Does anyone have any tips on getting the waste out of a hole saw easily? Sometimes it takes a good five minutes to pry out the debris – makes drilling a double sole plate pretty time consuming.
I tried finding a 4 inch self-feed but no luck. Do they even make them that big?
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Replies
I know milwaukee makes 4" selffeed.
Mike
if the plug is 2" or bigger i shoot a drywall screw in it and pull,or just cuss alot and sewar i'm going to invent one with a plunger and get rich!larry
hand me the chainsaw, i need to trim the casing just a hair.
Mil makes self feeders but ya better have a Hole Hawg. Try a diffrent hole saw. I pickled up a smaller Ridgid fron the cheapo and its body is relieved for clearing the chips and plugs out. Id check them out and use a quick release mandrel and you should be ripping thru...
I use a small cabinet tip screwdriver. There are a couple of slots on the side of the hole saw. Just pry it out, one side a little bit at a time.
Idealally, once the pilot drill pokes through, you remove the saw and finish the hole from the other side. This creates a clean entrance wound on both sides of the stud. The slug or plug will be sticking out halfway and can be easily and obviously removed.
~Peter
If you already know this, it should be obvious. If you didn't, I hope I've helped.
If you can get at both sides of the wood, this works like a charm... Cut about halfway through from one side. Then complete the cut from the other side. When the holesaw completes the cut, the plug will be sticking about halfway out of the saw. You can grab the plug with your hand and unscrew it out of the saw.
What you need is one of these:
http://www.toolbarn.com/product/lenox/25464-64HC/
The trick to hole saws is to rock the dril as you are drilling to open up the kerf.........
They cut quicker & cooler that way
On a hill by the harbour
Before you start drilling coat the inside of the hole saw blade with some spray on silicone, or wd-40. The wood plug usualy falls right out after your done.
Tipi fest 06. Let's roll.
Jig-a-loo is the magic spray these days.
Drill a couple of holes in the land (i.e. the part that will become the waste disk) about ½ a radius out from the centre and roughly ½" apart with the pilot bit first, then drill the big hole and remove the disk using thin-nose pliers in the two holes.
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a 4" self feed?
maybe they make em. I don't know. Further, I don't know if I'd want to use em. For drilling holes for dryer vents, where yer drilling through siding, insulation, previous siding, tar paper, cladding, and on into insulation, then, hopefully missing studs, drywall, the last thing this fella wants is some bit telling me how fast to feed .....
The arbors I use are the lockable arbors- where the bit is "pinned" to the arbour, either with the screw pins or with the push pins, and it don't take me 5 minutes to clear debris, you simply unlock the pins, spin the blade off and tap out the debris with the centering drill.
30 seconds to clear debris most times, if that long.
I'll augment that comment by saying that if yer not careful with the screw on pins, your "guiding hand" can unwittingly back off the pins, or on the push in pins, the sudden breakthrough can cause pin disengagement. Both of these situations mean yer reaching to the massive channelock pliers and a bunch of expletives.
The upside is that, despite the fact that these arbors run 20$+ at the hardware store, the tool-god has seen fit to place a plethora of these beasts in front of me at garage sales at reasonable prices. Ergo, clearing the debris isn't a major problem. Alas, most of em are only suitable for 1/2" chucks, but some are compatible with 3/8.
Nothin like a 1/2" drill and a 6" hole saw to teach you humbility. either learn the lesson or break yer wrists.....
As for clearing out waste, drilling down, ain't no way for the sawdust to clear, so the gullets get jammed up, , no where for chips to go. Force it, and you overheat the bit, Pull it out every now and agin, or even run it backwards for a second of two to clear the gullets a tad.
or if yer drilling throung 3" of 2x, you might even start the hole and then run a 1" drill just inside the hole diameterso that chips have a chance to fall out down below.....might be faster in the long run.
course if the bits are old and dull, and ain't no set left on the teeth, and if they are burning their way through the wood (I can smell it even as I type...) all bets are off.
Eric
Cowtown Eric, Great summary of everything I would want to know about using a holsaw efficiently. They ought to include a printout of that in the holsaw packaging.Karl
hold on there karl....If I knew everything about hole saws or how to use em, or even had the brains to get it all down, I'd be suprised. but I think I know what you mean. anyway- wait til the 'lectricians and plumberators chip in. Eric
Thanks everyone!!
Those 4" self-feed auger bits are actually 4 5/8" (to clear a hole for pipe). They cost about $165 last time I looked for a lenox or milwaukie.
That being said, I hate using a hole saw for boring through wall plates so, over the years, I've spent the $$'s for a range of the self-feed bits (which are great, by the way, as long as you have a Hole Hog or some other make of low speed hurky drill motor: for the recharge battery enthusiasts, you don't want to go there!).
In a pinch, I've had to make do with a hole saw for boring 1 1/2" framing material and I usually bore about 3/4" to 1" at a time, clean it out with a chisel, and continue....and hope to not hit a nail.
most better mgfr's make 4" selfeeds...
plumbing or electic wholesale out lets and the contractor level BB's...
sounds like the set is about gone on yur HS ot it is out of round...
you can spray dry lube on it to help drilling and plug removal..
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Two tricks I've used - bend some steel rod (coathanger, eg) into a V with the legs about 5" long, then bend the last 1/2" of the tips inward at an acute angle. File to a point. Now, spread the V so that the sharpened tips dig into the wood visible in the slots, and wiggle the wood out.
