A mate of mine is planning to make some holders for table decorations at a forthcoming wedding. He's planning to use lengths of freshly cut branches (with nice bark on) about 15 cm length and diameter. He wants to bore a central hole about 40 mm diameter about half way through to hold suitable glass containers for flowers, etc.
His first attempt was a 38 mm cutter of the type normally used for cutting hinge holes in kitchen cabinet doors and carcases (only larger, of course). Not surprisingly, cutting into wet end-grain with something with poor chip clearing capability doesn't work.
A hole saw works (sort of) OK but it's a PITA clearing out the remaining material with a chisel, even at 20 mm depth.
I have a spade bit on order, but I am not over-confident that this will work well. The other option is an auger (£20 for 240 mm long, 40 mm diameter). I have a small pillar drill but this might not be powerful enough. Should I be considering an auger in a hand brace?
He wants to make a couple of dozen of these, so needs a reasonably efficient method. Neither of us have a woodworking lathe. I had wondered about trying to make a customised jig to use with a router but to my mind that's not the right sort of cutter to be using on green timber. I also wondered about trying a TCT core drill from both ends, then filling the hole in the bottom.
Any bright ideas?