Long Masonry Drills

They were when I bought my socket set 30 years ago... :o)

I have a set of no-name 450mm 8,10,12mm (non-SDS) masonary drills (or maybe 6,8,10mm, can't recall off-hand). I bought them for 99p in the market. I expected them to do one hole each, if I was lucky. 10 years later, they still work brilliantly and were the best (non-SDS) masonary drills I have ever had. Ideal for drilling holes through walls for phone/alarm/data cables. You just can't always tell up front.

I also have a Rolson 1000mm 12,16,24mm SDS set, which was very cheap from CPC (around £7 IIRC, and I've since seen quite cheaply elsewhere. I've not used them much, but they have been fine too, so far.

Well, you just know one day you'll have some random job to do where you have every other tool needed apart from a long drill bit, so you'll have the inconvenience and expense of going into town just to pick one up.

At least that's the way I justify buying things that I don't get around to using until years later ;)

If you have a market near you, you may well find there is a tool stall selling random large drill bits for surprisingly little. I keep trying to tell myself that I don't need one right now, but they are very tempting.

Chris

Hilka is generally rubbish, but the sds bit seems to make quite a bit less difference than the ability of machine driving it.

I have a couple of Rawlplug extensions. I think there was a 30 year gap between the times that I wanted to use them both together.

I take it we are talking SDS?

I bought a cheap set from Toolstation and they have been fine.

I recently bought the cheapest masonry bit that would drill a hole big enough to fit a 22mm pipe throgh a 9" brick wall, from Screwfix. I have no idea what the longevity of this bit will be ...

Just say no! Your sanity is in danger kids. I once, in a moment of derangement, decided to try a pack of cheapo masonry bits. I only had one hole to do, cba to travel to the proper tool place... surely 3 bits would do that! Bzzzt, wrong answer. Each one managed about 1/4 the hole in soft brick - and thats with several regrinds along the way. Eventually I'd had enough and went and got the SDS, and 45 minutes of hard slog became an easy 1 minute job.

Andrew has been very lucky.

NT

But - what is in a "Brand" name. (nowadays). Any item can be made anywhere (usually China) to a range of specifications and have a brand name attached. One can no longer assume that one decent product in a range will infer similar qualities across the range (Except Miele before anyone jumps!)

Indeed. I've seen plenty of DIY products where there's lots of commonality between components across the brands - in some cases it even *is* the same product, just with different sugar-coating and branding on it.

Brand name seems to be mostly bollocks these days - best you can do is go look at the physical items and make an assesment as to quality/longevity from there (which doesn't necessarily help with drill bits - but at least they're often cheap enough that you can keep a few spares on the shelf just in case)