Drill Dowel End

[Ira Mellon]

Could someone tell me how to drill a hole perpendicular to(and in the center of)the END of a 1" diam., 4 ft long dowel?

[B a r r y]

Find the center, mount the dowel in a vise, and drill it with a drill press. bench top drill presses will need to be swung to the side, hand held drills would benefit from a guide block to keep the bit at

90 degrees to the end face.

A guide block is simply a thick piece of scrap wood or MDF with a hole through it..

Barry

[TeamCasa]

How deep? What size hole? Dave

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[John Crea]

Assuming you have a drill press, drill a 1inch hole perpendicular thru a price of fairly thick wood (scrap 2x4), put dowel thru hole, (raise drill press table to let the dowel clear the base/floor and drill to a accurate center mark

John

[Silvan]

That could work pretty well if you can get the table up without changing anything. On my DP, that's a dubious proposition. It tends to waddle from side to side a little as I crank it up.

Here's what I did in a similar situation. I had to drill really precise holes in the dead center of 4" dowels. A little easier goal than the OP's problem, but similar.

So what I did was bore a hole in a suitable piece of hardwood scrap with a Forstner bit, stopping shy of going through the piece. (The OP would want a 1" bit here.) Then I left the piece in the vise and chucked up a suitable bit for the axle hole. I used the dimple from the Forstner to re-center the new bit after raising the table, then I bored the rest of the way through. This was my drill guide.

In my case, I clamped the 4" dowels in my Grizzly cross sliding vise with the prismatic jaw installed, then put the drill guide on top of the dowel, lined it up, and drilled the holes. The OP's problem is a little more complicated. Maybe a vise with prismatic jaws and the table tilted 90 degrees to keep the support up near the business end of the thing. That or maybe rig up some support blocks to wrap around the column and hold the dowel at just the right distance. (Maybe cut big holes with a fly cutter, then cut one end off and screw them back together or something. These would be hard to make well, but might do the trick if the OP is as averse as I am to screwing with the tilt setting on his DP.)

Assuming he has a floor model drill press, of course. Hrm... I guess the only alternative would be to make the drill guide on a benchtop, and then do the actual drilling by hand. With a really thick drill guide that might deliver acceptable results, depending on the level of precision required. I'd say this whole propsition is pretty well impossible to contemplate with no drill press at all.