How do you organize your drills ?

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How do you organize your drills ?

I've got the standard individual index boxes for fractional, letter and number up to 1/2"

I've also got a few 17/32" around for 1/2" screw clearance screw holes.



The big problem is the larger drills

Some are reduced 1/2" shanks that I've turned
some long
Some short
some Morse taper 1, 2, 3

Whatever I've bought, inherited or whatever ove the years.

all in baskets that I have to root through to find something


I don't use them too often, but I'd like them organized
I don't really want to line the walls with them.

It would be nice if it fit inside a filiing cabnet drawer or toolbox drawer


What do you do, let me steal your ideas

[EdK]

The larger drill bits that don't get used that often are kept in the container they came in and then are all put into a shoebox that gets stored on a shelf. Not very elegant but it works for me.

Oh, and welcome to the group.

Ed

   

[TomG]

Steven,

When I was working as a machinist my drill indexes would constantly disappear, so I screwed then into one of the drawers in my Kennedy box. The small drawer on the left is just large enough for a fractional and a number set. It works great.

Welcome aboard BTW. Be sure to stop by the introduction section and tell us about yourself. Oh, and I'm sure you'll hear all about it, but we love pics.

Tom

[oldgoaly]

organized? heck no!

   

now if I every get everything else done.... restore this jobber bit display and use it.

   

[PixMan]

I organize my taper shank and larger drills like this:





OK, so that's just how the lot of drills my dad bought at a flea market for $5 got tossed into an empty drawer of a Kennedy 527B roll-around that I picked up for $100.

I've got two of the Huot 115 drill indexes, one nearly complete of jobber length HSS drills, the other complete set of screw machine length HSS drills. The indexes house wire gauge drills from No.60 to 1, fractional inch sizes from 1/16" to 1/2" by 1/64", and Letter sizes A through Z. Also a couple of smaller indexes just for wire gauge, fractional and Letter size Jobber length drills and one for letter size reamers (that I don't know if I'll ever need.) I've also started collecting metric jobber length, inch and other sizes of taper length and extended length drills, those will be tough to store in any order.

As I sort through and clean up the shop my dad just left me, I'll be seeking better ways to organize those taper shank drills, my taps, end mills and so much more. That's why I appreciate this thread, so keep the ideas coming.

[Mayhem]

That's not organization Ken, that is chaos!

I keep the majority of mine in the indexes they came in. I have some two MT1 drills that live in their plastic tubes and a set of MT2 drills that currently live in the case they came in, although it is not very practical. Eventually, I will make a rack for them. My very small collection of MT3 drills and other MT2 live on the crude table I have positioned behind my lathe. It has a 1" thick piece of chipboard as a top and I have drilled holes into for the drills to sit into. I have a set of 9/16" - 1" drills with a 1/2" shank, which I have sitting a block of wood - nothing pretty but it works.

I have a tap and die set that came in a plastic case. But I have a large number of UN taps that were rattling around in a box. I now have them sorted by size in plastic tubes, so now just the tubes rattle around in the box I plan on making some sort of index for them.

I'll try to get some pictures tomorrow.

[krv3000]

well i have a set of dormer drills in the tin they came in from 1mm to 6mm in .1 steps i made a stand to hold the next sises from 6.1 to 13mm sum of the holes are still empty i wood say 87% of me drills have cum from boot sales and i have me spear drills store in watt ever i can put them in and me Morse taper drills are in a draw pics

[Micktoon]

Hi Bob , you have got me laughing here ............ I loved the 87% of the drills came from car boot sales .............we need you to be more precise than that Bob................... You will have to tip them all out ,count them all and remember which ones were car boot jobs and give the lads a proper figure of the percentage
Nice work keeping them tidy mind Bob........I need to get more drill storage sorted out as its always the last one you get to when looking through loose boxes of drills

Cheers Mick

[the penguin]

here is how I store some of mine

[EdK]

(08-04-2013, 06:32 PM)the penguin Wrote: here is how I store some of mine

that's a lot of drill bits.

Ed