annular cutters: a better way to drill big holes in thick steel

[puckgrinder85]

I've seen these at my local store...nice lookings product. Amazon.com: Champion CT7-1 Tungsten Carbide Tipped 1-Inch Hole Cutter-1-Inch Thick Metal: Home Improvement

I bought one of these, only issue is the max depth for the chips to clear is about 1/4". Now thats not a terrible thing as you can always flip the workpiece and use the pilot to go 1/4" more into it and still have a pretty clean hole. They work really well, something a hole saw would never touch.

 

[Todd727]

I bought one of these, only issue is the max depth for the chips to clear is about 1/4". Now thats not a terrible thing as you can always flip the workpiece and use the pilot to go 1/4" more into it and still have a pretty clean hole. They work really well, something a hole saw would never touch.

That sounds like the CT5

 

[sparc]

I just checked out your link and see the Hougen arbor for 1/2" Jacobs chucks
that you mentioned. What did it cost you?

Back when I started this thread, I wanted only a Morse Taper arbor, but I can
see that an arbor for a portable drill can be very handy. I did not see one
when I was looking and when I bought my Champion bits. With a large
hand drill, you can go very slow, and really flood the area (if outside) with
coolant. My geared head 1/2" hand drill is a wrist-buster.

If a Jacobs chuck arbor costs anywhere near what I paid for my MT3 arbor,
I would consider getting one.

I just completed a bunch more 3/4-7/8" holes in 1/2" plate. Sweet.

Sorry it took so long for me to get back on this. I have not followed the thread and just looked at it by chance this evening.

The adapter was about $45 IIRC, but its been a few months and I could be off by 10 bucks or so.

 

[dbotos]

Hougen RotaCuts are great if you don't have to do anything super-thick:

RotaCut Sheet Metal Hole Cutters

 

[mjncad]

Neat, thanks for the link.

 

[dbotos]

Just to give an idea of price on the RotaCut sets, I paid $85 for the small set and $185 for the large set back in 2012. I don't think they had the master set out then.

 

[JamesH]

For those interested I also started using annular cutters last year. I bought a set of cutters at the AG show and use them in my table top mill/drill. While it would have been possible to put the cutter in an end mill holder I ended up buying a Jancy arbor from Amazon. It is an R8 arbor with coolant capability. It works real slick and the steel cuts like butter.

 

[dfkrug]

It is an R8 arbor with coolant capability. It works real slick and the steel cuts like
butter.

If you use them with the center coolant, they are even more impressive than the way I use them (above). AND
you can run them at fairly high RPM.