"carl mciver" wrote in message
.net...
My OCD's, being only partially suppressed by medication, still
allow me
to obsess about certain wild ideas until I a) give up, b) figure out
how to
make it work, or c) forget what it was all about to start with.
That said, I've been thinking about the body of an arbor press and
the
resemblance to a certain number of other tools out there, with the
main
difference being the operating device planted onto the top. Got me
thinking
about a press body (made from reinforced large I-beams) with
interchangeable
tooling, which would be nice in my increasingly crowded garage and my
inability to find a place for everything yet. Possible applications
include
bolting a hydraulic jack to it and making a C press, using the rack
and
pinion and attach my very old Thor 1/2" drill motor for a slow and
strong
drill press, bender, punch press, tapping machine. So on and so
forth.
So, the primary tool, the arbor press uses a simple rack and
pinion to
provide the force needed. Went looking for rack and pinion items the
other
day and didn't find too much that was both inexpensive and capable of
doing
what I needed it to do. Of course, what came up a lot in my searches
was an
automotive steering rack and pinion. Hmmmm... Just like what I
needed, but
I wasn't sure about what kind of pressure I could actually create with
an
automotive style rack and pinion, and what larger vehicles use one for
steering (not likely, but I had to ask.) I figure it's got to be a
decent
figure, considering the overload factors built into every automobile,
but
wanted to see if anyone had any useful thinking they could throw out.


Most manual auto racks can handle 4-5K pounds with no problem, the
mounts fail before the guts. The power racks can handle even more.




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