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Up Topic Welding Industry / Welding Fundamentals / Magnetic base drills
- - By aevald (*****) Date 08-16-2006 17:13
Hello All, awhile back another post reminded me of this little bit of information regarding mag-base drills. If you are using a mag-drill to drill holes through material that is say 1/4" or less, there is a tendency for the drill to want to walk or slide on the surface and not hold as it should. If the situation allows, after the drill has been positioned and the magnet has been activated, take a 1/2" or so thick piece of steel about the same size as the drill base and stick it to the underside of the drill base, making a sandwich out of the material. The one caution to this method is to watch out when you de-energize the magnet as this piece will obviously fall to the ground and on your foot or something else if you forget about it. So remember to support this piece when the magnet is turned off. In other situations where you would like to drill holes through stainless steel or aluminum and if you have the room to do it. Use a piece of mild steel and clamp it to the part to be drilled and then attach your mag-drill to this material and proceed to drill your holes. So if you haven't already figured out how to do this, it is something to be considered. Good luck and Regards, aevald
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 08-16-2006 17:20
Good tip and works great to give the magnet some meat to sink it's magnetic field into, but do use a C-clamp (when possible) to hold the material that you placed underneath from falling on your feet should someone trip over the power cord and the magnet turns loose. :-)
Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 08-17-2006 18:05
Hello everyone, I forgot one other item to go along with this. When you need to drill a hole in a piece of pipe or possibly the side of a tank or some other round item, a piece of channel iron tack welded to the round shape or clamped depending on the situation, will give you a good base to mount the drill to while you are drilling. To make sure that the hole will be perpendicular to the round surface you will need to carefully center the channel in relation to the hole center and also center the drill on the channel. Regards, aevald
Parent - - By turbo38t (*) Date 10-05-2006 01:11
Hmmmmm......I often "bridge a gap" when using the mag drill.......but I can only use 1/8th or smaller plate as the magnets on our Hoegen and Milwaukee drils is not powerful enough for 1/2" plate......and when u use annular cutters in the hoegen drill you don't want that thing to move or OOPS....there goes a $50 bit. Dave
Parent - By Bill M (***) Date 10-05-2006 13:28
We have permanently attached a 42" long 1/8" dia., platic covered braided steel cable to all our mag based drills.  One end of the cable is hard fastened to the mast of the drill.  The other end of the cable has a large snap hook.  The safety cable easily wraps up with the power cord around the drill handles when stored.  It is a requirement that whenever the drills are used horizontal or overhead, the safety cable needs to be hooked onto something overhead whenever possible.  Often times we have had the power cords unpluged, or blown circuit breakers cause the drill to fall off the workpiece.  These safety cables have significantly reduced "hit by - struck by" type injuries from falling drills.  The cable has never been the cause of an injury to date.  We still recommend safty c-clamps whenever possible in that config. but sometimes clamps are not possible.
Parent - - By TimGary (****) Date 10-06-2006 18:42
Whenever I'm mag drilling a large hole through thick plate, I clamp or tack a piece of angle adjacent to the mag base. This prevents the $100 + annular cutter from shattering it gets hug up.
Speaking of shattered cutters, does someone have a neat trick for removing the shattered pieces that inevitably get stuck in the bottom of the kerf? I hate it when trying to cut through remnants of the last catastrophe ruins a new replacement cutter. I've removed pieces through the use of a small chisel and air hose, and as last resort burn the hole out with a torch.

Tim
Parent - By jwright650 (*****) Date 10-06-2006 20:46
Tim,
Removal of broken bits is a pain...the only way I've seen them removed are the two ways that you described...
Parent - By aevald (*****) Date 10-06-2006 21:00
Hello Tim, you might take a look at yorkiepap's post on removing a broken tap in a blind hole. I haven't tried this yet, but it might have an application in the scenario you are describing as the materials are somewhat similar and might react the same. Good luck and regards, aevald
Parent - By devo (***) Date 01-08-2007 19:34
I learned the hard way about giving a mag drill a thick plate to stick to.  I was drilling some 7/8 holes in 1/4 inch thick material.  I noticed the base wobbling a bit, but as this was the eleventh of the twelve holes I had to drill, I was just trying to finish in a hurry.  Just as the bit was breaking through, the bit dug in, the base broke loose, and that drill spun around and smashed me in the knee.  Luckily the damage was minimal, both to my knee and the drill, but the lesson was learned.
Up Topic Welding Industry / Welding Fundamentals / Magnetic base drills

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