How easy it is to drill through a concrete wall. How to drill a hole in a wall with different building materials

Drilling is one of the most frequently performed operations by a home master. And any master faced problems when drilling, especially if the work is thin. And fine work is most often found: a drill half a millimeter has gone - the furniture door is skewed or a simple towel hook in the bathroom has stood obliquely, and it is impossible to re-drill: the tile has just been laid. Elegance and "oakness" are incompatible, so you need to know how to drill with a drill correctly.

Safety

In terms of electrical safety, a commercially available power tool belongs to class II: double working insulation, it is permissible to use it without additional grounding, i.e. such a drill can be plugged into a regular, non-euro socket through an adapter. At the "iron bazaars" you can find a class I tool ("industrial"), with a ground terminal on a metal case. It is dangerous to use it in everyday life, and its cartridge is most often used for a drill with a tapered shank (Morse taper), unsuitable for rotary percussion drilling. Therefore, do not take such a drill, even if it is powerful and inexpensive.

Class I is indicated on the nameplate of the drill, and if there is no designation, the case is partially or completely plastic, and the cord with the euro plug is a class II tool. Class III - a power tool for an operating voltage of up to 42 V (low voltage) can be recognized by the class designation on the nameplate and by a special plug with flat cross-shaped contacts. For the home, it is suitable, but inconvenient: you need a powerful step-down transformer.

For protection against ingress of foreign objects and moisture, power tools and equipment are marked with the letters IP (Ingress Protection) with two numbers after them: the first - from foreign objects, the second - from moisture. If the protection for any position is zero, the letter X is put instead of the corresponding number. So, IP32 drill - can be used outdoors in good weather; IPX2 - only inside, IP34 - outside in fog and drizzle, and IP68 can work during Samoom in the Sahara and under water.

Important: the first number 2 means that the device is finger-proof; for example, a household socket has a degree of protection IP22. But this in no way means that if a drill chuck with the same degree of protection is grabbed by hand during operation, then it will stop by itself. The IP standard does not guarantee foolproofing.

Cartridge

A conventional three-jaw chuck is accurate and good at rotary drilling. With a rotary percussion drill, it quickly loosens up in it, and the cartridge itself loses accuracy and can completely fail: the threaded clip of the cam mechanism bursts. For work on hard brittle materials, a three-jaw chuck is suitable for occasional use or with a diamond working body in rotation only mode.

In a keyless chuck (it can be recognized by a corrugated plastic holder), the drill is clamped by a collet. Such a cartridge holds the drill better during rotary impact drilling, but is less accurate and is not suitable for fine work. Powerful drills are supplied with a two-sleeve collet chuck - clamping and loosening are done by different rings.

The SDS cartridge (Steck-Dreh-Sitzt, German “inserted-turned-sits” or Special Direct System, a special direct system, English) was invented by Bosh. SDS is ideal for construction work: the system of curly grooves, see Fig., absolutely securely fixes the working body according to the principle of a Chinese puzzle; changing the drill is done with just two easy movements.

Unfortunately, SDS is not suitable for metalwork and carpentry: the accuracy of centering the drill is insufficient. The adapter from a three-jaw chuck to SDS does not make sense: it will become loose from vibration, like a conventional drill. Therefore, the SDS drill is incompatible with the usual fit of the working body.

Note: There are three types of SDS fit: SDS+, SDS Top and SDS Max. SDS Top is rarely used, as an intermediate and generally unsuccessful option; SDS+ is designed for one-handed tools up to 5 kg; SDS Max - for heavy two-handed.

Power and RPM

When buying a rotary impact drill for general work, you do not need to save on power. The power reserve is needed to create the necessary torque at low speeds. The external characteristic of the collector electric motor with sequential excitation used in drills is close to ideal, but the low-power motor overheats at low speeds from high current. It is also advisable to purchase, if not included, a front captive handle.

The maximum speed of the drill is also important. The diamond tool is literally "eaten up" before our eyes at a rotational speed of less than 1600-1700 rpm; its normal operating speed is from 2500 rpm. Carbide tools need at least 1500 rpm. If you meet a drill at 600-1200 rpm, this is a special tool that is unsuitable for general-purpose work.

