Drilling a mill-drill table

[Docgera]

I recently bought a CBX digital display for my bench top mill/drill. I'm a begginer and I don't know how to drill and tap in the sides of the table, I think it's kind of hard and how do I do to drill it on-site, with a portable drill?, What kind of drills? how do I do not to drill off-axis?. Please help me!
Docgera

------------------
Dr. Gerardo

[Lead Screw]

Make yourself a template to match the hole pattern you need. Make it thick enough to also keep you straight. About the table- How hard? Can you cut it with a file? What kind of mill is it? I cant imagine it be hardened or Ive never seen one that is. Maybe its case hardened.

[bdarin]

I did my CBX like you are. I just drilled with a hand held drill, real carefully, and tapped the holes. Nuthin to it.

[JIM DEWOLF]

Leadscrew is right. Make a template from 1/4 " flat bar drilled to tap drill size and clamp it in position as tight as you can and drill it with a dand drill. It's just good cast iron. Cheese!

[SGW]

Shouldn't be a problem. The cast iron in the mill/drill should drill pretty easily. The trick is making sure the holes don't wander.

Good idea on the template.

Another thought: does the table have a front T-slot for stops? If so, you might be able to mount the DRO on brackets bolted into T-nuts in the slot, and not drill the table at all.

[Docgera]

Thanks a lot! Hope to be reading digital display soon