OK guys and ladies, I am in a bit of a dilemma here. For several days now I have been looking for some drill bits. the major requirement is that the bits must contain 1 drill bit that is 1" wide for wood boring and at least 6" long USABLE, so that I can drill a hole in a 4" long piece of wood and not lose the bit in it or snap it off or whatever.

I want to make a pepper grinder but need a long shank bit to get it done. Can someone please point me in the right direction, i have seen a lot of drill bits over the last several days, but they are either too short, too long or don't even mention the length as if that isn't part of the specification

Thanks for the help.

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Charles Nicholls
Site Host
nicholls61@att.net
http://www.nichollswoodworks.com
This website is new so it doesn't have much to it yet but you are welcome to take a look

A forstner bit would be best and you will probable need to purchase an extension for the bit to give you the depth you need.

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John Moody
Site Administrator


John Moody Woodworks
http://www.johnmoodywoodworks.com

I can only assume that the 1" hole is for the main body of the peeper grinder! If that's the case you shouldn't need a 6" bit. A regular length bit should do the job if you drill from both ends as long as you have the holes centered.

Turn a cone plug and put it in you chuck and it will center itself and then you can bore the other end.

Turn a piece of wood into a cone shape about 1.5 inches long that has a diameter just under 1" that increases to about 1.5 inches which makes the cone, that is inserted into one end of the stock that has a 1" hole that you bore about halfway through the stock. That will support the drilled end and will keep it centered while you drill the other end. You can put the cone in your chuck or use a spur center.

It's basically the same as a jam chuck.

If your stock is square and you have the center marked then you can do the same thing on the other end with the short bit and the cone plug and the holes will meet. There are many articles on line that deal with this very issue.

2 ways I know of:

 

http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/smarthtml/pag...

 

 

Scroll down to bottom of page.

This has a 4 sided extension that will hold the bit square (squarer) than one that only has 2 hex screws.

 

The other way is to take one of these

http://www.irwin.com/tools/drill-bits/power-drill-long-ship-auger-bits

 

 

and use a big 3/4 inch d handle drill or a drill press but it's kind of tricky so get ahold of me if you got any questions.

 

 

 

 

Charles,

Maybe you already thought of this but, if you drill the hole first- before you turn the stock round- then use a cone (on the tail stock) and a tenon (on the head stock chuck) to turn the stock round. This would assure the hole would end up centered. I am assuming you are chucking the bit in the tail stock when drilling.

 

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Lew Kauffman-
Wood Turners Forum Host

Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!

Dragon,

I'm a long time customer of MLCS and have never stumbled on to that extension. Many thanks for the link!!! 

I have an 18" 2 screw extension that, I'm assuming, is intended for electricians. I cannot recall ever needing that much length. And, it will not accept my Forstner bit shanks.
Again, thanks a bunch.
dragon1 said:

2 ways I know of:

 

http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/smarthtml/pag...

 

 

Scroll down to bottom of page.

This has a 4 sided extension that will hold the bit square (squarer) than one that only has 2 hex screws.

 

The other way is to take one of these

http://www.irwin.com/tools/drill-bits/power-drill-long-ship-auger-bits

 

 

and use a big 3/4 inch d handle drill or a drill press but it's kind of tricky so get ahold of me if you got any questions.

 

 

 

 

Charles,

You might find some ideas here-

http://www.thepatriotwoodworker.com/profiles/blogs/a-pepper-grinder

 

 

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Lew Kauffman-
Wood Turners Forum Host

Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!

Just another resource, Woodcraft also has a pretty good inventory of Forstner Bit extensions.

  Forster Bit Extensions

Support Woodcraft, they support us!!!

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John Morris
The Patriot Woodworker
Proud Supporter of Wounded Warrior Project and Homes For Our Troops

Actually make the waste block slightly larger and then trim it to the same size as the "good" piece. That way you'll be certain it will be centered. I used Titebond II for all the joints then just part off the waste block after everything is done.

Charles Nicholls said:

Thanks Lew, Ok so if the piece I am working on is square or near square, I should be able to find center fairly easily the problem then becomes how to make sure the waste block gets centered unless I take a same size square piece and glue it to the block as you did in the blog.

Did you use TiteBond for that?

Thanks.

Lewis Kauffman said:

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Charles Nicholls
Site Host
nicholls61@att.net
http://www.nichollswoodworks.com
This website is new so it doesn't have much to it yet but you are welcome to take a look

I can't tell you how many times the gremlins have snuck into my shop and moved pieces after I have glued and clamped them.

Charles Nicholls said:

my first attempt to glue a waste block to the blank. Can we say FAIL? It was straight when I placed it on the floor so it must have got skewed when I sat a heavy stack of boards on top of it to get the glue to seal good. I have what are supposed to be 6" clamps that SHOULD fit this but they dont. So looks like i'll be making another browsing trip to WoodCraft for some 12"-18" clamps I'm tred of crud going wrong just because it can ;/

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Charles Nicholls
Site Host
nicholls61@att.net
http://www.nichollswoodworks.com
This website is new so it doesn't have much to it yet but you are welcome to take a look

Lew,

Those gremlins have close relatives in AZ, too. 

For glued up face to face slabs, I've started spreading the glue, slapping the slabs together and smearing them around. Then, opening them back up and letting them set for a few minutes. Then, putting them back together and letting them set for a few minutes more before clamping. Seems to help....a little. 

Lewis Kauffman said:

I can't tell you how many times the gremlins have snuck into my shop and moved pieces after I have glued and clamped them.

Charles Nicholls said:

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Lew Kauffman-
Wood Turners Forum Host

Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!

ok, again i got 2 ways to drill a straight hole THE FIRST TIME.

