Gentlemen,

I have a couple of Milwaukee Steel Hawg magnetic drill presses. One is
a model 4240 and the other, a 4245. Both use different "quick change"
cutters which are not cross compatible. Apparently, some of the later
model Milwaukee drills use a #3 morse taper arbor that can be made
compatible with the 4245 (but not the 4240) cutters by means of an
adapter. Therefore, the machines appear to be backwardly compatible
with the older cutters but not forwardly compatible.

Anybody have any experience with these older machines? I would like
to be able to use the later threaded type cutters with either or both
of these cutters, if possible. It would also be good to be able to
use the cutters in a drill press. I have two machines and at present,
only one cutter for each machine. Therefore, for them to do me any
good I'm gonna have to sink some money into cutters for one or the
other. Since the cutters are expensive I can't afford to invest in
cutters for both. And whichever one I go with I would like to be able
to use the cutters on my Chinese drill press. If I'm not mistaken the
Jacobs chuck on the drill press fits onto an arbor with a #3 morse
taper. Speaking of Jacobs chucks and arbors it would be positively
ducky if I could fit a chuck to either of the metal hawgs and use
regular twist drills in it.

After doing a fair amount of googling my preliminary impression is "it
ain't gonna happen" to use a jacobs chuck on either machine. However,
it does appear that I might be able to buy cutters for the 4245 hawg
and that there is an adapter (big $$$ however) that will enable the
4245 cutters to be usable with the LATER model hawgs that use a #3
morse taper arbor. What I'm wondering is whether that same arbor will
work in my Chinese drill press? If there is a #3 morse taper out
there is there one that's cheaper than the $400+ critter sold by
Milwaukee? During my googling I saw a discussion among home-built
dirt digger freaks who were discussing how they managed to drill big
holes in thick steel for their projects. One guy said he bought a #3
arbor from a guy in England and that this enabled him to use the
Milwaukee cutters. As is probably apparent by now I am not very
knowledgeable about machine tools.

Hope this makes sense. Is anybody in here up to speed on all of this?
I would like to be able to clearly understand what I can and cannot
hope to accomplish with these machines.

Thanks and best holiday wishes.

Vernon