# The hobby machinist gods got a chuckle last night



## Eyerelief (Nov 16, 2021)

I absolutely LOATHE changing shanks on Albrecht chucks, it's never easy for me.
A while back after having way too much pearl  pop with foam on top, I decided to put a half inch shank on an Albrecht 5/8" chuck with a JT6 taper (I don't do well unsupervised).  This was a perfect storm for disaster because Albrecht chucks have solid bases, and a half inch shank is smaller than the JT6 taper so wedges don't work.  I knew all that, but did it anyway thinking that if it worked as I wanted, like it always does (said nobody ever), I would leave it on.  Didn't work so it sat in the drawer unused for a year because I didn't want to do what I am about to do, try and take the shank out.
My first thought was to turn a groove in the shank then add a spacer and drive wedges in to the groove.  Nope, not this time (sorry no pic of that).  Tried heat, no help.
Next thought was to cut off the half inch shank, drill and tap the stub on center and draw it out with a bolt.  This is one of those no turning back, all in maneuvers.


	

		
			
		

		
	
 The drilling went slow, the shank was harder than I expected. Went to 1" depth on the hole.


	

		
			
		

		
	
 Tapping even slower.  Used a deep socket for additional torque on the tap wrench.  Fortunately some of the Jacobs taper extended outside the chuck which gave the vice grips something to grab (pardon the vice grips, sometimes they hold really hot steel while I weld = lazy)
I had already made a spacer so I grabbed a bunch of washers and and a short 3/8" bolt.


	

		
			
		

		
	
Proceeded to start tightening the bolt. Got it as tight as I could, but the shank did not budge. At this point, the romance of trying to repurpose the chuck was gone.  I was out of ideas and had a high dollar chuck in front of me that was absolutely worthless. I stood the chuck on its nose and just stared at it contemplating trying to drill out enough material to make the shank weak enough to pull out. Being lazy, I didn't want to invest another hour on this all evening project that should have taken 10 minutes. While deep in thought, staring at the chuck on the work bench, a loud bang! The bolt, shank and washers came raining down on the work bench. I yelled, soiled my diaper, and grabbed for my beer.  The bolt, shank end and washers had shot about 2' into the air.
After changing my britches and cleaning myself up, I grabbed my beer, looked at the dog and said "Yeah, I knew it would work".  He (Recon) is still looking for a bird to fall out of the sky after the loud bang.


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## jwmelvin (Nov 16, 2021)

A good story and a fine ending. Well done.


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## Mini Cooper S (Nov 16, 2021)

I loved the line about the dog still looking for the bird!


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## Dhal22 (Nov 16, 2021)

Indeed a great story.  The pearl pop with foam on top had me laughing.


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