Super paint mixer

The easy way to mix a big bucket of paint

Published Sep 30, 2011

I recently needed to do some painting in the shop, hence I needed to mix up this five-gallon bucket of paint. My cordless drill was over at a rental home I was working on and my corded drill was MIA because the shop was in chaos because of the expansion. While debating whether I really wanted to go over and get my cordless drill, which isn't the best tool for the job anyway, I hit on the idea of using the drill press instead!

It worked beautifully. My Delta 18-900L was perfect for the job, just crank the table down and put the bucket up there. The long quill travel and terrific quill locks make it simple to move the mixer wand up and down in the bucket. Best of all, you don't have to stand there and hold a drill, so you're more likely to take the time necessary to do a good job mixing the paint.

I use a mixing wand that has shrouded spiral blades at the end. I just started the head near the bottom, sliding the bucket around to pull up whatever settles at the bottom of a paint can. Then just moved it up a little at a time, letting the paint spin off in a very controlled way, no spatters flinging everywhere.