Thread: Finding the centre of a rod

Well done Jeremy,

Looks very similar to the design I submitted in the original post, and easier to make for the home handyman.

Ken

I have a centre finder but a more accurate method for me is as follows.

Use a small piece of scrap say 50x50x50 mm hardwood drill a hole not all the way through that is a snug fit on the material to be centre found. eg for 20mm round rod drill a 20mm hole say 30mm deep in the scrap then using the (for want of a better word) countersink of the large drill, drill a small hole say 3mm diameter through the rest of the scrap. Place the jig you have now made over the end of the rod and using the 3mm drill a shallow hole into the work piece. This time the 3mm drill is entering from the opposite side from which it was originally drilled.

The square or hexagonal material is done in the same way, again just make sure that the stock is a snug fit in the large hole in the jig.

This method should mark the centre very accurately so long as the drills are sharp so the material of the jig does not deflect the drill.

I have used 110mm thick steel as the jig and drilled a hole 5mm dia in 10mm rod.

All the other comments about making sure the drill and the wotk are aligned before drilling the holes are also necessary with this method as well as any of the other methods

If the jig made accurately on an aligned drill press and is deep enough say about the same or greater depth than the finished hole and the material of the jig is hard enough the final hole could be pilot drilled using a portable drill, as the jig will keep the hole aligned.

I know it is an old thread but I'm sure people are still drilling holes in the end of all sorts of material.

Cheers

Put the rod in the drill chunk and the drill in the machine vice and who cares where the centre is, the drill will go up it.