Time to upgrade my drill bits, looking for advice.

[Gunder]

Over the years I have always thought of drill bits as consumables and usually bought the mid-grade sets at Lowes of Home depot. I'd use them for wood, aluminum, steel. Basically as a one set does it all, but lets be honest they don't really do anything great, just adequate. Lately I've been going through those even faster then normal. Yesterday I needed some metric wood drills, so bit the bullet and bought the Festool stuby brad set. Wow, completely blown away with the difference. A few years ago I upgraded from box store grade driver bits to all PB Swiss and wouldn't go back for the world... so would like to now do that with my drill bits.

So that got me thinking it was time to invest in a few sets of single purpose bits. I.E. a full breakpoint set, a taper set, and a dedicated hardened steel set.

Now I'm looking for some advice on who makes the best bits for each of these purposes.

Bradpoints: Festool doesn't do anything smaller then 3mm AFAIK and I need smaller sizes and a full imperial and metric set.

Tapper wood bits: Thinking about ordering the 14 piece set from WL Fuller. They on ungodly expensive so curious if something else was a close second.

Carbide set dedicated for hard steel: Saw some on Fuller's site that look good but they don't sell sets.

Non-ferous metal set: Was thinking about just using a general purpose set from Bosch or millwaulke but open to ideas.

I dont own any centrotec drills.... its about the only thing I don't own from festool, so I can see my self going down that rabbit hole soon, so centrotec compatible bits are a plus but not a must.

 

[Holmz]

I have the A190 set of Dormer bits, and some Festool brad/centrotec ones.
I use the Dormers a lot.

 

[PreferrablyWood]

I don't really see the need for bradpoint bits under 3mm. I'm pleased with my festool bradpoint set from 3 to 10mm for the attic systainer insert.  I also have the festool HSS centrotec bit set for metal etc, that contains 3, 3.5,4,4.5, 5,5.5,6,6.5,8,10mm that have holders that allow for replacing the bits. With a little work on a grinder wheel you can modify other manufactures bits to work the holders. They work well in metal, plexiglass, though i don't use them intensively

I recently acquired a couple of Fagmag carbide bradpoint bits, seem good not better than the festool bradpoint.

 

[leakyroof]

Lots of choices- Don’t over look the Machine/Cutter supply houses that sell tooling on-line.
Also, Mc-Master Carr sells drill bits for different materials too.

 

[Cheese]

[welcome] to the FOG.

Do you actually need tapered bits? They’re typically used in the boat building area for use with tapered wood screws.

I’d shy away from carbide bits for steel, especially if most of their use will be in a hand drill. Carbide chips very easily and they are better suited for use in a drill press or machine tool. Cobalt are my choice for steel and they are mandatory for stainless.

I believe Fuller makes metric bradpoints in diameters smaller than 3mm in .5mm increments.

 

[Rip Van Winkle]

For drilling metal, you really need to match the srill bit to the type of material being drilled, and the type/speed of the equipment being used.

Just for general purpose metal drilling, a lot of people seem to love Norseman/Viking Magnum drill bits. These are USA made, M7 steel, drill bits with a nitro carburized surface, and a more open flute design. The same drill bits seem to also be sold under the Consolidated Toledo Drill/CTD brand, and may be sold rebranded by other companies such as Walter. The manufacturer also specs the same drill bits for drilling certain types of stainless, although only certain types of stainless.

Norseman also manufactures Cobalt, and regular bright finish HSS drill bits. Cobalt is generally for drilling harder alloys, and higher chrome content alloys like stainless steel. The Cobalt in the drill bits makes the drill bits harder and significantly more heat resistant, but it also makes drill bits more brittle, so better to use in a drill press. Also Cobalt drills are also supposed to be used at Higher Speeds, like 2,000 RPM or higher, since heat really isn't an issue but breakage is.

For other manufacturers, I like Triumph "Thunderbit" drill bits, which are also USA made. These have a parabolic flute design for faster chip evacuation. They're available in a black and gold nitro carburized finish, as well as titanium nitrate, and made from Cobalt steel. I believe Milwaukee used to sell these under the Milwaukee brand name when Milwaukee mostly manufactured they're power tools in the USA. I believe Snap-On also sold these as they're house brand.

There are also other USA made drill bit brands that get good reviews like Champion and Cle-Line.

For brad point bits, I don't think I've ever heard a bad thing about Fuller or the Lee Valley bits. I've used the Lee valley "USA" made bits and they were excellent. Both companies, from what I understand, take higher quality industrial bits, and use CNC machines to regrind the tips to a proper spured brad point geometry. Lee Valley offers standard 29 piece fractional, and 25 piece metric .5mm sizes as well as some larger sizes. Fuller offers the same and I believe some other sizes as well. I believe fuller may slso be willing to produce custom sizes if you order a certain number. Fuller also manufactures a whole selection of other specialty drill bits like plastic point bits for acrylic, and taper point bits for both hand held drilling and machine use.

There are some specialty European manufacturers for woodworking drill bits, but they're not as easy to find in the USA, and prices are usually higher.

For metal drills I would probably avoid name brand power tool bits. Most manufacturers seem to have gone to selling Chinese made bits with lower performance, at least in the USA. Dewalt might be an exception, since they're bits are sometimes German, and you sometimes see lower priced USA made bit sets from Hitachi at Lowes, but even these don't seem to be up to the quality of the above USA brands which are usually excellent.

 

[peter halle]

I doubt that one manufacturer will be a source for all.  I remember a mention of Montana drills bits when I was visiting the Bridge Tool site.  You might want to see what they have.

Peter

 

[Cheese]

Lately, I’ve been rebuilding a motorcycle trailer and have been using Triumph ThunderBits with  TiN coating for drilling steel and aluminum structural shapes. Very satisfied with the results. Purchased them from MSC Industrial because they’ll sell you a set or individual bits.

I believe you can’t purchase directly from Fuller, so when purchasing their brad point bits, I go through Jamestown Distributors.

 

[Gunder]

Thanks for the suggestions!