# High Speed Engraving Head For Bridgeport, Good Idea?



## Andre (May 27, 2014)

My grandfather bought me a new style dremel drill press for xmas a number of years ago, I must have been 10 at the time. (Can you tell I am a tool nut!) and frankly, it's not useful at all.....for anything. I use it for endmill touchups, but it and my Dremel 4000 could serve a better purpose.

I have a '48 Bridgeport M head (with an interesting history), with bad bearings. For my work, it's plenty accurate but I can wiggle the spindle (quill up and locked) .005. Not cool! So I am thinking of attaching the dremel, and drill press in an upside down manner on the un-used side of the round ram. So I can swing it around when I need it....

Would this be a good idea? If it sounds too weak I can fab a mount but it'll be a pain. If I had an older dremel, I could make a new housing but my dremel has "speed compensation for heavy use" garbage that's supposed to add power when it gets bogged down. The circuit boards would be a pain to house internally....(could also use a flex shaft) 

I intend to engrave a steel rule for a little toolmakers square I intended to make, with a 1/32" ball end "burr" (actually has tiny flutes, so it's not technically a flute, but you get the idea)

Any thoughts appreciated!)


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## JimDawson (May 27, 2014)

See this thread.  http://www.hobby-machinist.com/showthread.php?t=23186  There is quite a bit of discussion.

In general a Dremel is not really a good choice.  But there are other inexpensive options.


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## Andre (May 27, 2014)

JimDawson said:


> See this thread.  http://www.hobby-machinist.com/showthread.php?t=23186  There is quite a bit of discussion.
> 
> In general a Dremel is not really a good choice.  But there are other inexpensive options.



A pencil die grinder would be nice, but my mill is in 7BS with 1/2" collet capacity, and I want to take my spindle out of the equation anyway.

Dremels are not nearly as weak as they used to be. How much work do you think I'm going to do with a 1/32" endmill anyway? Not making a business out of making PCB's, just engraving some straight lines....

I will take your information into account though, thank you for posting that thread.


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## JimDawson (May 27, 2014)

Andre said:


> A pencil die grinder would be nice, but my mill is in 7BS with 1/2" collet capacity, and I want to take my spindle out of the equation anyway.
> 
> Dremels are not nearly as weak as they used to be. How much work do you think I'm going to do with a 1/32" endmill anyway? Not making a business out of making PCB's, just engraving some straight lines....
> 
> I will take your information into account though, thank you for posting that thread.



I wasn't suggesting that you try to mount a die grinder in your spindle, that would not work on your mill.  I like your idea of attaching a mini drill press to the ram.  I think that would work well.  You could mount just about any kind of a powered spindle in that setup.

My experience with Dremels is that spindle nose tends to move around too much for my taste.  I recently built a small machine for a customer and one of the tools I explored was a Dremel, I could move the spindles in the housing in all of them that I looked at.  I moved down the isle a bit and looked at a Roto-Zip, that is what I purchased for the project.


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## george wilson (May 28, 2014)

Dremels have crappy bearings,and the bearings are mounted in poorly dimensioned cavities. There is now a very weak plastic coupling that breaks down easily. Lowes sells these couplings,so prevalent is the problem. Mine broke down doing light buffing and I have started using a Dumore or old Fairchild hand held die grinder.

Some years ago in Fine Woodworking,there was an article in putting in packing around the Dremel's bearings to improve performance in the wagging spindle department. But,that doesn't cure the poor coupling problem.

I don't know why Dremel doesn't do something about the poor coupling. I guess they think their hobby level customers won't know better.


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## Andre (May 28, 2014)

george wilson said:


> Dremels have crappy bearings,and the bearings are mounted in poorly dimensioned cavities. There is now a very weak plastic coupling that breaks down easily. Lowes sells these couplings,so prevalent is the problem. Mine broke down doing light buffing and I have started using a Dumore or old Fairchild hand held die grinder.
> 
> Some years ago in Fine Woodworking,there was an article in putting in packing around the Dremel's bearings to improve performance in the wagging spindle department. But,that doesn't cure the poor coupling problem.
> 
> I don't know why Dremel doesn't do something about the poor coupling. I guess they think their hobby level customers won't know better.



Thanks for that info on the bearings. I will inspect my spindle later and see how bad it is.


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## pineyfolks (May 28, 2014)

:think1:You could make a mount to attach to the mills quill and offset the roto-zip or whatever tool you're running off to the side. You would still have use of the quill. A piece of 1 1/4 thick alum plate should work. Bore a hole to fit the quill another for the roto-zip.


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## george wilson (May 28, 2014)

I plan to do just that with my 1/10 H.P. Dumore die grinder,or my 1/4 H.P. Stanley vintage aluminum router. That and a router speed control will enable very small end mills to be used. I'll saw the adapter plate from 1" aluminum plate I have on hand.


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