The Home Machinist!

The other day I went to a flea market and saw a bunch of push drills selling cheap. A push drill is like a ratcheting screwdriver. A tool like this can be useful for certain things.

Problem: none of the drills had bits with them.

I looked around for bits on Ebay, and I saw that there were different brands. My question is this: should I expect push drill bits for one brand to fit another manufacturer's drill?

I am considering using a push bit in my Dumore drill press to make nice holes for stitching leather. Maybe the push drill itself is not needed.

I would not mess with push bits. For leather you can make a tube punch on any dimension on your lathe and use the DP, the mill or a hammer.

A 1/16" tube that won't get clogged with leather?

as to the original question, push drill bits appear to have a standard shank and are interchangeable - at least that is the case for the several brands I have.

Garrett Wade catalog still sells the push drills, perhaps they have spare bits.
And they do: https://www.garrettwade.com/push-drill- ... -bits.html
--earlgo

Thanks for that link.

I can get push drills in great condition for nearly nothing at the local flea market, but bits are unobtainable.

These are all the North Bros. Yankee patent. The thing is; the smaller ones break and were discarded. There is usually half the length remaining and can be ground sharp again.

I love my Yankee push drill. I can drill a hole faster than I can either run an extension cord or find the Makita and get it out of its case.

I also occasionally use the old time hand crank drills.

Steve

I'm sure that you are familiar with the North Bros / Yankee drill press. They are very cool and cute and clamp to a bench. Crank driven there are two speeds by shifting bevel gears in a few seconds. The table is round and good quality and fully adjustable to height. They have the automatic advance option built at the top. I think that for leather ..and in fact seen them used for custom belts and such. Outdoor markets didn't have all that much electric to access but they did fine. The chucks held regular twist drills too.

Getting back to the topic; There were other push drills which held drill bits having a spline shaft. Goodell Pratt comes to mind. I also picked up the "egg beater" style in many flavors until I quit looking. There were differences in them between manufacturers. Quite clever some.