Add an oil pan under drill press

Recent misadventure with an oil can spill started looking again. I was thinking large cookie sheet, Never occurred to me using an oil pan intended to place under cars. Was in local auto parts store, they had oil drip pans, like used to keep drips off cement for 6 bucks, duh. Pretty shallow, 1/2" by 36"x25", even made in the USofA!. Seems would be perfect, well at least catch most directly under the drill.

Showing the plastic but also the vice used as 'anchor'. Used to keep a large plastic crate on drill press base, its where I kept a lot of ugly steel scraps. It got moved out of the shop. Didn’t realize how much the weight helped stabilize the drill so temporarily placed the even uglier Chinese vise on base.

My concern is putting metal tray under drill if its going to slide around? Should be bolted down but could only lag into plywood floor-don’t really want to do that thru the new pan. But I wander but something that needs addressing.

Walked the drill press over & laid pan in corner. Good fit, goes to cabinet and outside wall and doesn’t protrude to where I stand or to the side to access cabinet behind. Couldn’t 'walk' the DP over tray lip, so leaned it enough to get some blocks under it, then slide off onto tray.

I had placed some foam mats on the floor a while back. Placed some unused trim from floor mats around tray lip cause I kept stepping on tray lip. As it 'just' tucked under the rolled bead realized I could utilize it to hold floor mats. So I'm going to pick up another package of the mat and cover around the press.

Nice-the pan though larger than drill press base is no larger than press as far as walking by. Outside edge at front is well behind left exterior door so not an issue walking in/out of shop.

And floor covered. Kinda nice-the tray recessed. We now have "wall to wall" anti-fatigue mats in the shop. These are the packages from Harbor Freight. 4 pks bout over a few months, each a different color and slight thickness. Now to look at stabilizing the press.

Earthquake bars :)

This drill has always had a lot of movement at head, column and cast base flex. Though more to address drill walking, short of bolting to floor what I came up with. Simple piece of angle, split at one end folding over legs to make bolt pad. Replaced the motor adjustment knob with a socket head cap screw at drill side, lag bolted to door frame at other end. I can still loosen if needed (rare) to adjust belts when changing speed.

At some point I'll add another front to back brace. Adding the single side to side brace really helped, a lot with column flex. Not sure if bolting would have gotten rid of the excess wobble as much as this. But at least it cant walk. The second brace when added I'll use some 1" flat bar to clamp the column, bolt a piece of angle run to back bench. This, other than getting rid of any movment, should also address possible drill rotation when working on really long material.

So new oil catch pan motivated me to finish matting the floor, and a bar to keep drill from walking on new pan got rid of excess wobble. Last project for drill is adding a plastic curtain at back to keep debri off cabinet. Plan is a welding shield curtain that can double to block view from kitchen when welding- Round toits.

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