If you are looking for an inexpensive bi directional, variable speed motor for your power wrapper; look no futher than your old used up cordless drill.

Many many cordless drills are thrown away every year because the battery has gone bad.

Rather than throwing the drill away, strip it down, salvage the motor and speed control from the drill and use it to power your power rod wrapper or dryer.

Especially, if you have a drill that has a nigh and a low speed switch, you can have the advantage of a higher speed wrapper if needed, or a much slower speed wrapper if needed as well.

Then, the simple thing to do is to connect it to a foot controlled variable voltage power supply to vary the voltage going to the drill motor and you will be set, after you have built a stand to hold the drill motor for your power wrapper.
Since the drill motor already has an excellent chuck on the end, you can just use the excellent chuck, to either holder a larger chuck if needed, or use it to hold solid rod stock to be inserted into the open end of a rod being built.

Be safe
Roger

I recently purchase a 1/2 in drill from harbor freight for 20 bucks and am in the process of getting rid of my sewing machine motor and replacing it with the drill motor. The drill has much smoother speed control and can be easily controlled at low speeds with my foot pedal. If I remember right it is cheaper than the sewing machine motor also.

Well I really like that idea... my only concern is I thought the motors were geared down internally in the drill. I have never taken a drill apart but assumed that when apart the gears were totally seperate from the motor which would cause a big issue.

I just mounted the whole drill down. It started off as a lathe for turning handles, but I liked the sensitivity of the speed control so much I'm using it as my power wrapper motor. No pulley's needed, just a direct connection. I guess the only down side is no easy free turning, but thats not to much of a problem since the drill will turn easily at such low rpm's.

Casey,
In many drills, the gear assembly is solidly connected to the drive motor.

Then, when you take the drill apart and remove the cover, you are essentially removing the shield from around the motor and gear drive.

Of course, if you remove the cover, you then have to fabricate a stand to support the motor and gear case.

Roger

roger wilson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Casey,
> In many drills, the gear assembly is solidly
> connected to the drive motor.
>
> Then, when you take the drill apart and remove the
> cover, you are essentially removing the shield
> from around the motor and gear drive.
>
> Of course, if you remove the cover, you then have
> to fabricate a stand to support the motor and gear
> case.
>
> Roger


Well heck then that is a great deal.. I had no idea that the motor inside was essentially a gear motor.. I just assumed that the motor was seperate form the gears and the housing acted as the housing for both the gears and motor....

Well heck I may have to rethink some things after finding this out

This sounds like a great idea. What are you using to power the cordless drill motor.

If you choose to use the trigger control that comes with the drill, you can use a simple plug in AC to DC plug in power supply that are widely available for less than $20 on line, as well as surplus stores and other supply houses.

If you were to look at the AC linemaster speed control foot pedal, you would find that Linemaster simply uses the simple trigger speed control that is commonly used in AC series motors to act as a foot operated AC series motor speed control.

In this case, the trigger contrl is simply placed into a mounting location in the foot pedal and then the movable part of the foot pedal has a tab that comes down and depressess the trigger control when the foot is depressed.

If one wanted to use the same trigger control and variable speed control that is built into a typical variable speed cordless electric drill, you could simply use a similar foot pedal and mount the trigger from the drill into the foot pedal.
Or you could strip out the innards of a common sewing machine foot pedal, and fabricate a tab to depress and a mount to locate the trigger into the base of the foot pedal and use it to control the speed of the drill motor.

You could use the appropriate plug in transformer that meets the drill motors voltage and current needs from a source similar to this one:

[www.electronicsurplus.com]

Check on the side of your drill motor for its voltage and current requirements, and then insure that you purchase a transformer - ac to dc transformer that will meet the minimum needs of the motor.


Good luck
Roger

p.s.
Remember if you use a Drill Motor to act as the power source for your power wrapper, you will have plenty of power to do nearly any type of lathe work as well.

Remember, this typical drill motor is used to drill large holes, sink screws, or even tighten nuts.
So, espeically if you get a two speed gear train - one wiht high speed, and also with hight torque, you will have the ability to turn the work quickly for sanding and high speed wrapping, or turn it slowly for low speed wrapping, drying, and or heavy duty lathe work.

Take care
Roger

Thanks for the information I think I will try it.

If any one is going to try using a cordless motor, you might try out a few motors for ease of use and the relative sound of the motor when it is in use.

Some of the drills use gear trains that are rather noisy. Although they will work just fine, the constant gear noise can be a bit irritating in a quiet rod wrapping room.

But other drills have gear trains that are nearly silent. You just have to try a few to find the ones that work for your particular application.

Roger

By the way, whenever I am doing a cork ring glue up for a handle, I always use my low speed high torque drill motor to spin my mandrel and or blank when I am doing the glue up.

The high torque of the drill motor makes it easy to spin the mandrel or rod blank when applying glue and allows one to easily and quickly center and line up cork rings for gluing.

You can spin the mandrel very quickly to apply the glue and glue up an entire 20-30 cork ring rear grip, reel seat, and fore grip in a single epoxy glue set up as long as you are using 30 minute curing epoxy.

Take care
Roger

Man now you all have me searching around for an old drill. Im curious as to the gear box and what all I can do with it.

Roger or Anyone,

Are there any pictures available?

John

JLS Custom Rods
Cassadaga, NY

Hello John

Just go to PHOTO (at the top of the page) and either hit "search" and enter "power wrapper" or just look in the equipment and tools section.

Have a good one.

Bob,

New Bern, NC.

Bob

I don't see any using a cordless drill. Did I miss it?

Thanks, John

JLS Custom Rods
Cassadaga, NY

Bob

I don't see any using a cordless drill set up. Did I miss it?

Thanks, John

JLS Custom Rods
Cassadaga, NY



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/21/2011 10:22AM by John Straight.