For precision work on metal, a simple, only with rotation, low power drill - 120-200 watts is best suited. It will be very useful to have a bed that turns the drill into a desktop drilling machine. And if you also fork out for a turntable to the bed, then a dental bur can mill small parts.

Network or battery?

A cordless drill is needed for a home master in two cases:

If you work on the side - your more or less regular earnings.
If you have a non-electrified cottage or garage.

In any case, an expensive professional drill with a lithium battery and a charge time of 10-20 minutes is unlikely to pay for itself. This is an option for professionals working full-time day-to-day. And you can use a regular alkaline battery, charged in 4-8 hours. In extreme cases, it can be “pumped up” on a hole or two in half an hour.

Section Summary

All of the above can be summarized in the following recommendations:

Regular construction work, including metal structures - need a hammer drill and impact drill 350 W or higher.
Periodic homework - rotary impact drill from 250 watts.
For precise drilling - an additional precision drill for rotary drilling at 120-150 W; preferably - with a bed.

Drill

Drills for drills are most commonly used of the following types:

Spiral - come in tool steel, coated with hard alloy, with a hard alloy insert and solid carbide. Used for all types of work on any materials.
Fountain drills can drill wood, MDF and plastic. Allows you to drill large holes. They are made either in one piece or as a set of a shank with a groove and several inserts of different diameters. Such a set is cheaper than a set of solid nibs, but less accurate.
Crown (crowns) are used for excavating holes in hard brittle materials - stone, concrete and drilling wide holes in chipboard and fiberboard. Available with and without centering twist drill. The latter are cheaper, but only suitable for stone and require strong working skills.
A circular drill (central drill, ballerina) drills holes of large diameter in thin, strong, but brittle materials with a decorative front surface, such as tiles or polished decorative stone. The drilling diameter of the circular drill can be continuously changed. Rotary impact drilling with a circular drill is unacceptable.
Diamond drills are thin-walled tubes made of a special alloy with diamond coating. They can drill glass, polished decorative stone, glazed ceramic tiles. Roads require careful handling and precise adherence to drilling technology.

Drill sharpening

Self-sharpening of drills is acceptable for twist drills and feather drills. The first ones are sharpened with a diamond file - they are made of tool steel. Cheap kits can be made from regular carbon steel; their feathers can be edited with an ordinary needle file.

Twist drills are sharpened with an emery wheel (carbide - diamond) using a wedge tool with an angle equal to 180 degrees minus half the sharpening angle. So, with a sharpening angle of 120 degrees, the wedge angle is needed at 30 degrees. In the hypotenuse (oblique side) of the wedge, a longitudinal hollow or a blind hole is made, in which the drill is smoothly rotated during sharpening. The best sharpening is obtained with a fine ("velvet") hand emery wheel, see fig. below.

Different materials require different sharpening angles of the drill. Metal is most often drilled with drills with a sharpening angle of 116 degrees, concrete and stone - 90 degrees, wood - 60-90 degrees. The exact angles and sharpening methods for different types of drill bits for different materials can be found in material handling reference guides.

About Carbide

Hard alloys for drills are made on the basis of compounds of boron, tungsten or zirconium. The cheapest ones are based on boron, but such a drill will take concrete with great difficulty and will quickly wear out. Such drills are marked "by stone". It is impossible to drill decorative materials with them - the edges of the hole will chip off. Tungsten and zirconium compounds differ primarily in durability: zirconium compounds last longer. They are correspondingly more expensive.

What and how to drill

For any drilling, the locations of the holes must be marked. For metal, this is done with a punch, and for glass, ceramics and stone, either with a special diamond punch, or with a half of a victorious roller from an old glass cutter, sandwiched in a homemade clip. Punching (more precisely, scratching with rotation) hole marks in brittle hard materials must be done manually. Now let's move on to drilling technology.

