How to ensure parallelism of several holes in long rod

Drill the hole in one end in the normal manner - eg held in vice, centred, spotted, drilled. Then put a piece of 5mm silver steel rod or similar through that hole. Set up to drill the other end in the vice and rotate the job until the 5mm rod is in line with the drill bit by line of sight. Should be close enough for a kitchen rod. If you want more accuracy, you could always use a precision level to get the 5mm rod perfectly vertical. But the "eyeball" method should suffice.

If it was "really important" I would use my laser pointer and shine the beam along the length of the bar from one end

Chances are the bar will be a bit wonky though

Are the holes radial or axial (ie cross holes or lengthwise)?

If radial as I assume, drill the first hole, insert a close-fitting rod, move the work and align by sighting the rod.

The kitchen is a kind of workshop and deserves consideration; good luck with yours!

Clamp it to a block of something in the middle then you can slide it around the table always keeping it aligned. If the block almost goes off the end of the table before the other hole gets to the drill clamp a second block on further down while it is still aligned.

Clamp to a matched set ( or 2 ) of vee blocks; clamp a guide parallel to the table ( clock true ) to butt the vee blocks against ( BDMS angle ? ) ... clamp your blocks... drill your holes, move as needed.

George.

If I understand the problem correctly (radial or axial holes?) I would agree with the two V block solution. Just be sure that at least one block is fully clamped before you unclamp/move the other one. In this case, as the rod to be drilled is longer than the table, this will have to be done in several (2 or 3) moves but should still work.

By the way, using two V blocks in this way is a useful method to drill parallel holes at regularly spaced intervals in rod. Drill the first hole using a fixed V block (e.g. it's clamped to the drill table), clamp a second block to the rod at the required distance from the first (a spacer can be used), unclamp the first block from the material (but don't move the block on the table) and slide the second block up to it, which will also slide the rod the required distance. Drill your next hole and repeat as required. As highlighted above, at least one V block is always clamped to the work piece at all times...

A very simple idea but it works well and is perhaps not as obvious as it seems.

Regards,

IanT

Hello all,

I forgot to tell you that the holes are axial and their centers are located at about 15mm of the rod terminals.
Taking into account the limitations on the equipment at my disposal, the suggestion of IantT seems to me the one that best fit so far.

You can see ***HERE***  a (not good picture) of a rood with some hooks.

Edited By dcosta on 18/08/2015 22:24:51

A 950mm rod appears to be too long to place under the head of your BF50 mill (unless I am looking at the specification for the wrong mill), so rotate the mill head by 90 degrees to drill horizontally.

Mount the rod on the table with vee blocks. Vee blocks to be secured to the table separately to the rod.

Centre the drill to the end of rod and drill the hole. The mill will now be positioned to drill (and tap) all of the holes.

Paul.

Edited By Paul Lousick on 18/08/2015 23:49:23

Hello all,

I made a gross error. The holes in the rod are radial, not axial.
I apologize to everyone especially Paul Lousick who took the trouble to examine my problem with bad data.

Once again, thank you all
Dias Costa

Lay your rod on a length of wood long enough to take your rods,drill your hole and fit a dowel as previously stated,reverse the timber and drill.Hope this helps.

Frank

I missed the bit about drilling through into the wood to take the dowel.

Frank

Nice simple idea Frank - and quite good enough for Dias's needs I suspect - I like it.

Regards,

IanT