drill chuck recommendations for a bridgeport

[Gary Clarke 4Participant @garyclarke4]

A seemingly simple topic.. but perhaps worth discussion..

What type of drill chuck should I buy for a bridgeport mill? I want to get maximum utility from it.. capacity? integral R8 taper or an arbor? Keyless or? Are smaller capacity chucks more accurate for smaller drill sizes? Do I need more than 1?

I have other equipment (lathe) which uses a MT2 taper in the tailstock..

What kind of quality should I get.. any recommendations?

[Gary Clarke 4Participant @garyclarke4]

[old martParticipant @oldmart]

First get an R8 to MT2 tanged adaptor. Being able to share drill chucks between machines is a great bonus. At the museum, we have gradually acquired a lot of drill chucks up to 16mm capacity. The smallest is a 1/4" in MT2 but the Cutwel 13mm integral keyless R8 runs best throughout its full range.

[Anonymous]

I've got five drill chucks for the Bridgeport. Four of those were new Jacobs (1 x 1/4", 2 x 3/8" and 1 x 1/2" ) and are on quick change arbors, so I don't need to remove the R8 collet each time. They also get used on the R8 CNC mill. I also have a Jacobs drill chuck on an R8 arbor that came with the Bridgeport.

I don't mess about sharing tooling on mill and lathe. I have two separate drill chucks on 3MT for the lathe. One came with the lathe, now too worn to be useful, and another, larger one, bought secondhand on Ebay.

All my drill chucks are keyed. When not in use the keys are stored in the chuck, so I don't lose them.

I also have an R8 to 3MT adaptor for Morse taper drills on the Bridgeport, but things can get short on headroom at times, 19" can get eaten up pretty quickly. In general I don't use drills bigger than 1" on the Bridgeport.

Andrew

[John HaineParticipant @johnhaine32865]

Hmm. Mounting an R8 MT2 adapter so you can then fit an MT2 chuck takes a while and loses height. My recommendation (based on years using R8 in a VMB) is to have a big (13mm) (possibly keyless) chuck for the large drills on an R8 arbor. I also have a small keyless (6mm, Albrecht) on an R8 arbor, but often wish it as on a parallel arbor so it could go in a collet to save so much winding the head up and down.

[VicParticipant @vic]

Chuck capacities seem to vary depending on make so you may need two. I have an Albrecht 3-16mm on an MT3 arbor for my mill so I ended up getting a Rohm 10mm chuck also on a MT3 arbor for the smaller sizes. I have a cheap Chinese copy of an Albrecht on a MT2 arbor for my lathe and that seems to go from virtually zero up to 16mm.

[Dave WoottonParticipant @davewootton]

I use a Vertex keyless chuck with an integral R8 shank, used a lot over the last 10 years and still as good as new, very accurate and grips well. Not cheap but very good, came from Rotagrip.

Dave

[John ReeseParticipant @johnreese12848]

I have a 1/4 capacity Albrecht keyless, a 1/2 capacity Grizzly integral shank keyless, and a 3/4 capacity keyed ball bearing Jacobs.

[John ReeseParticipant @johnreese12848]

If you expect to use a hole saw you need a keyed chuck. A hole saw will over tighten a keyless chuck.

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