Steel, brass, bronze, solid alloy

Drilling of metal of normal viscosity is carried out at medium drill speeds, 400-1000 rpm, depending on the hole diameter: 400 revolutions - with a maximum drill diameter of 13 mm for a conventional drill; 1000 - with a diameter of 3 mm. For smaller diameters, the speed is again reduced to the same 400 rpm for 1 mm.

Turnovers mean the maximum, at idle. In the process of drilling, the regulator itself will reduce them according to the tool feed, i.e. according to how hard you lean on it. The selection of feed for manual drilling on weight requires a certain skill: if the feed is too low, the crumb will go, the hole will turn out with uneven walls. And from the same crumbs, the drill will overheat and quickly become dull.

With excessive feed, the so-called drain chips will go - thick, curling in a spiral. The result is the same. In order for the feeding skill to be developed faster, even small holes need to be drilled with two hands, with a cap handle. The chips should be thin and brittle. For steels 42 and 44 (ordinary structural steels), chips with a bluish tint are acceptable.

Bronze and some grades of duralumin require special attention: they do not give drain chips at all, and duralumin sharply loses strength when heated above 160 degrees. It is permissible to follow bronze by tint: its appearance is undesirable. Dural, on the other hand, must be cooled with liquid engine oil: if it boils, you need to press lighter.

You can set the idle speed by clicking the knob. If the drill is at 2800 rpm and the adjuster is 14 clicks edge to edge, then 1 click is 200 rpm. The adjusting characteristic of the regulator is not always linear, so you need to carefully monitor the drilling process and then give the necessary correction: to know at what clicks of this particular tool you need to drill this material.

Note: when drilling steel and brass, lubrication is not needed, it will only prevent the correct chips from forming.

Sheet metal

For the same materials, but sheet, so that drilling does not lead to sheet deflection, two methods can be recommended:

When drilling from the bed, give more speed, up to 1500-2000, and quickly “pierce” the sheet, which should lie on a wooden pillow. To prevent the sheet from turning and injuring you, it must be fixed with nails driven into the pillow at its edges, or pressed to the table with a clamp; better - two.
When drilling on the fly, as soon as an increased resistance to the feed is felt (this means that the drill is about to come out), you need to drill the hole on the other side, flushing the “pimples” with a punch inside.

But the radical way to get a wide hole in a thin sheet of metal with an ordinary drill is to first drill a hole with a diameter equal to the thickness of the sheet, then expand it in one or three steps to the diameter of the required hole minus double the thickness of the metal, and drill it clean. Each subsequent hole should be wider than the previous one by twice the thickness of the metal. The maximum allowable diameter is 5-6 metal thicknesses. That is, in a 2 mm sheet, you can drill a hole with a diameter of 13 mm, and it will be round, and not like a triangle with very smooth corners.

Aluminum is a soft metal, very ductile and fusible: its melting point is only 660 degrees. Because of this, when drilling, it can melt on the cutting edge, blur the hole, swell its edges and bite the drill. Therefore, when drilling aluminum, it is necessary to give one and a half times less revolutions than for other metals, cool the drill with liquid machine oil, emulsion or water, and feed the tool a little, without leaning.

The drill for aluminum must be sharp, factory-ground or sharpened on a special machine. Drills resharpened by hand are not suitable for aluminum.

Stainless steel

Stainless steel is drilled in the same way as structural steel, but with a solid carbide drill ground to metal. Such drills are very fragile, so you need to feed the tool easily and without the slightest distortion. It is best to drill with a low-power precision drill in the frame.

Wood, MDF and plastic

Commercial wood is drilled with a twist drill sharpened under a tree or a feather drill. Dense breeds (oak, beech, walnut) can be drilled with a hole saw with a center drill. Drill revolutions - 400-600 for a twist drill and 200-500 for nibs and crowns.

Drilling of plastic windows, MDF, plastic tiles and polished wood is carried out either with a special drill bit for wood (with shaped sharpening and a centering threaded cone), or with solid drill bits. In the latter case, a centering hole of 3-5 mm is pre-drilled; it can be drilled with a conventional drill. Turnovers are the same as for commercial wood; feed - easy, without pressure.

