The UnRatchet

[volvadi]

This thing ratchet's if you turn it one way and comes unscrewed if you turn it the other way.  It's about 8" long and the square hole in the backside of the head is less than 3/8ths inch.

What is it?

[Billman49]

Ratchet feed for a hand cranked drill press, or blacksmiths brace. Usually used with an adustable pressure arm that is fixed above work table. Used also by railroads fordrilling rails etc.. They were still listed in tool catalogues as late as the 1960's...

see: http://wiki.vintagemachinery.org/Metal-Working-Machines.ashx

[Billman49]

see also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ts3nM95U83g and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKs1Cyhd6SU

[volvadi]

Thanks Billman49!   My coworkers will be impressed with your fast and thorough reply.

[rusty]

Probably made by Billings, as only Billings and Packer seem to have liked the open frame design (Packers are older and beefier at the handle)

[Aunt Phil]

That's a drillmotor jack.
The point indexes perfectly into the steel insert on the back end of a 3/4 or larger drill motor and does the pushing for you.

I always figured the idea was borrowed from a Cole Drill.  Never cared much where the idea came from cause it beat hell out of me pushing on a drillmotor, especially drilling overhead.

First thing you learn about that tool is how to tie it off with a short rope because it hurts when it falls on your foot.

[Billman49]

No reason why it shouldn't be used with an electric drill as well as hand brace... All my old cast aluminium bodied drills also have a centre hole at the end, but in most cases this was to hold it in a pupose made drill press...

[Bill Houghton]

One of the little bits of historical trivia I like about these is that the post that would be braced up for the tool to work against was known, early in the 20th century when hand tools were as commonly used with these as drill motors, as an "old man," implying that old men were still good for something, anyway.

[ron darner]

Some of the early power drills came with built-in screw-jack type devices to force the tool into the work.  Some had a large nut with two or four handles (think of the handles around a ship's wheel, but much smaller), and pushed out a threaded rod with a pointed end to apply pressure.  Some of these were used to drill railroad rails in order to install fish plates connecting them to adjacent rails, so they NEEDED some pressure.  At least some I've seen in pictures didn't have conventional handles at all, and were not really usable except in a cradle or fixture.  With their torque, they'd have been unsafe in hand-held use, even if they weren't so bulky and heavy.