One tool/machine to level up a moderate shop

[Oblarg]

Originally Posted by DonRotolo

An alternative is an X-Y milling vise for your drill press. You can do light milling with somewhat more flexibility than the lathe setup. Avoid the very cheap ones, they are terribly inaccurate. These are great for drilling accurate hole patterns as well (and often that's the only use they see).

Do you find that putting one of these on a standard drill press holds tight enough tolerances for tube/gusset plate constructions? We've been doing those purely by match-drilling, but being able to drill them independently would be very nice.

Also, if you do have your drill press set up with one of these, do you just use an edge finder in the drill press the same way you would on a mill?