Righty, the drill press arrived, so I thought I would write a small review
Firstly, the base unit top, and drill holder are plastic.... which surprised me. That said, once constructed, tightened, its actually pretty damn solid, with no play left/right or tilt. The lever works fine, and the clamps work nicely to hold it steady on my desk. Its smaller than expected, but frankly I'm impressed for the price.
The bad points: only one so far. It cannot hold my dremel 300. The weight of the dremel can make it wobble slightly, and it will not sit vertically in the clamp (which is also plastic). To be fair to the press, NOTHING fits my dremel 300. So to turn this into a review of the dremel 300:
The 300 is heavy, the bearings are right so theres no play, and it has nice variable speed. But its loud, gets hot, heavy, and seems to be designed purely for hand held operation. Granted, the 'ergonomic rubber grip makes this confortable (I've spent several hours grinding at a time, no tired hands). But this is its weakness - I haven't seen any press/holder which can actually hold this thing at a correct angle without it wobbling. So anyone thinking of buying a dremel for PCB work - do NOT get the 300. You'll never find a way to hold it in place.
So, in *my* situation, I'll have to use my original press for the 300 (holds it solid, just not vertically....for drilling down), and buy a nice 'round' drill for the new press. I'm bloody annoyed, but not with the press (the new one is smaller, but solid, old one heavy duty, but wobbles), but with dremel. Looks good, bugger to clamp to anything.
Any idea's on making my own clamp for it?