Getting a good split is not possible unless you are remarkably lucky. So when I try to split, I either get a split past the center, or it leaves a little square piece of the point in place. The collets are so loose in the tube on mine that the end of a smaller drill moves around a distance equal to about its diameter. If the twist is different than expected, the tip will be at some angle other than expected.Īs far as the split. Mine cannot possibly be gripping on the split, since I never USE the split.Īlso, it grips the drill well back from the tip, at least a quarter inch, maybe more. If the drill has ANY other twist than the 'normal one' that the DD expects, it won't work. and the fact that they ONLY work on 'normal twist'. Not very sturdy, and seem to have shifted or worn. The main problem I have seen is the fact that the alignment 'prongs' seem to be made from old pieces of pallet strap that they must have cut off a shipment. If anyone is having problems with a DD not grinding drills correctly this could be something to look into. In practice I've found the solution is to keep a finger on the end of the drill and use my finger tip to manually rotate the drill to ensure the collet is gripped at the correct angle. It's clearly a design fault, as if the 'prongs' gripped further up the shank the problem wouldn't occur.

Whether that would be a problem to others may depend on the depth of cut set by the stop, I have mine set to just skim a little off each time I grind. As predicted, it allowed the drill to be rotated within the collet. There's not a lot in it, as it only JUST grips the wrong part. When I looked at it carefully I could see the 'prongs' that are used to align the drill in the collet were gripping part of the shank of the drill that had been ground from splitting the point instead of the flutes as it should. I couldn't work it out as the only possible explanation was that the drill was rotated when it was ground. Changing the 'notch' the collet was sitting in helped a little, but something clearly wasn't right. Nevertheless the (incorrect) relief was symmetrical on both sides. Soon thereafter the drills started being ground with negative relief and clearly didn't cut. If treated gently I couldn't foresee any problems with it lasting a while and doing a reasonable job. When I first got the machine it worked like a charm, sure it's not industrial quality by a long shot, but I couldn't understand what all the bad reports were about. I have a 750x and like the split point facilities. This may be common knowledge but I hadn't seen anything about it, nor did the Darex rep know anything about it when I spoke to him at a show.

Rather than hijacking a thread running here on the Darex I thought it better to start a new thread.

Drill dr