Thread: How do I drill straight holes for axles in wooden toys

use spacers

Three possible causes here; firstly is the drill table flexing when you drill? Cheap Chinese bench drills have rather bendy tables; if yours is like this then the "cure" is to use very sharp bits and drill slowly.

Secondly; and more likely, the car body isn't being presented at right angles to the drill. As Screwed briefly explained you can use spacers to shim up the body so that it is laying in the correct plane and properly supported.

Thirdly; the drill bit is following the grain and wandering. Normal twist drills can be deflected by difficult grained woods, use forstner or brad point drills in wood where possible, and have them professionally sharpened when they go blunt.

Do you have a fence of some sort on your table to put the face that you are trying to stay parallel to up against to ensure your workpiece is vertical at all times. I have made a fence for mine which is 90 degrees to the table. I put the workpiece up against it and adjust it back or forward to get one of the holes lined up with the drill bit point. Once I have it positioned correctly I just lock it down and slide the workpiece along it to line up each hole. That way any holes you drill will at least be in one line where they start and hopefully come out at the correct position on the other side. As Chief Tiff says, a normal twist drill can follow the grain especially if you are using soft wood like Pine as there is a lot of variation in hardness of different parts of the grain. Brad points tend to track a bit better in these types of wood. Good idea not to make the holes too neat on the axles as this will give the wheels a chance to take up some of the slight misalignment.

Hi folks thanks for the advice. I have a very solid drill press table, but I've been using a twist drill at high speed which could be my problem. I built a jig with a 90 right angle to clamp the wood into to keep the body straight but I seem to angle the hole some how, so I'll take you advice and use a fence and lower the drill speed and use a brad point bit. Thanks again

Originally Posted by Thomsign

Hi folks, this is my first post. I just got started making wooden toy trucks and cars for my great, great nephews. When I drill the axle holes through the car bodies I seem to drill them on a slight angle. I drill the hole on a drill press. The drill press table is 90 degrees to the drill bits. But when I push the dowels through and put the wheels on they always are crooked with one wheel that just misses touching the table top. I sure could use some advices from you folks.

G'day Bob, Good to see you've found the more than help mob in toymaking...
I used to have the similar problems but with good making out from both sides plus clamping off to an old engineers vee block on the drill press table has helped fix my errors...
I hope that helps, Cheers, crowie

PS - Yes, I too have converted to brad point drill bits "Colt Brand"....

Hi Thomsign,
Welcome to a top forum. If the problem still exists after using the brad point bits, how did you check that the table is square to the drill chuck. The best way I found to check, is to make a Z out of a piece of heavy wire and bring the table up to just touch the wire, slowly rotate the chuck and watch the clearance that it's the same all the way around. If you can get hold of a dial indicator that would be even better.
Kryn

Hi Thomsign, Not knowing exactly what the requirement is for, it is hard for me to comment other than what my other illustrious woodworkers have suggested.
Do you need to drill right through (eg. for strength or the wheel and adjoining axle rotates through the base). The fact that the drill bit deviates makes me think you may be using a narrow drill bit which indicates that the axle may not be stress bearing. Have you considered a short axle on both sides rather than a pass through and have the wheel rotate about the short axle?
Alternatively, as Crowie suggested drill from both sides and meet in the middle. Any middle "bends" will only make the dowel fit tight which could be eased out with a rats tail file.

Also I find bullet points deviate less than brad points. Once a brad start to deviate it's like my missus and CA glue... the mind has been made up and sets like concrete.

Alex.

Hi folks, thanks for all your advice. Alexkara what I did was drill through a 3" long x 5/8" square piece of spruce lumber which is very soft, I took a bunch of ideas from photos of toys in Google and design my own plans. Currently I'm building farm tractors. These wooden axle blocks are were drilled on the drill press clamped into a corner jig using a standard bit. As I said above it would drill crooked. I tried it using a brad point The other day that seemed to help a lot. Still was a little crooked. So I'll take your and the other guys advice and just drill small hole on each side. Hopefully my toy model won't have one wheel higher than the others.
We have a lot of heavy earth moving going on across the street from the house, so I got my camera out and photographed excavators and bull dozers, from that I drew up a plan for an excavator, that I plan on building next. I'm an old graphic artist by trade so it was fairly easy to make drawing from the photos I took, also ideas from photos off this site and Lumberjocks. Now if I can make these old hand and eyes work together maybe I'll make something that doesn't wobble. Thank you guys for all your advice your ideas are great. Thomsign

RedvTractor rh front view.jpgRedvTractor rh side.jpgHI guys I had a few problems getting the axles on. I replaced several axle blocks and finally just drilled straight through and glued the wheels to the axles. Thanks for all the advice once again. I hope the next toy I build I'll have better luck with and take you great advice. Thanks Bob

Bat Car1.jpgHopper 1.jpgSpide car 1.jpgDumpers 1.jpgHere my first attempt at making toys the dumpers were the first one I started making Thanks again

WOW Bob, What top lineup of beaut hand made wooden toys, something to be very proud of and the double joy will be seeing children play with them...FIRST CLASS WORK sir... Cheers, crowie

PS - Where did you get the dump truck plans please....

Originally Posted by crowie

WOW Bob, What top lineup of beaut hand made wooden toys, something to be very proud of and the double joy will be seeing children play with them...FIRST CLASS WORK sir... Cheers, crowie

PS - Where did you get the dump truck plans please....

I copied an old plan that someone put on some web site, it was a farm truck. I redraw the plan to make it bigger and with a dump box on it. My great, great nephews really enjoy them, the three of them have broken bits and pieces of them. But that's OK as their dad's have to learn how to fix their toys. Thanks for your post Bob

Bob,

Welcome to the forum. From your photo's I can see that you use short axles on each side of the car. The wheels turn around the axles. That way the placement of hole becomes critical. The way I make my cars is different.
I use 8 mm axles through and through. I mark the holes on one side of the car and adjust my drill so that on the lowest point the tip of the brad point drill just pokes through. I use 9 mm holes, 1 mm bigger than the axles. Turn the car, and drill the holes on the other side where the tip of the drill bill poked through. You can drill through the car in one pass, but turning the car can prevent splinters an torn-out pieces. Now you have a hole in your car. I buy wheels with a smaller hole for the axles than I need, so I drill the hole of each wheel to 8 mm. Cut the axles so that one wheel has 1,5-2,0 mm space when the other wheel touches the body. That way the wheel can turn freely.

Plus:
- You can use a bigger axles, thus stronger
- The 1 mm between the axle and the hole makes sure the wheel can turn freely, and act as balancers, so all the wheels touch the ground
- The axles on each side are always on the same height if the drill bit is 90 degrees

Con:
- A bit more work
- Since the axle is bigger, you need to put the wheels higher on the car to make sure that there is enough wood on the bottom of the car left to support the axles

Greets,

Bob

Crowie,
The Farm Truck plan that Thomsgn refers to is, I think, Jim Makowicki's plan from "Making Heirloom Toys".

Geoff