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Edited By JasonB on 06/01/2016 20:16:32

I bought a cheap 'mole grip' with square-shaped jaws that makes it very easy and quick to clamp down the drilling vice.

Neil

Same thing happened to me when I were about 13, I got my first drill press, exactly same vice too and it was on brass, luckily the belt was loose. At the time I never knew about this problem with brass as schools used to give you a hand vice and give you a hole to drill, I always assumed it was ok as it's what I were taught at school, probably why they don't teach metal work in schools anymore.

Andrew- I used to machine plastic seals which couldn't be clamped most of the time and had to be held by hand, I used to use only slot drills as even the slow spiral drills were unusable. I admit I had many accidents on the miller at work, no emergency stop on machines either, it was a case of deal with it, this was the kind of place where you given an interlock key to over-ride CNC machine doors so you could catch the parts as they come off, one of the reasons I left.

Maybe someone should start a near miss thread,

I think I would have clamped material as thin as that between something thicker and drilled through the lot. Drilling thin material is always a problem when you break through and the hole usually finishes up triangular. On this occasion I think the material thickness contributed more to the problem than being brass but I would always adjust the rake on a drill or as mentioned above, use a slow helix drill for brass.

Mike

Drilling plastics like acrylic need the drill treated as for brass, but I have found that a larger 'flat' is needed to work well all the time on plastics.

Pete

I'll make a note of this for the next time the tab breaks off a tin of cornbeef

An alternative is to use a punch. A hardened and tempered silver steel rod with squared end, sharp corner, into a close fitting hole would easily do the job. You can make it as complex as you like.

But, I suppose, the obvious ease and speed of using a drill always wins.

JA

Bazyle:

Those drilling machine clamps are excellent as long as one can be bothered to use them. I found the ring nut rather slow in use and have recently substituted a quick nut which makes installation and removal much quicker and removes the temptation to take a chance.

Apart from its tendency to grab brass can also work harden which accentuates the problem.

Put something on top of it that is held by the vice and drill through that. The stuff underneath needn't be held tight.

So much trouble you probably wouldn't have done it in the first place and made the part from a decent sized sheet.

John

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Russell Eberhardt:

Sheet metal punches have a central pip which I assume is intended for location.