I would expect that as long as you don’t clip the cutter against the top edge of the bushing and damage the cutter that you should be fine as long as you do your best centering things up before drilling. The drill bushings are very hard and designed to resist wear, and although it is a lot of holes, you’re going to be splitting up the wear across 12+ bushings. The annular cutters do almost all their work (besides chip removal) with the tips of the cutting edge, not the side, so as long as you are careful not to chip it you should be able to get through quite a few holes.
@Gringo.Ironworks
I did some calculations on how many hours it would take to drill 1200 holes in 1 in plate with a mag drill. It takes approximately 8 hrs to drill 240 holes in 1/2 plate. Simple math says it will take approximately 100 hrs to drill the entire table in 1in plate. This is drill running time. This time doesn’t include broken tools, cleanup, chamfering the holes or dull tooling
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@Gringo.Ironworks, it’s a concern I’ve got as well actually. I can’t seem to find a replacement drill anywhere with a >1/2" 3-jaw chuck and forward/reverse so I’m likely stuck with that Milwaukee 4208. I have considered re-grinding the Morse taper to eliminate the runout but it has seemed like slightly less of an issue on the Weldon attachment than it was in the 3 jaw (it wasn’t the 3 jaw, dial indicator only measured runout in the Morse taper sleeve).
@Fireball_Jason, I can personally attest to the time required for drilling as I reamed every single hole on my table with the mag drill and the process took months of a few hours at a time in my off hours. I’m still really stoked for that 5/8" drill guide, though as I have several projects I want to do for myself and to showcase how you could use it for things in a home shop that’s lacking other precision equipment for things like the saw base I built.
good lord! I 100% didn’t realize the time this endeavor was going to be! I actually have a sheet of 5/8 as well I just figured “go big or go Home”! and I’m kind of fa " take a few measurements and get started, we’ll figure out the rest in production" kind of guy! didn’t cypher that hard on times as I have 14 days off at a time, but I’m not sure, even as much as l love DIY, I want to put that much time into this project! Aslo thanks so much for participating in the Forum, not sure where you find the time but its really cool that you do!
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First off is it runout or play? I don’t think I would worry about it as Henry said, you are drilling a lot of holes through a lot of bushings.
Also remember a Annular cutters cut on the bottom not the sides.
Make sure the drill is already to the bottom of the drill bushing before turning on and use oil or coolant and I would think you will be fine.
I will be doing the same thing to a 5x8x3/4 A36 plate holes on 2x2 grid.
I am looking forward to it, now maybe 700-800 holes in I might feel differently 
I know right! for some reason the idea of drilling top holes doesn’t seem that terrible, Its the other sheet for the side holes! I could build the table and use it as I go if all I was doing was the top, but I fill like I’ll regret not putting the sides on it? Has anyone else put sides on their DIY job?
also, how many annular cutters are you Guessing/budgeting for your project? I’m still crunching numbers here!
I would have to check my notes but when I talked with Hougen and he said to figure something like 500-600 per cutter and more if Carbide but don’t remember how many more.
One thing he did say was, all a Carbide cutter would get you was longer life, not a more precision hole.
Anyone got some pics of various projects laid out on the large Dragon Wagon? Jason’s comment on starting there might be making some sense! just trying to get a visual feel for how big a project it can handle. For Building table frames, sign frames. Ornamental work, mailboxes… it might be the way to go money wise???
Carbide can go through hard inclusions like a weld without getting messed up vs HSS
So little up date for those that care, I got my test plate mag drill and reamer all set up this morning and went to work. Took 50 mins to ream out 25 holes. The holes had tapered down to probably 1/2 inch at bottom. I reamed from that side , seamed like right thing to do to save wear on reamer. Went pretty slick, didn’t see any problems with reaming the flame cut holes I was actually getting trough the holes in 35 secs drill time at the end once I got the hang of it. I used hog lard because I have a cousin that has a store that cooks and sells cracklins so I have an inexhaustible supply of it , worked great. i used a “drill Amharic’s” HSS reamer 50$. Was still cutting just as good as when I started after 25 hokes. I was pumped up with the project until I checked the fit. Apparently my guys cnc machine is off, on axis is fine, the other is not , at all. I bought the square with four pegs to get a true test fit and gladeI did, pretty disappointing but I did learn a few things. Oh well back to the drawing board!
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So your saying the holes did not get placed right? How much are they off?
Let us know what you decide to do.
Yea the holes weren’t placed right, I know it wasn’t the reamer deviating because north to south are all perfect, east to west are off, being as it was “charity work” I can’t very well tell him to fix his table before he does my free work😂 I recon I’ll visit with him see if he thinks he can dial it in if not I recon I’ll hope I can get a drill guide when they come available!?
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So I just want to make sure I have this right, 5/8" hole flame cut, with aprox 1/8" of taper?
Were the holes out on both x and y?
Thanks for posting your finding.
It was suppose to be a 3/4 flame cut hole, and it was on top but had tapered down by the time the cut got through the 1 inch plate. I’m assuming machine tracking too fast ? Or not hot enough? Just the y axis was off.
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FYI I got around to getting some quotes form some water jet shops, Good Lawd they were high! a couple were more than just buying a table from Fireball tool! I had no idea how expensive that was gonna be! looks like its drilling one when the jigs come back in stock!
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Got the plate cut, will start drilling next time home, FYI hog lard works great with that Milwaukee steel saw! Was only getting 2 inches of cut before tripped over loads on saw before, started drowning blade in hog lard , cut the rest of plate in one pass, that’s 5/8”!
Looking for some sage like advice on a few parts of this table build. The frame, In an effort to save money and work with what I have I was thinking of trying rip some 4 inch runs of the rest of that sheet of 5/8, enough for a perimeter for the side holes, and one run down the middle. Then the big question. do I try to stitch wild a little bit at a time, or try to drill and tap the 5/8 thick section on the plates? seems kinda narrow?
For some reason the photos didn’t upload?
Flat bar is common to use as the “frame” if you want to call it. To fasten the FB use only big tacks 4-6in spacing. Unfortunately the table will warp. How much? That’s hard to say. There’s really nothing you can do about it. Here’s video link on how the siegmund table is made. FYI Siegmund isn’t flat. It also has a lot of twisting flex.
Finally got started drilling holes
Useing a carbide “evolution” brand cutter, averaging 21 seconds of drill time per hole, cutting well. Gonna be a long project,
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How big is the table?
I got my table top back but wont have time to work on the frame for awhile.
I plan on documenting the complete build if I remember
So mine is 5x8x3/4 2in grid I think it was 1200 + holes
Done on a large mill. This plate looked very small once it was in the mill.
I also have video of it being drilled I will post later
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