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Any recommendations for a compact drill stand?
I want to drill perpendicular holes so thinking of a getting a compact drill stand. Are the cheap ones cheap for a reason and I'll wish I spent more money? Is it worth going for something more expensive? It will mainly be used for drilling wood, do the cheap ones cope well with spade bits? I'm not an aspiring furniture maker or anything, but would rather go with something I'll be satisified is of reasonable quality rather than buy some cheap crap that wobbles about all over the place.
I have a couple of old Black & Decker ones which I have used for drilling 35mm hinge holes in wardrobe doors. I've always found them to be an absolute time consuming pain. Getting the workpiece level, getting the bit perfectly aligned and getting the depth spot on.
Sadly I found it even harder to find an inexpensive alternative. I ended up spending quite a bit on a specific hinge jig.
If I need to drill a perpendicular hole down the centre of an 18mm panel it involves all sorts of Heath Robinson messing about with Workmates, offcuts, clamps and so on.
And I'm a professional FFS.
Just buy a pillar drill. A cheap one isn't much more than a drill stand and it'll be so much better.
If I had a workshop I'd be tempted to get a pillar drill, as it is I have to get out a bit of old carpet to work on and do stuff in the hall way. Limited space to store too, though could probably find somewhere.
A cheap one isn’t much more than a drill stand and it’ll be so much better.
my experiance differs....
cheap pillar drills' are ****ing awful.
even my cheap aldi drill press stand was more rigid than the cheap clarke pillar drill.....
i bought a used meddings off mcmoonter and now know that i have no fear of the bit wandering due to Shit keyway designs allowing rotation of the headstock and general flimsyness......
I bought mine for a specific drilling into a very expensive and unreplacable TI frame to renew a rivnut..... but since then its done such tasks as removing pistons from car brakes (depth control is a must) its removed bleed nipples from various things , its set up for helicoils that need to be perpendicular to work piece to ensure even clamping.
its one of them tools that once you have you wondered why you fannied around with a handheld for so long ....
Can only echo what trail_rat has said! Mine's a 50yr old Union that I'm looking after for the next generation; was 440V 3ph but now running using a Mitsubishi inverter and VFD so I have full speed control, reverse and jog - should I ever need them.
So much quieter and smoother than even the £400 Axminster Trade drill I bought new last year.
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I have one of these, comes in handy.
http://www.wolfcraft.com/en/products/p/drill_guides/1_tecmobil_mobile_drill_stand/s/p/index.html
Look out for the record power drill stands - DS19 is current model I think,
not cheap but a lot more solid than the cheapys - can be found second hand or new.
I have a Meddings and a couple of other pillar drills - they all have their place .
One option - and they do come up for sale cheaply sometimes is a small morticer with a drill chuck attachment I have the record power small morticer which uses the same components as their earlier drill stands - that has done jobs that the big Meddings could not do - ie when you have to move the drill to the work and not the other way around, you can also bung it on a workmate and clamp it down - bugger doing that with 120kg of Meddings!
Something like this:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Very-large-heavy-duty-drill-stand-Record-Power-Sheffield-England-piller-drill/323041357652?hash=item4b36c3ef54:g:KwoAAOSwhdZacH4E
or new
or the morticer - the yellow bit comes off and then you have a single speed pillar drill
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Woodworking-Morticer-Record-Power-75-RPM-and-3-Ridgeway-bits/273045922608?hash=item3f92ce2330:g:jy8AAOSwJ0xaV11Y
As per the other posts the really cheap pillar drills are a bit poor - deflection on the work table and really bad runout at the chuck are common, thats why the morticer works - its designed to cope with a very high downward force without deflecting.
One speed is a compromise - but in woodwork its much less of a problem than with wood.
Thanks for the replies. Going to go for the Record stand, had my eye on it anyway but good to hear some experienced opinions.