry, the arbor press is also commonly used as a cutting, punching, and pattern embossing tool. The force an arbor press provides has the ability to punch through some metals without damaging the surface, unlike other pressing options.

In the automobile industry, the arbor press also features as a mandril press. Here, the arbor press is used for press-fitting bearings and embossing metal objects that fit in its throat. The arbor press is also used in woodworking for creating patterns and metalwork that enhance the functions or aesthetics of a woodworker’s piece.

And I found this in a different thread on using an arbor for leather work

  On 1/15/2018 at 2:13 PM, Double Daddy said:

I used a bench top drill press for a long time for lots of pressing and setting functions...as well as spinning my sanding drums and my cocobolo burnisher. It worked well right up until all of the pressing/setting stress finally weakened the knuckle arm where the table connected to the vertical post and it cracked and failed...now I just use the press as a sander and burnisher (no sense in tossing it when the motor still works great). I have a 1-ton arbor press and a keyless chuck adapter with powerful magnet built into it...it just grabs right onto the ram and I can use the short/cheap line20/24 snap setters or take it off and use the ram face to press my brass maker's mark. Here's the link to the keyless chuck that I have:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Arbor-Press-Magnetic-Pin-Press-1-2-Chuck-Tool-APMT0-5/252843022376?hash=item3ade9e5828:g:PJoAAOSwc-tY4oNz

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It looks like there's a lot of stress on the table that it wasn't intended to have

But using the old drill press without a motor that wouldn't matter I guess

 

Edited August 15, 2020 by Lil Doodler