Step Drills

[jarhead]

Does anyone own a set of these step drills? It seems that for each size hole, you can only drill about 1/4" deep until you hit the next size.

[LCHIEN]

Does anyone own a set of these step drills? It seems that for each size hole, you can only drill about 1/4" deep until you hit the next size.

They're not for drilling deep holes, drilling in 1 x wood would be impractical.
In my experience these are great for drilling clean holes in sheet metal or thin plastics, etc that would be dented and deformed by using a large drill bit.

[Tequila]

I own a couple of similar ones. They're meant for cutting metal (plates, angle iron, etc), so you usually aren't working with anything more than 1/4" or so thick.

And they are absolutely fantastic for cutting metal - they cut much cleaner than standard twist bits without any of the deformation or tearing that sometimes happens at the end of the cut.

[eezlock]

step drills......

I have that same set from HF paid $9.95 I think a while back. Like previous poster said, they work better on metal and plastic. Great for enlarging holes
that you may need a little more clearance on, for making things easier to adjust as needed. eezlock

[Hellrazor]

Those bits are made for drilling into metal.

[LCHIEN]

I'm sure they would drill quite well in wood, but of course the problem is that if the wood is thicker than the step heights then you'll get a stepped hole. So, it would be good fro drilling holes in veneer or balsa or other thin sheets of wood.

The step heights are probably like 1/8" or so, so that basically limits the step drills to 1/8" thick materials or less.

[eezlock]

step drills...

in wood, they wood make stepped holes...hey what about using them for countersinking? ....not too deep though.just a thought. eezlock

[sacherjj]

For countersinking, I use the 3 bit Dewalt set for #6, #8, and #10 screws. It was around $20, but I use it all the time. It makes life nice, when doing a bunch of wood screw joinery.