Norseman step reamers = big disappointment

[shamrock12]

First of all, I am a huge fan of their (Norseman) drill bits and have several of their sets plus some S&D individual bits. As many of you already knew, they are known for top notch USA made drill bits. So I am not in any way trying to bash them but rather to just share my honest experience.

So I recently had a small project that I was working on. I was adding a hydraulic deflector on my 3-point rear snowblower and that was when I noticed that my tractor top link ball socket seemed a bit loose on the implement side (the snowblower). A quick investigation revealed that the manufacturer of snowblower cut a few 11/16” holes at the top link bracket and supplied a 5/8” pin. This is rather odd because the snowblower is setup for category one and most compact tractors are category one which uses 3/4” pin for top link. So as you can image, there was a bit of slop. So I decided I want to correct this by simply enlarging the existing holes to 3/4” and buy a new 3/4” pin which would match the diameter on tractor’s top link. I recall seeing Norseman’s “Hole Hog” style drill bits designed for enlarging S&D holes in their catalog awhile ago and was planning to order one. Then I saw their newly released “Step Reamers” and was surprised by their advertisement that they can work in material up to 1/2” thick.

http://www.norsemandrill.com/HSS-GR-Step-Reamer.php

Their reamers seemed really intriguing to me but to be honest, I also was a bit skeptical about their claim about reaming really thick materials as well. But knowing Norseman, I thought I would give them a try. So I ordered their 3-piece set through Harry Epstein online two days ago and it came to my door today. (Great service by them, as always). Opened up the set tonight and it has the look of quality all over it and appeared to be very well made. I really was looking forward to try them out, so I wasted no time chucking up their medium sized reamer (which has the 3/4” that I needed). Grabbed a bottle of quality cutting lubricant and gave it a good coating. The 11/16” section of the reamer slides through the hole, a bit snug but with only very little effort because of paint coating inside the hole. I started drilling at low speed with minimal pressure out of caution and to monitor how this reamer would respond. It started smoking right away (cooking the oil) and was making some nice chips. So I keep adding oil liberally as it would continue to smoke even though I was taking it fairly easy. This reamer “drilled” through the 1/4” thick A36 steel like butter. I was really impressed. In fact, I was so impressed that my doubt about their reamers immediately went away. So I went over to the other side to do the second hole. Added some more oil before starting, of course. Again, using only low-moderate speed, it started smoking again as usual but not for very long. And when I say smoking, I’m not talking about a full blown coal burning steam locomotive. Just the typical ones you see when drilling with an ordinary drill bit with liberal amount of lubricant to keep it cool. Then after drilling about halfway through I noticed that it wasn’t generating as much chips as the first hole did and that it was taking a bit longer too. Neither less, I finished the second hole after adding a little more pressure (again, 1/4” thick A36 steel) but it did leave behind some burrs on the exit hole. The first one hardly had any. Not certain what was going on, I decided to enlarge a couple more holes (the snowblower has two different positions for attaching the top link to, with each position having two holes) to see if it is the reamer or if I had a bad hole. Positioned the reamer into the third hole, lubricated it and started drilling. Not much was happening. Oiled some more and bumped up the speed a bit but nothing much still. So I put even more pressure on it and got it going but still was very slow. So I really cranked up the pressure by putting my body weight against the drill and eventually got the third hole reamed out. The exit burr has progressively gotten worse. So my excitement about this reamer set is rapidly turning into a big disappointment. But the job still is not finished yet as I still had one more hole to enlarge. Lined up the reamer, oiled and I tried my mightiest to get it to start reaming but it only got about 1/32” of the way through 1/4” thick material, so I was like screw this and took out my 1/2” carbide burr bit chucked into my die grinder and enlarged the 4th hole until it was just under 3/4”. Then I finished off the job with the reamer. It did leave behind even worse burrs at the exit.

I am not sure what happened or why it’s performance went downhill so quickly. After cleaning up the reamer, I really couldn’t see or tell what or where the issue is. I am sure this reamer set is not designed for daily production run but rather for occasional hole enlarging. But if it can only do it’s job for one thick hole before it’s performance would quickly deteriorate downhill then it definitely is not worth $100 for the set at all.

Again, I am only sharing my experience with you so that you would not get disappointed like I did. I mean, I really had my hope up with this set, but I guess my instinct was right in the first place that their claim of being able to drill up to 1/2” thick seemed far reaching for a step reamer. Don’t get me wrong, I’m fairly sure this set would work well on thin sheet metals but definitely not thick sheets or plates. Norseman does make excellent drill bits, but they really missed their mark on this one.

 

[GeoBruin]

Am I to understand you were using a reamer in a hand drill? I don't know a ton about reaming but I always assumed it had to be done in a machine.

Also, I've always heard a rule of thumb is that a reamer can cut 2 - 3 percent of it's diameter. For a 7/8 cutter that's . 02625 at the high end. You were taking a 1/16th which is .0625 which is almost 3 times that.

Maybe the combination just wore them out prematurely?

Edit - I see now these were step reamers which I've never seen but which it seems can be used with a hand drill.

 

[cvairwerks]

Typically reamers are only used to remove less than .025" in soft materials and even less in hard stuff. I don't think I ever took more than about .015" in fracture critical aluminum forgings.

