Drill Press Throw

[zbynek]

When you are looking at Drill presses and they state that the throw is 12" or 15" or 20", what does that mean exactly???

[imported_CWSmith]

Zbynek,

I'm not exactly sure what you mena by "throw"! I don't think I've seen that term used in reference to drill presses.

Normally a drill press is "sized" by it's ability to drill into the center of a piece of stock. For instance, a 15" drill press has approximately 7-1/2 inches from the center of the drill chuck to the forward edge of the column... in other words, it can drill to the center of a 15" piece of stock. If the drill press was a "bandsaw" you might say it was a 7-1/2 inch, because with a bandsaw the size is stated as the amount of space from the blade to the leading edge of the support column! With a drill press, the size is twice that. (An oddity of the business I guess).

Other criteria for drill presses are:

Motor Size: in Horsepower

Number of Speeds: Usually adjustable by repositioning the belts on the pulleys at the top of the tool

Range of RPM : Speed range (minimum and maximum)of pully drive ratio.

Chuck Size: The maximum shaft size the chuck can accomodate.

Spindle Travel: Maximum amount of travel of the drill bit/chuck which equates to the maximum depth a hole can be bored in one operation of the feed handles.

I hope this helps,

CWS