Cutting wooden plugs

Ruffles

Ruffles

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Boat: Portsmouth, Us: Stewkley
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I'm replacing the woodwork on our old tender. I've bought myself a plug cutter / hole borer pair (made by Faithful) to make the roughly 50 plugs and screw holes required. Trouble is I'm finding the plug cutter hard to use. If I use a power drill it skitters over the surface of the wood and I often find that the plug is broken when I extract it from the cutter. It also gets very hot!

Am I doing something wrong?

Also, how deep should the c/s hole be to ensure the plugs don't fall out. The timber is only 3/4" thick but is likely to get worn.
 
I use Stanley ones, but I imagine that they are much the same.

Ideally, use the plug cutter in a drill press. In practical terms, use an electric drill and apply fairly brutal pressure to stop it skidding. It will get very hot, as it is cutting away a lot of wood in a small space, so there is a lot of friction and nowhere for the heat to dissipate.

The plug should not remain in the cutter, but should stay attached to the bit of scrap wood that you are making plugs from - use a chisel or a dovetail saw (a fine backsaw with about 14 points per inch, rip cut) to separate the plug from the waste.

Theoretically the plug should be about as deep as its diameter, or just a little less.

Don't set them in epoxy, or they will never come out. Use a PVA glue (colourless when dry!) or (better) use a drop of varnish.
 
Plug cutters should only be used in a drill press - not by hand as you get exactly the problem you describe.

One way to ensure that you get a very good fix with the plugs in thinner materials is to make the plug and recess much bigger than the screwhead; i.e. drill a large recess, say 12 or 15 mm wide (the size of one of the bigger plug cutters), then drill the screw pilot and countersink in the centre of this recess, and then use a larger plug than you would normally. The plug has a much larger glue area due to its larger circumference.
 
A plug cutter really does need to be used in a drill press or with a power drill held in a drill stand. Trying to use it freehand, as you have found, is nearly impossible. Even if you do get the cutter to bite in without skittering you will probably end up with an undersized or broken plug.
Choose the wood for plugs carefully - if the grain is not uniform and straight this can make chiselling off the excess difficult. I usually cut a block of plugs, then release them by running the block through the bandsaw. However, it is quite easy to release them by levering against the side of the hole with a small screwdriver or similar.
I favour tapered plugs, made with cutters by, say, Veritas. These snug up very nicely. For shallow holes I usually chisel off the thin end of the plug, then insert the remaining thick end for a tight fit.
Of course, the final result is only as good as the hole you've drilled. I like to use a Forstner drill bit to get a very clean hole.
Axminster (axminster.co.uk) is an excellent source of equipment.
Plug cutters do run hot, and need to be kept sharp to avoid burning instead of cutting. Using a drill stand and running the drill at a lower speed will help a lot.
 
Rob,

What wood are you working with? Since you are probably not going out to buy a pillar drill, try a softer matching wood for the plugs. They certainly can be cut by hand, I have a few on the boat. Or you can buy teak plugs at the swindlery, and the link to Thai Teak posted recently yielded this:

http://www.thaiteakmarine.com/catalog/page49.htm
 
I discovered exactly what you are finding. It is not only nearly impossible to hold the drill still by hand, but very dangerous. The cutter jumps about all over the place, and the closer you get to it the greater the risk of it skidding off and cutting a plug out of your knee.
Ideally use a drill stand that is bolted to the bench, not just free-standing. Also some sort of guide to hold the wood is a good idea. The cutter can suddenly lock in the hole and twist the wood out of your hand if there is nothing to brace it against.
I've always used an ordinary countersinker to drill the hole, carried on beyond the point where it stops countersinking but just drills a hole, eg 1/2 ". That way if you are using screws, the same tool countersinks for the screw and also drills the hole for the plug.
Matching the grain so that the plug becomes nearly invisible is very satisfying when achieved, but rarely so in my case.
 
Thanks all,

I think I know someone with a drill press. I'll call on them at the w/e. I guess cutting the plugs is the last job to do since I'll be using the scrap timber. It's an amazingly wasteful process - I'm glad I'm not using 'real' teak - just iroko.

The existing woodwork had plugs of varying depths. However it is hard to know how much the wood has worn over the years. Fortunately I have an old unloved chisel - very easy to damage the edge when you 'find' the screw unexpectedly.

BTW the job is to replace the top edge of a gf dinghy. I found steaming the pieces, a job I've been dreading, remarkably easy. I used a wallpaper steamer, plumbed it inco a box from an indian takeaway, and progressively slid the wood along, bending a section at a time.
 
If you don't do any good with the palk with the drill press, drill a hole the sixe of the outside of the plug cutter into a pice of scrap wood, say some 2"x1" pine. Clamp this to the iroko where you want the plug to be cut from, and you will have a guide to stop the drill from having its own way. It will also pay to clamp the whole assembly to the bench before starting to drill with the plug cutter.
Peter.
 
Peter,

That's a great idea. I'll give it a try. I have an adjustable bradawl bit so I should be able to get a close fitting guide.

It's just occurred to me why the thing is so intolerant. It cuts tapered plugs so the tool is in contact with the unsupported tip of the plug all the time. Any change of angle and the plug breaks. Other plug cutters cut straight plugs and so are presumably more tolerant of angle.
 
As mentioned previously to get good plugs you need a drill press and a good cutter, Axminster do sets of cutters and drills so the holes are the right size, I use them all the time and always try and cut the plugs from the offcuts so colour and grain match
 
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