I am pretty familiar with these types of products. I don't know how good this particular Chinese product is but I am familiar with the higher end better-known companies that you mentioned and they are worth every penny. My question is how much tapping do you do? You might be better off taking $6000 and buying a milling machine that's dedicated for tapping. It won't be as good but you have other capabilities besides tapping should you need them.

 

You’re not aware of my space situation :cool2:

I’m in the most packed out 1 car garage imaginable.

I ordered it. Few people messaged me
On Instagram saying it’s incredible.

Flexarm gets $5000 for the pneumatic. It’s $7000+ for electric.

I run a tapmatic in my geared head drill.

 

BB,
Knowing how small your shop is, have you thought about mounting this tap arm to a wall or even the ceiling?
Or would you store it out of the way when not needed and then just mount it to your table when needed?

 

I don’t think it will be much of a problem in the corner of this table.

With the assumption the base is metric spacing I’ll make an adapter from 1/2” steel to easily move it around the table. It says it weighs 70 lbs or so.

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We have had an import tapping arm for about 4 years now and really like it. It takes some translating to get it switched to English. Also the Flexarm #2 adapters will fit our arm, some of our taps don't lock into the metric adapters that came along. View attachment IMG_0419(1).jpg

 

We have had an import tapping arm for about 4 years now and really like it. It takes some translating to get it switched to English. Also the Flexarm #2 adapters will fit our arm, some of our taps don't lock into the metric adapters that came along. View attachment 1756895

Awesome to hear I think that is basically the same machine.

I ordered it with the imperial collets.

 

I'd be interested to hear how you like it... that one actually ships into Canada.

 

Looks like I’ll have it early may. I’ll be sure to report back. A friend sent me a video i didn’t know he had one. It has automatic tapping which is pretty sweet. You put it to the hole and hit start. His is up to 26mm, i only ordered the 16mm version but he said even the 26mm runs on 110v.

Are you using metric or imperial up there?

 

This will be pretty cool having a WW member test an import unit first hand.

Thanks, BB!

 

meanwhile, today i'll carry on with my Fred Flintstone unit ....

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I usually use an adjustable wrench and a cordless drill. [emoji15]

Edit: I wonder if a brace (think bit-and-brace) would work for driving taps....

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Ordered a drill chuck adapter for it off Aliexpress as well so you can run a countersink in it for deburring etc.

I suppose you could use drill bits but i imagine down pressure will be problematic.

 

small drill bits you won't have enough speed and for large drill bits you won't have enough torque if that works like a flex arm.

 

Not enough speed? I drill at 80 rpm and I would prefer to tap slower... not sure how much speed you really need for the job...

 

I think build my own or a radial arm drill and put a tapping head on

It with I did works great.

Dave

 

I’d think it takes quite a bit of torch to cut a 16mm+ thread.

At that size down pressure is the killer. A hand drill with a smaller motor has the torque to drill 1/2” holes it’s still a nightmare by hand force.

 

I have a customer that has a flex arm. The one that does up to 5/8. Well hey do 5/8 x11 in alum anyways. It's pneumatic.

They love it, beat it up for many years. Still works great.

I would but it, but that 6k needs to be there. But very worth it in the end for my customer.

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I was considering it, but looking at the thing I couldn’t justify $5000+ for it. It just doesn’t add up when you look at the tool and i am not sure how they sell any appreciable amount of them.

The flex arm electric is $8000 and is a simple forward reverse manual machine.

The import one has a full computer control for automatic tapping etc.

If it was $1200 import vs $2400 US made i would probably go with the US made but at the cost of 5 import replacements there is no reason to.

Anyway, it was delivered it’s in my garage but I am away until tomorrow I will do a full unboxing.

 

Well here it is.

I'm extremely happy so far though I have not tapped a hole yet.

Came in a very nicely packed wood/foam enclosure.

Extremely simple its 95% assembled. To my suprise the base post is not only solid bar stock it also has 100mm (~4") hole spacing so it fit my fab table with no adapter. I mounted it where it is in the picture just to set it up that is not where it is staying. It has a really healthy reach of about 3'.

The bearings are a very snug fit and everything moves very smooth. Casting is suprisingly clean as well all smooth edges no obvious parting lines. The arms are actually not tube stock they appear to be a cast/extrusion type structure as well.

Gas pistons move great. you can let go of the machine and it will softly pop itself up and out of the hole when it reverses.

The touch screen was extremely easy to figure out. What you see is what you get essentially the only complaint I have is that the tap depth can only be set in metric. Really not a big deal for me its an easy mental conversion to set it if you really need the depth stop.

The actual motor is incredibly quiet you barely know its on.

Lastly the tap collets, which were my concern, are spot on. All my spiral flute and gun taps fit them awesome. They are extremely simple to use you just push them in, lock the square shank in and to release them you press the collar. They are all torsion chucks so they click and stop when they hit the pre-set torque limit. I have not gotten to the stage of testing that yet, they can be adjusted with the spanner they give you.

