As part of our move to NC, I decided to sell my old Drill Press and replace it with a new one.  My old Drill Press was, literally, an antique.  I purchased it in 1982 and it served me well for 30 years.  It was a solid, American made, with a cast iron body and had all original parts when I sold it.

My only real complaint about the tool was the coarse speed selection.  It only had six speeds ranging from about 300 RPM to about 5000 RPM.  With this huge range it was rare to find an ‘optimum’ speed.   Over the years, I looked at replacing the tool many times, but I could never find an ‘affordable’ replacement that offered the one feature I absolutely loved about the old one: The Quill stroke was over 6 inches.  Most “Modern” Drill Presses were providing only 4 – 4.5 inch stroke and, if you’ve ever tried to end bore a deep hole, you’ll appreciate the value of the longer stroke.

Fortunately, Delta Machinery is now selling an 18″ Drill press with a 6″ stroke AND 16 speeds, the 18-900L.  There are other numerous features that I like about this drill, but these two were the clinchers!  Let’s see… I don’t have to move my old 250lb clunker from TX to NC and I get real speed control with a larger capacity table… Did I mention Free Shipping?  Hmmm, this is a no brainer:

Here it is:

With the new Crane Hoist it was relatively easy to assemble (despite the 240lbs of machinery!)…