Guys, this IS a first for me. I never thought I would be able to bore out a D Maglite to use a 4AA holder in it. If you remember, I just finished making a wooden drill press. This was the biggest reason for attempting a drill press. I use 3AA holders all the time, but only because I could not afford to buy expensive equipment or buy pre-bored Maglites.
I did a lot of reading and found that, (I was surprised), a Bi-Metal hole saw will work for Aluminum and mild steel, as well as wood. I now know they will for sure.
This is what I would call a "generic" saw. I bought it for a specific reason and I will explain in the next photo. Oh, by the way, the body is my wife's (the one I just made for her)
. It is a 1-3/8" hole saw. That is about the perfect size for these Maglites, unless you have a lathe and can go 1.400" instead of 1.375" (1-3/8).
These hole saws are made for a certain maximum depth. Usually the thickness of a 2x4. I knew I had to bore deeper than that and I saw that many of these hole saws are welded in a way that prevents the user to go farther than the top of the saw, since the weld extends out at the top and acts as a stopper. This particular hole saw is not made that way and the 3/8" drive end is already welded on (one piece), so I didn't have to buy any mandrel for it. Also this saw went for $7 on ebay (normally $15), so I bought two!
I also found out that the paint will gum up the inside of the hole you are cutting, so I sanded most of it off the saw. You can clearly see the weld is done so that the top of the saw does not have a larger ring around it, which would prevent the saw from going deeper than it's top.
I put the body in my small vise and tried to get it level. I found out later that it was a mistake, as the drill press isn't perfectly level! Hey, this is an experiment right?
If I had looked closer, I would have seen (as in this photo), that the drill press is off compared to the body. Anyhow, here I am getting set up to try this thing. I am nervous at this point (I always am).
OH, I almost forgot the WD-40. Yes it works well for cutting fluid on Aluminum. It worked great for this! Here we go!
This cut like BUTTER! It took all of 2 minutes to cut about 2" deep! I didn't have to use hardly any downward pressure either. I found that running the drill at about 1/3 max speed, cut the best. Here I am about ready to go see how the cut is doing inside the body. What I found was that the cut was not running true. It was going off to one side, as I was afraid of. I simple rotated the body 180 degrees around and continued to finish the cut, which helped to straighten the whole bore.
TA DA!
It is not perfectly centered, but for a Hack Job, it really surprised me! Since this is my first try, I feel it will only get better! I'm happy about the result and I will be looking forward to doing some 4AA mods in the fall and winter.
OH, I have some 1-3/8" Nylatron rod stock for making battery holders, but I've never used it, because I couldn't bore the bodies. It fits right in this body now, so it's time to work on refining a battery holder!
Carry on...
