Customer Reviews

DELTA 17-959L 17-Inch Laser Crosshair Drill Press

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I purchased this about a month ago and have been fairly satisfied with it. It was made in china, so the usual level of fit and finish should be expected. I had to debur the table and the upper pulley wheel is not drilled perfectly on center. (I brought it in for repair because there was a wobble in the shaft, but they couldn't find a problem and when I set it back up at home, I didn't notice a problem either.. must have just needed a breaking in.)

Other than that, it is a solid piece of machinery. It (now) drills smoothly and the almost 5 inches of travel is really nice. The lasers are setup in plastic mounts, so they aren't the easiest to get lined up, but they work. They produce a fairly thin line so it is simple to line things up for drilling. The wider flanges on the base make it very stable. The replaceable drill plates are nice also - this was definitely built with woodworkers in mind.

I was a little annoyed that it didn't work perfectly out of the box, but overall I am happy with my purchase.

I purchased this drill press on a Wednesday morning from Amazon with Free Super Saver Shipping and by Friday evening at 6:00 p.m. it was in my shop ready to be set up. I had been looking for a floor mounted drill press for some time to replace my Craftman benchtop press. I was very interested in the Powermatic PM 2800 but the cost, poor or mediocre reviews, with it's limited ability to drill into steel/metal combined with what appeared to be a difficulty to mount standard drill press vices on its table drove me to look elsewhere. The Grizzly and Steel City 17" presses looked nice but they had standard metal working tables that did not tilt forward and the Jet had poor/o.k. reviews. The Delta 17" had decent power, a large wood and steel working table that tilted forward and a laser which made it a logical choice. It's price through Amazon along with free shipping made it a good and economical choice for my shop. I don't mind the time for belt changes versus the varible speed Powermatic, so I placed the order.

The unit was delivered with no problems. A drill press is a pretty basic set up and the manual covered everything in plenty of detail. However, the manual for the Grizzly and Steel City presses are superior and provide better set-up options (i.e. install press head on pole and then lift up, not anchor the press to the floor and lift the head on top of the pole). Also other manufactures provided an explanation for the drift key to change the drill chuck, which Delta left out completely. Grizzly did a nice job on providing basic instructions on how to properly and safely use the press, which would be nice for a novice, a fact which Delta left out completely. A nice thing Delta did provide was a chart with drill bits and speeds for you to post in your shop as a rapid check for the belt set-up.

As for the press, it is well constructed and went together very well. The external light came with a metal clip to anchor the electrical chord versus the plastic units shown in the manual. The instructions gave no indication of where to put the metal clip, but a close inspection of the press head identified a threaded hole near the motor where the clip mounted perfectly. The laser took a few minutes to set up but does work very well at various table locations. I was able to square the table to the chuck in both directions with no prbolems and the chuck had 0.005" of runout. The T-slots work excellent with clamps and make the unit very easy to use. The table is great for using C-clamps as there are no edge rigids on the underside.

The belts change very quickly and the press does what it is supposed to. The quill lock is easy to use and the depth gauge changes rapidly. The only reason I gave this press 4 stars was the vibration in the unit. Although it is not terrible, I expected a little better. After some use and tweaking of the pullies, it did get better results but I will be repalcing the stock belts to see if this settles it down a bit in the future.

December 2009 Update: Well I have had this drill press for a year now and I am looking to replace it. The laser is poorly constructed out of a plastic collar which broke after less than 6 months of use. The quill lock is poorly constructed and stripped out within a few months of use. I have noticed the run-out has gotton worse and the vibrations have increased. I should have spent a little more money upfront with another brand and I am sure I would be much happier today.

I bought this drill press from Amazon. Some time ago I bought into Amazon Prime for free, two-day shipping, and Amazon;s web page for this item says that it is eligible under that plan. However, it is so heavy that it had to be shipped by motor freight (ABF, in my case). It was still free shipping, but it took a week to get here. It arrived a couple of days ago and I just completed assembling it.

My initial view is that it is a very good machine that will do everything that I might ever expect of it. I especially like the laser cross-hair feature, which is very accurate. There are a few annoyances, however. I understand why Delta has its stuff manufactured in Taiwan or China, but in my view, low-cost product need not mean poor documentation, design or quality. Take the documentation, for example. On the "carton contents" page of the instruction manual there is picture of a "drift key" that is one of the dozens of parts that are packaged separately, i.e. not assembled. No where else in the entire manual is there any further reference to this piece of hardware. What the devil am I supposed to do with that?

Also, there were some changes in design that didn't make it into the manual. For example, the manual references two "cord clamps" that are supposed to stick, via self adhesive, to the side of the drill press head and serve as a mechanism to keep the cord for the light out of the way. These have apparently been replaced by a screw-on clamp. This is a much better idea - I suspect the stick-on variety lasted about two days, maximum - but there is no threaded hole anywhere for the screw that is supposed to mount and hold the clamp, and no reference of any kind in the manual! So what do I do with that item?

In addition to document errors or omissions, there are a few design flaws. They're minor, mind you, but annoying nonetheless. Take the lasers: they represent great idea and a VERY useful feature, but the initial setup and adjustment if far from simple or intuitive. I bet that a first-year industrial design student at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) could have easily figured out a way to build in two simple, externally-accessible adjustment screws into each laser unit, one of which would adjust the laser alignment to vertical while the second would adjust the laser line left or right. But instead, Delta's idea of how to accomplish the task is to disassemble each laser housing and futz around inside them. It works, but its a time-consuming pain in the butt. As Doctor Phil says, "what were they thinking?"