Alternately a couple of screws - d/w work well - screwed thru the wood until the points hit the back of the saw, and continue turning until the threads push the wood out.
All the best...
To those who know - this may be obvious. To those who don't - I hope I've helped.
The pipe hangers used for copper pipe would do this quite well. Old style that look just like what you described. A spanner wrench basically.
You can put a drywall screw or any kind non-Piffin screw into the plug, stick a screw driver or any other such implement between it and the drill bit, reverse the drill and hang on.
I'm sold on the one tooth lenox blades.... it's rare for even a 5" to bind or hang up, they cut fast smooth & clean and are deeper than most hole saws... the plug just pops out 90% of the time... i buy mine off of ebay and am very impressed
I also like the rigid hole saws from HD they have a double thickness bottom with huge cutouts so you can knock out your cuts from the back... used a 3.5" aqbout 5x today i was impressed with every hole the ease at whick i could clean em out and drill again... they are located with the bulk blades at hd the orange ones...
the other trick i use is to start the hole about 1/4" deep then remove the 1/4" pilot bit... makes it clean out faster
p
I drill a 1/2 hole on the inside edge of the cut line (on the future scrap piece). I usually use a 1/2" bit. Drill it so the edge of the bit hits your cut line. This does 2 things.
1. It makes a hole for the sawdust to fall out of. You don't have to 'pump' the bit to clear the buildup of sawdust.
2. It gives you a hole to use to pull it out if it does get jammed.
A buddy told me about this trick. I was amazed that it worked so well.
I bought a Vermont American plug ejecting mandrel. Actually, I haven't used it very much since I bought it. It worked as expected the couple of times that I did use it. I think it will work on some other hole saws but haven't actually tried yet.
The Vermont American blurb:
"Plug ejecting mandrels convert standard bi-metal hole saws into plug ejecting hole saws, saving time by quickly and easily ejecting the wood plug. Plug removal with a plug ejecting mandrel is four times faster than with a standard mandrel. For 1-1/4`` - 6`` hole saws. INCLUDES: one each large arbor and large adapter."
Lots of sources but one that gives a description:
http://www.doityourself.com/invt/6772081
One other tip I read somewhere, drill about 1/8" deep with the hole saw then remove the saw and drill a couple 1/4" holes aligned to the inside of the kerf. Then complete the cut with the hole saw.
This gives the sawdust somewhere to go so the cuts are much faster. Not sure if it helps the plug drop out though.
David
I had a ton of holes to drill (I was making wheels for trucks for my sons birthday party) and had the same problems.
Solution: Put a strong spring with washer over the guide bit. The extra force applied inside out after the hole is done is often enough for it to pop out on its own.
Rebuilding my home in Cypress, CA
Also a CRX fanatic!
now that's damn clever....I usually drill about half the depth of the saw and then use a screwdriver to break out the plug by wedging into the kerf until the plug cracks and then remove it and repeat until I drill through. the paint inside is usually the culprit with crap gettin jammed inside. and I have some older saws that I have sanded down ....using a dowel rod and coarse sand paper.... to bare metal and have had some success if a vacuum is nearby I use it whilst drilling to remove the dust. Lenox¯ also makes an arbor that they claim will eject the plugs , but I ain't used one yet.
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.Wer ist jetzt der Idiot
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We drill box gutter drops all the time with a 4".
Often at a place where the side meets the bottom..whacky kinda place and sometimes covered with copper already.
I resharpen with a thin cut off wheel in a grinder...also reset the teeth to be more involved with kerf width, sometimes ya can't wiggle that bit of extra clearance inside a box gutter.
And as anothe poster said earlier, drive a screw into the stuck plug and it walks up and out when the screw bottoms in the hole saw.
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
"Enjoyning the finite of matter, in an infinite realm of possibilities...
Use one of the modern hole cutters with large teeth and large side gullets which include the Blue Boar TCT hole cutters and the Milwaukee Big Hawg hole cutters. With the large teeth there is no sidewall contact to hold the cut plug inside the hole cutter. Then the only resistance is from the pilot bit. With soft woods a spade pilot bit works well but for hard woods and engineered woods like OSB it is better to use a tunsten carbide tipped pilot bit - only one I know of is the one sold by Hole Pro the makers of the Blue Boar hole cutters. Another benefit is that I can cut three times as large a hole with a cordless drill and it takes a tenth the time so the batteries last 10x as long.
Just walk over to your drill press and drill it out with a few holes. silicone helps and you can not go all the way thru and chip the stuff out then resume drilling the hole this way you wonr have such a deep plug.
Cheap but Effec
When anticipating this challenge I've learned to keep a sharp 1/2" or 3/4" chisel handy. Rather than let my hole-saw-of-choice (usually never much beyond 2-1/2" dia.) I stop frequently & use the chisel to split up & remove the core material before it becomes a stuck-fast saw plug.
If you're drilling stock thicker than 3-1/2" (my last home had floors framed with 'recycled' government barracks timbers, full 6" x 12" beams for mudsills, 4x8's for floor joists) it's a practical method to get a hole thru to the other side whether you pre-drill a thru-pilot hole (recommended if clearance permits) or not.
All the other suggestions are good too, particularly if you get to deal with this task often enough to make investing in the right tools worthwhile.
Cleaning the hole saws
I beleive there are several hole saw tube cleaners, try slug ejector, or sr slug ejetcor.