Concrete and reinforced concrete

Drilling of concrete is carried out with special drills for concrete with a super-hard solder or insert, in a percussion-rotary way at medium or 2/3 of the maximum speed of the drill. The best option is the SDS drill. If reinforced concrete is drilled, then the drill hitting the reinforcement most often leads to its damage: the hard tip is chipped off. Therefore, before drilling reinforced concrete, it is highly desirable to determine the location of the reinforcement with a reinforcement detector; This device works on the principle of a metal detector.

Drilling holes in the walls for socket boxes is carried out with a crown on stone (for brick walls) or concrete, with the same precautions in the case of reinforced concrete. If the hole is drilled with a crown without a centering drill, then it is tightly, without skew, applied to the wall, pressed, and the drill is turned on sharply, with quick pressure.

There is a special tool and technology for through wall drilling, but this is the subject of a special description.

Ceramics and stone

How to drill tiles is, without exaggeration, a whole science. The material is decorative, chipping of the edges of the hole is unacceptable. Drill already laid tiles, so that cracking is also unacceptable. On a smooth surface, the drill can easily slip off, which again is unacceptable. Drilling - only rotation.

Drilling ceramic tiles is done as follows:

A hole with a diameter greater than the thickness of the centering drill web is punched manually with a diamond or carbide center punch; its diameter is 2.5-3 mm. When drilling a large diameter hole, the diameter of the centering drill should be equal to the diameter of the centering rod of the circular drill.
A centering hole is drilled with a concrete drill. When drilling holes for dowels up to 6 mm, you can immediately drill clean.
With a finishing drill for concrete, the hole is drilled completely.

Porcelain stoneware is drilled in the same way as ceramic tiles. Drill speed - maximum, except for drilling with a circular drill; feed is light, minimal. It is desirable to provide continuous cooling of the working area with water. It is impossible to cool the tile with oil - when heated, it can spoil the decorative surface.

Drilling ceramics with a circular drill requires special care and firm hands: misalignment is not allowed, and the drill is not balanced. Even experienced workers need to drill with a drill with two hands, throwing the front handle on the drill. Turnovers - higher, but not more than 900, because. at large, an unbalanced drill will break the hole and cut off its edges.

Video: how to drill tiles

Solid stone and glass

Glass, granite and other brecciated (granular) hard stone with quartz inclusions should be drilled with a diamond drill. This is a job for an ace and a drilling virtuoso. A low-power precision drill is set to maximum speed, they are tried on, having aligned horizontally and vertically by eye, they are turned on immediately “to the fullest” and slowly, smoothly the drill is inserted into the material. Pressing and tilting are not allowed.

If the piece to be processed can be laid on the table, then glass and stone can be drilled from the bed in the ancient Egyptian way: with a copper tube with quartz (not sea shell) sand:

A roller 1-1.5 cm high is made around the drilling site from plasticine or putty.
Fine quartz sand is poured into the formed hole and moistened to a liquid slurry.
A flat thin-walled copper tube is loaded into the drill chuck.
The drill is set to the MINIMUM speed.
They drill with a series of short light pecks at the weakest pressure. Sand eats into copper, and the points of its grains, which have the greatest strength, gnaw at the material.

Note: the exact diameter will not work, but you will get a dull spot around the hole.

Video: examples of glass drilling at home

Holes in pipes

If a piece of pipe can be laid in the center or clamped in a vise, then it is better to drill with an accurate drill from the bed. If you have to drill on weight, then after punching, the mark must be expanded to a diameter exceeding the thickness of the drill jumper. For metal, this can be done with a carbide drill, rotating it with your fingers with light pressure; on PVC - with the tip of a penknife.

