A tap follower

[ksor]

Yeah, I needed one ... so I made one !

http://kelds.weebly.com/tap-follower.html

[unc1esteve]

Looks good.
This is one of the first accessories I bought before
I figured out I could make what ever I needed.

[tom osselton]

Oh one of those!  I thought you made a bolt! 

[PekkaNF]

Nice one. Any chance of parts inside?

Google tranlator offered finnish and I tried it. Hilarious. Even the english part. Can you guess which meaning it used for "spring". You guess it! Not the springgy one, but seasonal one.

Pekka

[ksor]

Nice one. Any chance of parts inside?

Google tranlator offered finnish and I tried it. Hilarious. Even the english part. Can you guess which meaning it used for "spring". You guess it! Not the springgy one, but seasonal one.

Pekka

  Yeah, Google Translate is NOT what it was ... one can say, Google is NOT what it was - all this integration **** ... Gabriel, blow your horn !

Parts inside ... a spring (nothing to do with the seasons  ) and a "nail-like" tip - the head of the "nail" shall be bigger than the diameter of the spring - that's it !

I learned that nearly every tap - except the "small" ones - have en "center-drill" in the top end of the shaft - but unfortunately the "smaller" ones have a cone like a tip !

So, in fact the very "tip" should be reversible - something like this:

------|
>----|----->
------|

As shown here, it's for the bigger taps with a "center drill" in the top.

------|
<----|----<
------|

Here it's for the smaller taps with a cone in the top !

  when you are a nuclehead - you just make a new one ... so, that's what I'm gonna do 

I have maded a schetch in Schetch on my web site: http://kelds.weebly.com/tap-follower.html

[PekkaNF]

Thank you. I got it.

I made one bit like that in stone age. But much more crude and ad-hoc. I just drilled and reamed hole at the nose of MT3 blanco and plonkked a spring and a centre made out of silver steel. It is rather long to reduce tendency of the centre to fall off. Hmmm.. thinkking of it maybe I should make another centre with a dimple.

Pekka

[awemawson]

Mine was even cruder - just a pointed rod in the Bridgeport chuck kept in place by downwards pressure on the quill feed arm, but now I tend to loosely grip in a chuck and start the tap by hand turning. (or power tap if the tap is stout enough)

Andrew

[Meldonmech]

           I have a set of tap wrenches made by Eclipse, they grip the tap in a chuck, and have a center hole in the other to locate with a  center.

                             Cheers David

[Arbalist]

These are mine. I made the top two, one male one female as some small Taps have a point on the end. I bought the one at the bottom but had to remake the internals as it was such a poor fit! I think I made it reversible, one end male, one female.

[ksor]

Oh, really nice Work you have done !