Author Topic: Drilling holes in HSS  (Read 5944 times)

Offline appletree

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Drilling holes in HSS
« on: January 16, 2017, 08:35:47 AM »
Hi Gents
I wondered if anyone has been successful in drilling HSS, I have a couple of U/S slitting saws I wish to cut up and make a specialist scraper for woodturning.
I have a couple of ideas Carbide or use EDM, wondered what you all thought
Phil

Offline Manxmodder

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #1 on: January 16, 2017, 09:39:01 AM »
EDM would do it for sure. Otherwise you may consider grinding a hole with grinding points,but that will be very labourious .......OZ.
Helixes aren't always downward spirals,sometimes they're screwed up

Offline chipenter

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #2 on: January 16, 2017, 01:47:13 PM »
Wood a diamond jigsaw blade be worth a try ?
Jeff

Offline appletree

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #3 on: January 16, 2017, 02:49:11 PM »
Hi gents
Thanks for the involvement, cutting the outside profile is not an issue as I can cut a section out with one of those ultra tin angle grinder blades but a jig saw blade is another solution, then profile on the bench grinder. The hole is the issue as it wants to be @ 5mm, bigger and a diamond hole saw might be the answer, I think EDM is the best solution, but I have not got one Ihad thought about a grinding point, but you might need a few. Wondered if a carbide Christmas Tree rotary burr might work



Phil 

Offline krv3000

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #4 on: January 16, 2017, 03:46:19 PM »
well you can unharden it then drill the hole then re harden

Offline sparky961

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #5 on: January 16, 2017, 04:38:45 PM »
When I'm without a solid carbide drill bit that fits the bill, I've put holes in a few things using a hand-sharpened carbide-tipped masonry drill bit.  They're easy to find and cheap.  Have a look at the tip before you buy it and try to picture whether you can sharpen it or not.  Some won't work as well as others.

Sharpen it using a silicon carbide or diamond wheel with minimal relief so it doesn't dig in too aggressively.  You won't get anything resembling spiral chips, more like saw dust or just plain dust.  If you're drilling through solid then maybe try to punch or nick a starting hole to keep the drill from walking.  Drilling out an existing hole will probably be harder because it will want to chatter like crazy.

Clamp everything rigidly, turn slow, feed light, and keep it all cool.

If it doesn't work, you've only lots a few bucks (or pounds, euro, quid.... whatever).  You may need more than one...

Offline PekkaNF

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #6 on: January 17, 2017, 01:13:23 AM »
Whole lot also depends on HSS properties. I have used very hard high carbon drill to drill trough "import" HSS.

HSS is known to keep temper at higher temperature, not necessary hardness. Normal carbon steel can be sometimes harder, but it has to be kept cool, because if it heated over 160C it might loose temper and that is not very high rpm.

Problem is that often we really don't know the hardness to our tools...both can be from 30 over 60 Rockwell scale.

Halfway down:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_steel

Very likely your slitting saw is M2 HSS and it could have hardness to 62-64 I would attack it with tungsten carbide drill, most likely to succeed.

Pekka

Offline mfletch

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #7 on: January 17, 2017, 04:05:50 AM »
Ive drilled through a HSS drill bit before and not through shank it was through the flutes just get yourself a locksmith drill bit there carbide on the end

Offline mattinker

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Re: Drilling holes in HSS
« Reply #8 on: January 17, 2017, 06:20:07 AM »
When I'm without a solid carbide drill bit that fits the bill, I've put holes in a few things using a hand-sharpened carbide-tipped masonry drill bit.  They're easy to find and cheap.  Have a look at the tip before you buy it and try to picture whether you can sharpen it or not.  Some won't work as well as others.

Sharpen it using a silicon carbide or diamond wheel with minimal relief so it doesn't dig in too aggressively.  You won't get anything resembling spiral chips, more like saw dust or just plain dust.  If you're drilling through solid then maybe try to punch or nick a starting hole to keep the drill from walking.  Drilling out an existing hole will probably be harder because it will want to chatter like crazy.

Clamp everything rigidly, turn slow, feed light, and keep it all cool.

If it doesn't work, you've only lots a few bucks (or pounds, euro, quid.... whatever).  You may need more than one...

I've had frequent sucess with this method very useful!

Regards, Matthew