Tall cabinets with the hole drilling system?

[Kevin Johnson]

I have a project coming up that is going to require me to drill 32mm holes in some tall 8' bookcases.  I am thinking about getting the Festool hole drilling system as in the past I used a drill and a Rockler template.  (too slow).  I looked through the archives, but don't see this answer. How does one move the rail along the workpiece if your rail is shorter that the workpiece?  Thanks

 

[Brice Burrell]

Kevin, try this link, reply #43.

 

[gkeas]

I have a project coming up that is going to require me to drill 32mm holes in some tall 8' bookcases.  I am thinking about getting the Festool hole drilling system as in the past I used a drill and a Rockler template.  (too slow).  I looked through the archives, but don't see this answer. How does one move the rail along the workpiece if your rail is shorter that the workpiece?  Thanks

You can also get the 97" rail, but that'll set you back about 150 more than the shorty.

 

[Kevin Johnson]

Thanks Brice.

 

[Programmergeek]

Still will not fit a 8' piece of wood, the guide is a bit short.  95" guide with holes the longest there is. The trouble is the rale needs to over hang about 2" for there spacer and also had to be near the end for the clamps the .  YOU HAVE to clamp the rail or it will move.  I like the tip above joining two rails to be able to clamp.  Ii spent some time talking to Festool about this after I ruined some good cherry because the guide moved and they are aware of the issue and indicated that they would consider drilling a longer rail for the US market. 

Another quick fix for Festool would be to make a small section of railing maybe 8" or so that you could clamp to the end with rail connectors of the long rail.  To extend the system just a bit so you can clamp since you don't need holes all the way to the end in most cases. 

 

[Brice Burrell]

Still will not fit a 8' piece of wood, the guide is a bit short.  95" guide with holes the longest there is. The trouble is the rale needs to over hang about 2" for there spacer and also had to be near the end for the clamps the .  YOU HAVE to clamp the rail or it will move.  I like the tip above joining two rails to be able to clamp.  Ii spent some time talking to Festool about this after I ruined some good cherry because the guide moved and they are aware of the issue and indicated that they would consider drilling a longer rail for the US market.   

Another quick fix for Festool would be to make a small section of railing maybe 8" or so that you could clamp to the end with rail connectors of the long rail.  To extend the system just a bit so you can clamp since you don't need holes all the way to the end in most cases. 

  I'm working on a few ideas around this very issue, when I have the time to do a write up about it I will post on the how to section here and on my site. Programmergeek I will try to get an email to you when its up.
 

 

[Programmergeek]

I was thinking that festool should make a side to side clamping system for there rails (or someone else).  Would also be useful for router projects ect where long boards are involved.  I can use the longer rail but I have to pull a 8' rale out to clamp when I need to drill holes or rout a 2' section if I could clamp side to side I could use the shorter more managable rails and better if I need to transport them. 

THat ws what I was thinking is the best solution but I haven't had time to figure out how to do it yet.

 

[ccmviking]

Are you just interested in having holes the whole length for aesthetics's?  Generally you don't see holes all the way to the top or to the bottom.  A shelf less than a foot or so from the bottom would sure make it hard to retrieve items, and if it's for books you can leave the 10-12" w/o holes as well.  Can you use the shelf pins to hold the rail in place like you do the Rockler template or does it have to be clamped?

Chris...

 

[Kevin Johnson]

I am planning to start my hole about 12" from the bottom and end about 12" from the top.  I don't own the system, but I don't think you can move it like the Rockler system because the holes that use to offset the system are not in line with the holes that you have drilled.  I wanted to use the Festool method.  In my case, I have decided to pass on the Festool system for this application and get something like the one from Meg products.

 

[Greg_R]

You are in luck!  I just went through the exact same problem that you are having (2500+ holes in a large 8' tall bookshelf project).  I wanted the best option (besides renting or buying a line boring machine).  I tried the LR32 system, the Veritas 32 system, and a variety of other systems (plexi jig with drill, etc., etc.).  I ended up building a jig that was created over on the WWA (uses a router and notches).

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For details on how to build it and how it works, read this post.  Note that I'm not routing in the picture above... the wood needs to be indexed and clamped against the side.  Here's my post with some more pics and an enhancement (+ reviews of the other shelf pin systems that I tried).  This is an extremely fast and accurate method for drilling a lot of shelf pin holes!  I am able to drill _ALL_ of the holes on 1 piece of wood without having to adjust or reclamp my jig.  With the plunge bar and router combo I can drill almost 1 hole per second over the entire sheet.  After setting up the width for the 1st board, it's a simple operation to start another sheet (shove it against the side and back of the jig, clamp, and start drilling).  You _do_ need to keep track of the "bottom" of sheet and drill everything from that edge (so any jig construction errors are mirrored).  More details about this are in the how-to build post listed above.

 

[Greg_R]

For whatever reason, Festool does not sell a 8' plus LR32 rail.  With a MFT and an indexing pin you can do infinitely long LR32 panels.  Place the panel against the front edge stop and a right edge stop.  Route your holes using the LR32 system, remove the right edge stop, and slide everything to the right.  Re-index the rail with a pin in one of the last holes that you drilled.  Keep the rail and workpiece parallel with the MFT table front edge as you proceed (using table 90&deg fence, etc.).

I went through all of this and opted for building the jig shown above (my previous post).  IMO Festool's LR32 system is not optimized for large pieces and lots of holes (works great for smaller projects where precision is a must).

 

[Dave Ronyak]

Can you use the shelf pins to hold the rail in place like you do the Rockler template or does it have to be clamped?

Chris...

Chris, the hole drilling jig positions the router to drill the holes off the rubber strip of the guide rail.  Thus, simply sliding the hole drilling guide rail along the tall workpiece and using a couple of shelf pins stuck in previously drilled holes for alignment won't work.  But you can use the router/hole drilling jig/bit on the hole drilling rail to index for additonal holes exactly by plunging the router while mounted on the hole drilling jig into one of your previously drilled holes.  If you first draw a line where the centers of those additional holes are to be located, you can confirm that you have the other end of the hole drilling rail perfectly lined up by sliding the router/jig to the far end of the rail and ensuring the bit when plunged meets your centerline.  Adding ordinary guide rail extensions onto the LR 32 hole drilling rail makes this a lot easier to accomplish.  And of course, use the side stops if you can.  I say if you can because my last project involved drilling 5 rows of holes to match some HD slides I purchased from Lee Valley, and only two of the rows of holes were within range of the side stops, Festool  Item # 485758.

Dave R. 
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