Help!! 10" drill press won't make clean holes!

[LX Kid]

All of our above statements reference alignment which do nothing other than direction.
What do you mean by clean hole?
If drilling at an angle through stock then alignment is issue.
If the hole is not round then it is tool issue or bad spindle bearing allowing wobble in the bit.

By a clean hole I mean that the inner walls are not smooth. Guess I'd call it chatter marks on the interior cut wall of the hole. I think my problem is a low quality drill bits and spindle/chuck not running true. However it will do just fine for the occasional wood or metal holes I may need rather than using my mill. I can take the drill press outside so I don't make such an awful mess on my bench when drilling wood.

 

[jwmay]

Well don't I feel silly. I've never considered the looks of a drilled hole before. Only ever cared that it was perpendicular and the right size. I thought it was a crooked hole. Ah well.

 

[Navy Chief]

I'm not sure I have ever drilled a hole in metal that had good surface finish in the hole, drills are roughing tools. If surface finish is a concern then a drill press and drill bits may not be the tool of choice.

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[LX Kid]

Well don't I feel silly. I've never considered the looks of a drilled hole before. Only ever cared that it was perpendicular and the right size. I thought it was a crooked hole. Ah well.

Perpendicular hole from cheap drill press? Well that's a "hole" nother issue with mine. I hope I never really need a true perpendicular hole from it. I guess it's perp enough for me. LoL

 

[tq60]

Drill bit matters as does process.

Photo are from today.

This is for a BBQ, started as a torch or laser CT disk from scrap yard, it fits a hup from fire engine and supports the tube the BBQ is attached to

Started with1/8 as spotter then worked up.

The 11/16 and final 3/4 holes looked a bit ugly inside as the chips would get caught in the drill, Chinese bits.

The 1/2 drill had smooth sides that looked polished.

We used a 3/4 end mill as final cut as tye drill bits were not cutting exact, there was some wobble.

The end mill insured good, straight and round holes.

Your drill bit and method matters.

The photo material started at 1.25 thick and we reduced the outer part to 1 inch.

A constant pressure on the drill resulted in long and nasty swirling chips.

Pecking or releasing pressure when the chip reached the chuck worked well but makes for large mess the vacuum cannot pickup.

What worked well was pulsing the pressure, thing pecking the drill but not removing from hole, just relax for a split second, this stops the cutting resulting in broken chips.

Pulsing at 1 second interval resulted in small curls that the vacuum can get.

Problem is the small curls do not travel up and out of the hole so sometimes they get under the edge of the drill bit and make hole ugly.

Also be careful of speed.

Too slow rpm just takes longer, too fast burns up your bit, most drill presses on slow speeds are still too fast for good drilling at 1/2 inch.

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[LX Kid]

Nice job and great pics. I have had one of those dividing heads for about ten years and never used it or had a need to learn to use it.

 

[Shootymacshootface]

If your work isn't clamped or in a vise, you will get wierd ovalish triangles.

 

[LX Kid]

I bought a 4" drill press vice and I think I should have read the dimensions! That sucker is almost as bid as my planten. I guess it will just give me more to hang on to.

 

[LX Kid]

My drill press is really being used a lot so I did another upgrade by adding a Wixey Lazer Guide to the column. "It really works great" and very accurate. Easy install and adjustment. Think my mill is getting jealous because "not" doing a lot a lot of drilling on her. I'm really pleasantly surprised at this older budget priced Ryobi 10" drill press.