Drilling hardened shafts

[antt]

i need an engineering place in brisbane or goldy that would be able to drill and tap the hardened output shafts from my tcase for me. anyone know of a good place to go to

[antt]

or even advice on which sorta drill bits i need to drill the shafts myself, and i'll just get a shop to tap them. cause a normal drill bit didn't even leave a mark on them

[ISUZUROVER]

Drilling is not usually the hard part, tapping the shaft without breaking the tap is. If the shaft is very hard you may have to anneal it first and then re-harden it afterwards. If it was only induction hardened when made, it may be reasonably soft in the middle (assuming you want to drill and tap along the length of the shaft).

In the past for similar stuff I have just used a normal (but very good quality) HSS drill bit, that was sharpened very well and I went slowly. If possible I always drilled it in a lathe rather than a drill press.

[Strange Rover]

The shaft might only be hard on the surface so you could cut the end 5mm off the shaft and then drill and tap as normal (works on the mog pinions)

If the shaft is through hardned then this wont work.

Sam

[antt]

hmmm, that is a good idea sam. i recall reading that the hardening is only thin, so this could be the solution

[dumbdunce]

budget tip: you can use carbide tipped masonry bits for drilling hardened steel - you obviously have to put an edge on them which takes a bit of time but the results are pretty good. as I have said before - take it slow with plenty of lube

as others have suggested, the shaft is probably not hard in the middle so once you drill through the crust it should go easily, and if you mean to drill into the end of a shaft, do it in a lathe, or it will never be straight.

[mkpatrol]

take it slow with plenty of lube

.

Your not talking to Grimace you know

[Steve F]

i need an engineering place in brisbane or goldy that would be able to drill and tap the hardened output shafts from my tcase for me. anyone know of a good place to go to

Did this myself a few weeks ago on the Jeep, after cutting the end off the shaft it was fairly easy to drill although starting with a nice small bit certainly helped as the larger bits would easily go to the same depth but no further. It took me about 30 minutes to drill and tap into the end of my output shaft after the end was cut off.

Cheers
Steve

[dumbdunce]

take it slow with plenty of lube

.

Your not talking to Grimace you know

that's funny cos I thought Grimmus would be all over any thread containing the words "Drill", "hardened" and "shaft"...

[mkpatrol]

take it slow with plenty of lube

.

Your not talking to Grimace you know

that's funny cos I thought Grimmus would be all over any thread containing the words "Drill", "hardened" and "shaft"...

Not to mention 'lube'

[antt]

i need an engineering place in brisbane or goldy that would be able to drill and tap the hardened output shafts from my tcase for me. anyone know of a good place to go to

Did this myself a few weeks ago on the Jeep, after cutting the end off the shaft it was fairly easy to drill although starting with a nice small bit certainly helped as the larger bits would easily go to the same depth but no further. It took me about 30 minutes to drill and tap into the end of my output shaft after the end was cut off.

Cheers
Steve

cheers mate, i think i will go this way and give it a crack myself this weekend. still not very confident about tapping it though, might get someone to do that

[MARKx4]

If it case hardned the hardening process only penetrates no more then half a mm. So if you give the surface a light touch with the grinder, you should be able to drill and tap like normal.