Beefing Up A Cheap Drill Motor

[Rob] just finished reinforcing a cheap drill motor. He picked up the tool at Harbor Freight and ditched the case. The plastic retaining ring was replaced with a thick metal washer which he machine The washer uses three bolts to attach to the mounting plate that he welded together. We’re not exactly sure what he’s got in mind as he only mentioned that this will be used with a robot. We wouldn’t mind having one of these as a bench motor but there must be hundreds of uses now that it can be attached to just about anything. It seems Harbor Freight has become popular as hacking’s raw material source. The last example we saw of this was a welding table made from a utility cart.

18 thoughts on “Beefing Up A Cheap Drill Motor

  1. Come See the new hackerspace this was made at. Newly opened Makeit Labs at 111 tanner st Lowell MA. there will be open houses on thurs from 7pm on. Come down see some projects or work on some of your own.

  2. So… it looks like this post is about a bracket bracket used to mount a motor. I’d say ‘hack-worthy’ because more mechanical knowledge is always great (I’m a mech eng student), but I can hear the arduino/LED crowd whining already…

  3. i got some wireless headphones from harbor freight for 6 bucks lol. they only play in mono but theres a built in FM radio too and a MIC you can plug in to have a wired headset for skype or whatever. thats some raw hacking material 4ya

  4. Harbor Freight really is a great source of cheap components and gadgets. When you are buying things just to take them apart or repurpose them, it makes sense to go with a cheap supplier.

    Between Harbor Freight and online resellers like DealExtreme, there are a lot of interesting things you can pick up at very low prices.

  5. The chuck comes off pretty easy too if you want to replace it with a pulley or something. Open the jaws as wide as they’ll go and there’s a LH thread crosshead screw right down inside. After removing it, give the chuck a whack and off it comes to reveal a keyed shaft.

    The torque limiter ring is part of the gearbox though unfortunately, so it can’t be removed.

  6. Ok on the subject of hackworthyness:

    1.This bracket looks to be hand fabricated.
    2. The plastic retainer piece was custom fabricated to eliminate weakness.
    3. Ive personally seen the bracket today, the reason for the chuck is because the 10 inch wheels have a hole saw welded to them which directally chuck right up

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