Remember when Christmas was fun?  Every year I would get ready for Santa with my Christmas list clenched in my fist.  Mommy, mommy can we send the list.  My mom would always send that list off to Santa for me.  Right there is where my Christmas workload ended.  The only other thing I had to do all season long was to eat Christmas cookies and wait for Santa to arrive.  As I got older and holiday responsibilities increased, Christmas became less magical and more and more a hassle, almost to the point of hatred.   Long lines in that dreaded place called the mall left me with a bad taste in my mouth, and all the Christmas cookies I ate couldn’t wash the taste out of my mouth.   Last year Christmas around my house was hard.  With my mother’s failing health and my hours cut at work I needed a way to get gifts for my nieces and nephews, as well as something to focus my mind on to help relieve the depression from dealing with my mom’s situation.  So, I turned to the shop to help me with both.  I made a couple of projects mainly for my nieces and nephew.  One of my favorite toys as a kid was this block of wood that was turned into a tic tac toe game it had to holes drilled into the side to keep the marbles in.  I made a bunch of those and the kids loved them.  Unfortunately, this Christmas season is no better then last, with the passing of my mother this past summer.  I know this year is going to be hard. So this year once again I turn to my shop for comfort, making hand made gifts for family and friends.  Making gifts instead of buying them seems to have done a couple of things, one it keeps me out of the mall, which is always a good thing, second it has seemed to have restored my faith in Christmas.  And that is the best gift of all.

Let’s see where were we.  Oh yeah I called Shop Fox and I found out that shop fox does not handle their parts they gave me the info on the company that does.  I gave them a call and they were pleasant to deal with.  They helped me with ordering the part.  They only had three left in stock, so I ordered two.  If I didn't order the second part the 1st part would fail, and I would not be able to order a replacement part.  That’s just how my luck rolls.

The part got to my house in 5 days shipped UPS Ground.  I opened up the box and pulled out the bag.  I took out the two spindles and compared them with the original.  Everything matched so I proceeded with the repair. I took one of the two new spindles and set it aside.  The other I put back in the bag and put a little motor oil in the bag and made sure the spindle was covered.  I then sealed the bag. I think that this would do a good job of preventing the part from rusting.  I had already taken the small spindle out of the spindle holder I lubed up the new spindle.  I placed the spindle holder in my face vice and hammered the spindle into the bearing.  When I did this, the top bearing (located on the bottom the spindle is upside down in the vise).  I was not able to get the bearing in easily.

I had to devise a way to reseat the bearing.  My solution was to drill a hole in an MDF block for the shaft to slip through.  I used my face vice like a hydraulic press squeezing and tapping the bearing into place.  This worked.  Once the spindle and bearing were back in place, I could reinsert the clip ring; the clip went on with no problem now that I had the right spindle.

Inserting the spindle assembly back in the press was pretty straightforward.  I attached the spring and gave the handle a try.  I did not have enough tension on the spring to lift the assembly back up after lowering it.  I tightened up the spring and all good. 

I powered up the drill press and hooray a working drill press.  I did without a drill press for quite some time before I bought this press.  Now that I own a drill press it was really difficult to do with out...