 

[macgee]

I don't think I've gone bigger than 10 thousandths with a proper reamer and never with a hand drill, that's a recipe for disaster.

Having said that, I've never used a stepped reamer before like that before, I have several Norseman stepped drill bits that looks very similar to that reamer and they've been holding up really well even when using with a hand drill but those cuts are not nearly as good when using it in a DP or mill and the bit takes waaaay more of a beating when using a hand drill.

I also always use a lubricant when using it, makes a big difference.

 

[dutchgray]

Probably ran it at too much rpm and cooked the cutting edge, you only have a tiny cutting edge at each step so it doesn't take much to dull it enough it won't work well.
I find it I get any more than a tiny bit of smoke its time to slow the speed down.
No step drill is a particularly long lived tool especially used by hand.

 

[PCustoms]

I'm struggling to understand how this is anything more then normal step drill....

As to your issue, you cooked it. Too much speed/material engaged. I've done the same, on the same type of hole, but it was an $8 HF step drill I've had for years...

 

[Rinspeed]

Why they would call a step bit a reamer is very strange, two totally different tools. I've always used Uni-bit and they hold up well until you abuse them and then they fail like most other tools. I've always been a big fan of Norseman drill bits, tough to beat.

 

[karoc]

Thanks for sharing your experiences, I am also a Norseman fan even watch a show while back about Norseman Vikings. I wish that makers of these tools such as this would put out a simple Youtube on their suggested way of using them to get the best performance out of that tool and longest life. I can see free handing to drill hole in thin metal but I don't know about thick metal nor increasing the speed. But dang A36 and Norseman that shouldn't been problem.

 

[dr_clyde]

What you linked is just a fancy step drill. I don’t know why they call it a reamer, that’s not even close to the same tool. That’s misleading at best.

Personally, I find single flute step drills like that bring the ****. I much prefer two flute designs. My favorites are the Lenox vari-bit. I have personally hogged through 1/2” stainless with a vari-bit with no trouble.

 

[GeoBruin]

Just looked at the Viking site and they recommend 1% for hand reaming and 2% for machine reaming, but I interpret hand reaming to mean using a tap handle or something similar.

 

[shamrock12]

Thank you all for responding. Just to clarify, I was going pretty slow, like 150-250 rpm or so when I first started using it and it still was generating a bit of chip smokes. But it did not heat up the bit. Only the oil and chips that flung off the bit. I felt if I went even slower that it might dull the bit. There is absolutely no evidence of overheating the bit. In fact the bit still looked like near new after I cleaned it up. I know I took every preventive steps by giving it PLENTY of cutting oil, like every 5-10 seconds of drilling, low speed, so it never ran dry or overheated the bit.

I was given the impression and viewed those “step reamers” no differently than your typical Unibits. Only difference is that Unibits are for sheet metals while those step reamers are also for plate metals (1/4”-1/2”) or so they were advertised. If they were not intended to be used like I did then the Norseman were being misleading.

 

[Dustball]

Contact them- [email protected]

 

[Jlarson]

I've got kimball midwest and champion versions of them. I use them pretty regularly on 1/4 - 3/8 plate without issue enlarging holes. I run cutting paste on them like I do with my spiral reamers thought and go real easy and let them do the work.

 

[seber]

I have always believed you are either making chips or making heat. The worst thing you can do to a cutting tool is use too little pressure. If the cutting edge is sliding instead of cutting it will burn and dull quickly. That type of tool really is not well suited to hand drilling as you can't properly judge the amount of force required. In a drill press you can quickly find the appropriate amount of downforce and hold it there. I would say it held up well considering the application.

 

[shamrock12]

I have always believed you are either making chips or making heat. The worst thing you can do to a cutting tool is use too little pressure. If the cutting edge is sliding instead of cutting it will burn and dull quickly. That type of tool really is not well suited to hand drilling as you can't properly judge the amount of force required. In a drill press you can quickly find the appropriate amount of downforce and hold it there. I would say it held up well considering the application.

This type of tool has 3/8” three-flats on shank, so I would believe it was designed for hand drilling. I don’t think you would often see Unibits style bits on a drill press. If you were to use this “step reamer” on a press, you would need a lot of clearance below the hole before it could hit the table or another material behind it.

Yes, I was being mindful of this same thing. When I first started out it was cutting quite rapidly and generating some heat, so I was being easy on the pressure. Otherwise I’d be making more heat and possibly overload the bit. As already stated earlier, I was drilling at low speed as well. I balanced those variables to the best of my judgment. If they were to be used differently, then that would be on Norseman for failure to provide special instructions.

 

[MJD1]

Wrong tool for the job. What you want is what's called a " car reamer". Tapered about 1" per foot with a spiral to make it run true. They are designed to be used in hand held equipment to enlarge holes. In that 3/4" size run about 100-200 rpm and plenty of cutting oil. Also, never run in reverse. Not cheap but the best way to enlarge a hole with a portable drill.

 

[Mr_fixit]

I would have used one of these reamers. Best tool to make an existing hole larger. Pricey, but worth it.

 

[MJD1]

I would have used one of these reamers. Best tool to make an existing hole larger. Pricey, but worth it.

Those are car reamers, otherwise known as frame reamers.