 

DRILL PRESS 

Mark centers on a scrap of wood, place bit in press.put the scrap piece on your drill press table and clamp board to the table with the center over the big hole in the drill press table (in case you go through)

lower bit till you make a mark in scrap in center, try to make sure that mark is also over that big hole in the center of the drill press table.

 

mark centers on your piece.

Place one end of the piece your drilling onto the drill press table and align corners with marks. You can also drill into the center of the scrap and the center of the piece your boring through and put in a 1/4 inch dowel in between to keep it aligned.

 

Clamp the piece your boring down securely to the drill press table.

now the tricky part is going to be seeing that the bit STARTS in the center of the top.

 

IF, (lol) you have a dead on level table, straight quill and post shaft, drill bit, etc. the piece you are boring SHOULD line up nicely (within a 1/8 inch.).

 

IF NOT, (lol)loosen and "nudge" the drill press table adjustments till the top aligns on center with the bit.

 

Hint:  Try not to adjust the height of the table at this point as that throws all the adjustments off and your back to square one.

 

Your not done yet!!  Start your bit into the wood and have a good wet/dry vac ready to suck out shavings and sawdust (drill dust?) and be sure to let the hole clear itself so it doesn't burn the sides (which won't matter anyway, natch) and feed it as far as you can into the wood.

 

ok tough part coming up, shut it off, let it stop, get a freind or wife to keep light pressure on handle while you release the drill press table post clamp.

 

Lift the table while they bring the bit up to a little short of all the way up (bit still is in the hole.)  tighten post clamp and "nudge" it till it looks like the shaft is in the center of the hole (maybe measure all 4 sides of the hole to the shaft) and bring bit off bottom of the hole and turn by hand to make sure it's pretty well straight and free when you start it up.

 

Continue drilling through piece but not through table, lol.

 

A thought just occured to me as you will be drilling into END grain and not a face grain so here's 2 more:

 

slice it in half and route a 1 inch cove in both pieces then glue the pieces back together,

 

Overdrill it and epoxy in a pvc pipe with an inside diameter of 1 inch.

 

These directions are probably clear as mud so let me know if it needs more xplaining.

 

By the way, a bellhangers bit is closer to what your looking for

 

 

http://www.all-spec.com/products/Tools%7CPower_Tools%7CTOL-10/BELL1218.html

 

 

lol, ok 1 more idea.

Get a board the same width as your project piece.

 

Use a chop box and cut about 7-10 squares SAME SIZE as the top of the piece.

 

drill a hole in the center of each one.

 

Stack them one at a time and nailgun or predrill and screw them together , stack screw, stack, screw making sure the holes are as close as possible to aligned together.

Take 2-1x6x36"  boards and screw them together, edge to edge with 1 board horizontal, 1 board vertical to form a L.

put stack at one end in the corner of the 3 ft. boards, screws or nails facing towards you on the end and nail, predrill screw it in.

 

clamp it to workbench and run drill bit through to smooth out the hole but try to leave it fairly tight to guide the bit straight.

run bit through and use another square without a hole in it to use as a base piece and mark where the bit comes out (or will be going into the project piece.) And make sure you mark what sides of the square base piece are hitting which board (A-A, B- so you'll know it's right when you screw it in.

drill the 1/4inch dowel hole in the bottom of your piece and into the mark on that base piece. install a dowel in base piece.

 

put your project piece in the jig, put the base piece dowel in the bottom of the project piece, start your drill bit in the top of the project piece, then push it together till it's snug, screw the base piece to the L to hold the base of the project piece.

Then clamp it down and drill.

 

If the bit isn't long enough you can remove some of the squares to allow the drill to go deeper.

 

Clear as mud again, lol

 

 

 

 

 

You are making this more difficult than it needs to be. Take a small block of wood in your 3 or 4 jaw chuck. Place block of wood in chuck. Turn it to a cone shape and part the cone from the remaining stock that is inside the jaws of the chuck. This cone is now a jam chuck. Remove block of wood. Place pepper mill in chuck. Place jacobs chuck in you tail stock. Install 3/4" Forstner bit in jacobs chuck. Turn on lathe and drill your hole 3" deep. Remove pepper mill blank from chuck. Install cone into the hole you just drilled. Remove 3 or 4 jaw chuck and install spur center (it should have come with your lathe) in the head stock. Place blank with the cone you inserted into blank on to spur center. slide the tail stock forward until the center point of the forstner bit just enters the wood. Lock the tail stock down, Turn on lathe on low speed and advance the quill shaft until the forstner bit starts to cut with its outer edge cutters and then turn up the speed a little and advance the quill shaft until you've bored the hole the remaining 3". While your at it turn a second cone and use both cones (one in each end) to turn your pepper mill between centers and it will turn out very well. I've used this method before and it works very well. I know turners that have been turning since I was a kid and they have shown me this method and they use it a great deal. The hole comes out centered as long as you mark the center points in each end before you begin.

Charles,

Do yo have any type of saw?

Charles Nicholls said:

Mike, As I have asked a few times through this thread, How do I ensure that the FIRST hole is straight when I have No chuck that will hold anything that size withot using a waste block which as you probably saw was a failure from the beginning? 2) How can I drill a 3" hole with a bit thats only 2 1/2 inches long? This is why I need the bit extension.

Mike Dillen said:

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Charles Nicholls
Site Host
nicholls61@att.net
http://www.nichollswoodworks.com
This website is new so it doesn't have much to it yet but you are welcome to take a look

does the band saw have a tilting table?

Charles Nicholls said:

Hi Lew,

I have a band saw that is too small for the block in question and I have a miter saw(hand not powered )

Lewis Kauffman said:

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Lew Kauffman-
Wood Turners Forum Host

Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!