Keep in mind I bought the imperial kit so it is 110v ready with the ANSI collet adapters. You can buy it 220v metric as well.

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Here is the screen.

You literally just select the tap you want, set the depth and if you want automatic or manual. If you do automatic it keeps running with one push of the button until it hits specified depth and then reverses out.

You can also set up to 10 preset settings if you have go-to parts etc.

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Got it mounted in its permanent (probably) location.

Not really necessary but I made this ring up and hand tapped it for the m10 bolts that come with the tool. I didn’t have any M10 nuts around so I basically made the ring to serve as a quad-nut thing.

Took me like an hour moving it around to decide where I liked it and where it has the best stowed and extended reach. So that spot covers the entirety of the table and folds up nicely.

Moved all my Milwaukee stuff over so they weren’t in the way of one another.

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I know space is tight but do you worry having electronics so close to where you weld? Very clean installation as always with your work, thanks for sharing!

 

I don’t weld on that table actually.

Believe it or not, even with the space I’m in, i have two tables.

That table is more of a workbench.

 

Drill chuck adapter came in.

It does work, I wouldn’t say it’s ideal by any means because you can’t generate much downfeed pressure but to deburr a hole it’s fine.

The keyless chuck is a bit heavy for the gas pistons so they do slump down a bit.

View attachment IMG_7768.jpg View attachment IMG_7769.jpg

 

After using it for about a week now I absolutely love it. Total game changer.

Picked up a 6” vise on eBay for it. No need for an expensive milling style vise that has a small opening. The vise is where it is because I sometimes put long pieces on the front of the table and I don’t want it in my way all the time while still being in a useable part of the table.

Learning to set it up was extremely easy. It’s very straightforward to what is on the screen. There is a few settings you can change but there’s really no need.

If you use it in “intelligent” mode it will automatically gauge the proper torque setting as well as ideal feed speeds. In standard mode it’s a preset value determined by the selected fastener size, which you can manually
Change and you set the speed yourself.

The thread pitch is automatically done in metric when you select a fastener. What it correlates to in imperial I can’t say.

Depth setting being in metric is a little annoying as well but as long as you know 25.4 is an inch it’s very easy to set it where you need. It’s a little trial and error anyhow as the first couple threads of even a bottoming tap aren’t full threads.

In manual or automatic mode it will stop when it reaches the calculated depth however in manual you need to hood forward and reverse. I did not think I’d use the automatic but It’s really great. It hits the depth and brings itself out no problem.

The collars are very easy to use and hold onto the taps great. You just press down on the rim around the tap and it slides into the jaw and a square back that locks the shank from rotating. To remove it you just press down on the collar again no tools required.

I am trying to locate a 5/8” size collet as the largest they give you is 1/2 but the machine will tap 5/8 or 16mm.

Overall couldn’t be happier with the purchase. Should pay for itself in no time.

View attachment IMG_7909.jpg View attachment IMG_7908.jpg View attachment IMG_7906.jpg View attachment IMG_7905.jpg View attachment IMG_7898.jpg

 

Little clip on parallels I made for the vise jaws.

I have real parallels but i don’t have the spring loaded holder for them and this isn’t a high precision setup so these should work wonderfully at the cost of maybe 50 cents a pair.

View attachment IMG_8001.jpg

 

Little clip on parallels I made for the vise jaws.

I have real parallels but i don’t have the spring loaded holder for them and this isn’t a high precision setup so these should work wonderfully at the cost of maybe 50 cents a pair.

View attachment 1758115

A machine shop buddy showed me to use broken band saw blades as a spring to hold parallels in place. Works great.

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Nice! I am trying to decipher if those were 3-D printed or milled out of solid stock.

 

They were printed. Ain’t no room in here for no mill… i wish.

I have an aftermarket motor on my Princess Auto drill press.

In lowest pulley speed which I think is 250 rpm
The motor has a reverse wiring option, but it's not a hot switch reverse.
You have to stop it, switch to reverse and restart in reverse.

It's super duper handy though.
It will tap 1/4-20 npt no problems.
3/8 -16 pretty well
Above that the hard tap in the hard drill chuck jaws will spin.

Maybe a MT2 taper end mill holder would hold the tap and go bigger.

My drill press has forward and reverse but is intended to be stopped and reversed as well. It goes down to 90rpm i think but i just use the tapmatic. It has an R8 spindle which comes in handy for accessories.

 

I did some tapping in a radial arm drill with a standard chuck. The shop was too cheap to have the proper tap holder. Owner told to run a weld bead lengthwise on the tap so it would hit the jaw on the chuck and not turn. It worked but I'm sure what the welding did to the tap.

 

Just noticed in my post above it should say not sure what the welding did to the tap.

 

nothing good. lol


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Yeah, figured those wave parallels might come in handy.

 

Twas a joke.

I posted the link to them 1/2 an hour ago...

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ik[emoji41]


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not suitable for machining but i use roller bearings as parallels for drilling and fabrication

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Bearing races would probably make for good parallels for bigger parts

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