Suggestions for drills

FOMOGO said:
I bought a 119 piece,Ti coated set from HF many years ago, and they have held up amazingly well, under hard use. Hard to say if they are as good now, but for $50, or $40 for the HSS steel set, It's pretty hard to go too far wrong. Probably more important to learn how to sharpen them. Mike https://www.harborfreight.com/power...h-speed-steel-drill-bit-set-115-pc-61543.html
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My HF Ti coated set is at least 20 years old. I am sure it is not the nicest set available but it does get the job done. I buy 1/8", 3/16" and 1/4" in packs of 10. I do not see any reason to own really expensive bits in sizes that never get used. Just replace dull or broken bits with quality bits.

Does anyone use Cobalt drill bits? I have a few Cobalt step drills that I really like but step drills have a lot of meat in them so they are much less likely to break from the brittleness.
 
I am in the "camp" of buying what I need, when I need it. for 1/4" and smaller drill bits I tend to buy 5 at a time. I also rarely buy jobber length. Usually I buy the shorter length. I think they are called "Stub-Length" when that is available. Same for TAPS, buy what I need, when I need it and then replace as needed. This allows me to purchase higher quality and spreads the cost out over time helping with the "sticker Shock" of full sets ...
Good luck
 
I bought a fractional set from Sears many, many years ago and a full 115 piece set from Enco maybe 40 years ago. More recently, I bought a metric set from 1 to 13mm by .5mm.

My rationale is that if I need a particular size, I have it. It may not be the best quality drill but it usually does the job. I live 20 miles awaqy from the nearest DIY or hardware store and the convenience of having the right drill at hand can't be understated. Even if I were to make the hour plus round trip to a local source, the quality wouldn't be the best and I would have paid a premium for the drill and $5 for fuel to get it. If I were to order one from an online provider. the minimum time to receive the drill would be a day and possibly a week as well as shipping charges to boot. By that 5time, I probably would have forgotten what I needed it for ;)

If a drill fails, I will replace it with a quality drill, thereby slowly building up my inventory of most used drills. I keep a list of drills needed to fill the sets and I order them with my next order to MSC, etc. If the job demands, I may pock up a frill locally but in most instances I will wait until I have other reasons to make the trip.
 
Even if you don't want buy a full set, at least buy a modest set with a Huot index so you have a place to store what you use. After you wear out the most used sizes, replace them with whatever you choose.
 
ConValSam said:
Even if you don't want buy a full set, at least buy a modest set with a Huot index so you have a place to store what you use. After you wear out the most used sizes, replace them with whatever you choose.
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$75 for a drill bit organizer case like you get free with a set from HF? Is it seriously worth that much??? If it is really that nice I may fork over for one as the HF organizers suck.
 
I have the separate huot index boxes. They are great quality and worth a few more bucks. I haven't used the single box with number/letter/fraction bits, but I expect it's just as good.

If you intend to tap imperial, I would get a number set first. The recommended tap drills are often number sizes for imperial.
 
The HF index isn't the best. I just leave mine open on the bench so not an issue for me. For $75 you could buy two full sets of HF HSS drills, with Index's. Call me a cheapskate, but i would go that route, and spend the money where it really matters, i.e. taps and dies, cutting tools, etc.. Mike

MikeInOr said:
$75 for a drill bit organizer case like you get free with a set from HF? Is it seriously worth that much??? If it is really that nice I may fork over for one as the HF organizers suck.
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If I had only one set, it would be the fractional. There are acceptable fractional sized drills for common tap drill sizes which can be used for all but the most critical applications. If there is a need/desire to have a tap drill for a full 75% thread, one can buy the few drills necessary. A number set stops at .228" while the 29 pc. fractional set goes to 1/2".
 
MikeInOr said:
I do not see any reason to own really expensive bits in sizes that never get used. Just replace dull or broken bits with quality bits.
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I really like this approach. The main reason is that with a cheap, 120-bit set you get an index and all the sizes you didn't know you were going to need. Most will never get used, but you have SOMETHING to work with when you do need it. Replacing the ones you actually use, allows you to build up a set just like you would do if you were doing it that way from scratch.

I have several sets. Nearly all of them have a few bits missing, and they are the same ones in every set. When they broke in the first set, I bought another entire to get the few I needed.

As I slowly learn things, I hope to get smart before I get too old for it to matter.
 
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