drill press jig

  Well I have talked about hand held electric drills in past articles, they are great but not if you want to drill accurate holes in your woodworking projects. You need a drill press, but what kind you ask, lets see if I can answer that question for you.

There are a lot of different things that you need to look for in choosing your drill press. First off there are bench models, floor models, single speed, and multiple speed drill presses.

So lets start with the bench models, as the name would imply, they are mounted on your work bench or a stand alone bench. These bench models have a limited drilling depth because of there height. Also if your work bench looks like mine half the time, you have to move stuff before you can drill your longer woodworking project. You are also limited by the length of your bench. Not a problem if your drill press is mounted on a stand alone bench. The bench drill presses are about half the price of floor mount drill presses but they are more limited in there use.

 Let us go to the floor models as the name says, these drill presses mount to the floor so you can drill from the chuck all the way to the floor. This is important when you have to drill holes into work that is 12 inches or more in height. You will find that floor models have more power than bench models, very important when using large forstnter bits or large hole saws. You want to make sure that you have variable speed, most of the time this is done by moving belts to different pulleys so that you can use slower speeds for metal, hardwood and plexiglass. You need faster speeds for soft woods.

 Make sure your quill feed has three levers so that you always have a handle to feed your bit into your work. You want a table that you can tilt to 45 degrees. I have an adjustable machinist vise bolted to my table, I then have a 1/2 inch plywood table with a 2×2 inch board on the bottom that I can put in my vise to drill my woodworking stuff on. Remove the wood table and use your vice for drilling metal, this works great for me.

 Lets talk safety woodworking beginners don’t understand how dangerous the drill press can be. A drill press will grab hold of anything that is loose. So guys, don’t have your shirt tail hanging out preferably wear short sleeves. Make sure that you have proper hold downs for your work because once that bit sticks in the work it starts spinning and you can’t get your hand out of the way fast enough. I have the scares to prove it. In my younger days I was not as smart as I am now.

 Now for all you lady’s out there, wear a ball cap and please tie your hair back and do the same as the men do with their clothing. Oh yea, this goes for all you long haired guys also. Well thats all for now, but there is so much more about the drill press, we will go into jigs and more latter so bye for now, Uncle Mel