Here's a REALLY minor design flaw, but for me the most annoying: there's no place to store the chuck key. How difficult or expensive would it have been to modify the table support with a bump-out in the casting through which a vertical hole could have been drilled to hold the key? I have a Craftsman bench-top drill press that was my father's, purchased, I'd guess, in the '40s. It has just such a provision for storing the chuck key which, for that very reason, has never been lost or misplaced. This proves that the idea is not new. Furthermore, I suspect that had there ever been a patent on the idea, it has long since expired. I fully expect to be spending hours - over the next few years, of course - trying to figure out where I put that key.

All of the above negatives, however, do not deter from the fact that this drill press will do most any job the average home shop might ever require of it, for a very reasonable price.

Oh, by the way, the assembly instructions say to install the drill press head after assembling the column to the base. Specifically, it says simply: "Place the drill press head on the column as far as it will go." Well, if you wanted to lift it up onto the free-standing base and column assembly, it'd require at least three burly guys and two rugged step ladders or a block and tackle arrangement; that head unit is VERY heavy (motor pre-installed at the factory). Instead, I laid the assembled base and column down on the floor and slid the head onto the column there by my lonesome. Then just my 5'0" wife and I were able to lift the fully assembled tool back up to vertical. MUCH easier!!

I got this drill press about 2 months ago. So far it has been nothing but a pleasure to use. It has been a very worth while upgrade from my prior Delta bench top model. The assembly of the machine was relatively easy, although part of the table support appeared to be installed backwards within the packaging (it was easy to reverse the piece). Once assembeled the machine feel very sturdy and well built. The table is great and easy to adjust. While the machine does vibrate slightly when in operation, there is virtually no runnout on my unit at any speed. The laser is a nice feature but not altogether necessary. It took about 10 minutes to adjust it properly, but in practice I have not used it that much. Really the only trouble that I have had was trying to convince/bribe a friend to help me to put it together (definitely do not try to do this yourself). I would definitely recommend this purchase to others. Its a great unit that can be had a reasonable price (I managed to find one for $450 shipped).

This drill press represents the worst in mainland Chinese manufacturing. Delta is squandering their good name with products like this. The casting are rough throughout. The pulleys are unbalanced, the drive belts are stiff. The idler pully shaft and the shafts used as part of the belt tensioning system ride in holes drilled in the head casting. No bushings are used and the play can be measured in fractions of inches. As you apply tension to the belts, the motor shifts upward causing the drive belt to skew upward. The poor build results in a lot of vibration especially at higher speeds. The laser adjustments are poorly designed and the beam width at working distances are too thick for precise hole designation. I haven't measured runout because I wouldn't bother using this drill on any precision work. The best I can say for this drill press is that it will drill a hole. I wouldn't expect it to last for long however.

A well built drill press solid enough for accurate work.

The assembly manual states that unless the stand if fastened to the floor, an auxiliary stand of 3/4 plywood is necessary. I made mine about 6 inches to either side, and a couple of feet more in the front for convenience in standing. I put thin strips around part of the edge to slip a dolly under it in case I want to move it. Oh, and if you want to use 230 volts, you need to change the switch.

The laser sight is quite convenient, but the mounting system is not yet well developed. It is tricky to align. All in all, though, a good tool for the price.

I have been wanting a drill press for some time now and just making do without. But, now that I have the delta 17-959L I am really happy with the results. The extra long quil length has come in handy already. I thought the laser would be pretty useless. But, I was wrong take the time to set it up properly and it works really well.

I've had this for just over a year and am pleased with it. It is not perfect as others have stated, but for the $ it is a good drill press for a home shop. It is not a $2000 production level drill press so I think some of the criticism here of this is unwarranted: if you expect the Ferrari of drill presses then buy something else and pay much more for it. I had no trouble assembling it, the lasers work well (not perfect), and it drills fine. The runout on the chuck is .0015" which I think is acceptable. As other(s) said, the criticisms of it are the typical lack of attention to detail seen in most China built tools: the belt tensioner is a very substandard design- but yeah, it works; there really needs to be a place to store the chuck key and drift key- it's unacceptable that they couldn't add some sort of clip and hangar pin on the side of the main casting to store these items. It would be nice if the light tied in to the main power cord internally for one thing to plug in- I understand why they didn't do this, but how many people will run this on 240V? Despite these criticisms, overall it is a good unit for the $. I also purchased the Delta 20-619 6-Inch Drill Press Vise for it. This vise is not intended for this press but it will work with it with some modifications- I cut out the slot divider on the vise so there is one long slot per side instead of two and added some half inch diameter mounting bolts with large wingnuts to clamp it to the drill press table.

Works very well, some wobble in chuck.. Not a machinist dream but very good. Chuck is very stiff when cold.. 40 degrees and below. Belt changes are easy enough. Light is good. Lasers,,, why? Not really needed most of the time. Good product. Nice table. Nice tilt.

I purchased this drill press for woodworking. First, the product manual for setting up this machine is inadequate. Fortunately, I examined this drill press in person, prior to purchase which greatly aided me in setting it up. However, once set up properly this is an excellent piece of equipment. It is smooth running very massive head to absorb vibration, a stable base for stability, 16 speeds and powerful motor(3/4hp). It has many amenities which are very useful for woodworking. The table is a large flat rectangle with T slots and a replaceable MDF center piece with leveling set screws.It tilts forward, Left or right. The depth stop adjustment is without a doubt the easiest most intuitive of any drill press. It also has the ability to lock the spindle at any height making drum sanding or even setting up depth stops easier. As an added bonus the unit comes with lasers to locate the hole and a work light. The runout on the chuck is .001 inch. Except for the owner's manual this is all I could ask for in a drill press.