Drilling Holes into Long Legs

[Eric The Viking]

I saved a couple ideas on pinterest that might work

Coley

That's exactly what I've done in the past, but it's horribly awkward to set up. I was drilling 3mm holes into the edges of dolls' house floors (8mm MDF) to take wiring. It is extremely hard to get the alignment to start with, and to maintain parallelism - the quill pressure exerts twisting force on the drill table mounting, and it will move off without you noticing it! DAMHIK.

With a larger hole, the force you need to exert will be pretty high, and it's presumably end-grain too. The picture shows a bottom support - you will definitely need that (I didn't have one, which was a beginner's mistake).

My drill is floor-standing, but it is probably one of those odd jobs where a benchtop one would have been easier.

E.

PS. with bottom support, a woodworking drill table would help you (tilted through 90deg) as you have a fence for alignment. It will still be a nightmare to get the hole in a precise location and straight.

 

[paulrockliffe]

I did try that, but it was too tricky to get the wood clamped to the table so that it was parallel with the drill head. In the end I built the feet with the M16 studs fixed in place, then I marked the centres very accurately, drilled by hand and then a adjusted the last hole centre by offering up the foot. Then I tweaked the holes a bit wider as necessary to get a tightish fit.

It's rock solid, massively over-kill, but looks neat. Thanks all!