Then the tip of the main drill is inserted into the hole with the drill turned off, the tool is leveled and tried on, as when drilling tiles, lightly pressed and the drill is turned on, gradually increasing the speed. If the hole diameter is more than 1/5 of the pipe diameter, then a centering hole with a diameter of 2-4 mm is drilled first. In general, with some skill, drilling holes in pipes is not a difficult job. You just need to be careful: when drilling on weight, the drill, splashing, can damage the wall or furniture.

square holes

Can you drill square holes? Yes, you can, if you use a drill in the form of the so-called Renault triangle - the simplest figure, as mathematicians say, of constant width. Renault drills come with a fixing frame; it is attached to the drill with a barbell and a clamp. The corners of the hole will be rounded, but the imperceptible area of the hole will be only 2%.

However, a drill can drill square holes only in wood, plywood and not very durable plastic: such drilling requires a lot of power, and there are huge lateral forces on the tool. Square holes in metal are drilled on special machines, but ceramics and stone cannot be drilled like this at all: lateral forces will blow the part into pieces.

Outcome

Somehow piercing a clumsy hole with a drill is a simple matter. But drilling an even, round and neat hole is a job for a real master, who is knowledgeable, intelligent and with skillful hands.

When preparing for repairs in the house, you need to be prepared for the fact that you will have to drill the walls. For example, to fix a profile for drywall sheets. At this stage, some difficulties usually arise, since in many houses the walls are made of concrete. In addition to high strength, the material can be combined with reinforcement, which makes the work doubly difficult. To drill a concrete wall with a conventional drill, you need to familiarize yourself with all the nuances of the workflow in advance.

Drilling load-bearing walls and partitions made of concrete is not an easy task. To get the job done quickly and efficiently need to know some secrets and tricks. It also does not hurt to listen to the opinion of experienced craftsmen who advise:

How to choose a tool

Most often, a hammer drill is used to drill concrete. It has several advantages over a conventional drill.

These include:

Despite these advantages, such a tool is not always suitable for work. In some situations, its use is simply impractical.

The perforator will not work in the following cases:

when shallow holes (10–12 mm) are needed in the wall;
when working with a foam block (otherwise the material will crumble);
if the required number of holes does not exceed 15 pieces.

Based on this, we can conclude that a conventional drill is more suitable for home use. To purchase such a tool for drilling walls, you need to consider a number of important points.

The drill must meet the following requirements:

It must be impact, since this type is most effective when drilling concrete walls. In a hammerless drill, the bits and chuck will fail too quickly.
It is better to buy nozzles for it with victorious ones, with a purpose for concrete work. And the tip is coated with durable alloys.

You can also choose a hammer drill. True, such a tool is more expensive than a conventional model. But on the other hand, it has increased power, which can be adjusted at your discretion.

What nozzles are better

In order to be able to drill a concrete wall with a drill, you must first select the appropriate nozzles. They must exactly match the design.

The following types are suitable for work:

Before using any nozzles, it is necessary to check the wall for the presence of cables and wires, as well as fittings (if there is a device for detecting metal). This will help protect the wall from major damage, and the tool from breakage.

First you need to prepare a drill, nozzles and other related items. Then in the process of work you will not have to be distracted and waste time looking for the right things.

Drilling is often necessary in cases where:

rough finish;
wiring;
plumbing installation;
concreting communications.

At the same time, the concrete wall (if it is drilled correctly) should remain without severe damage and large chips.

When working with a drill with a pobedite nozzle, sometimes you need to use a metal punch. It is selected according to the size of the hole. This tool makes it possible for the drill not to jam when the drill is deepened. To do this, the punch is driven into concrete and hammered to break apart a solid obstacle. This process can take quite a long time, so it is better to use a diamond crown. In addition, a drill with such a nozzle will never get stuck in concrete.

Drilling sequence:

Inspect the tools carefully. The drill must be in good condition, and the drill must be intact.
Start carefully drilling a hole in the concrete with a drill, stopping the continuous operation of the tool after 10 minutes from the start of the action.
You can continue the process only after the motor has cooled down.
Before drilling the next hole, it is necessary to moisten the nozzle with water. This will protect the metal from warping.

In such simple ways, you can drill a concrete wall without a puncher.

Sometimes there are cases when the drill gets stuck in the wall. It is not desirable to use force in this case, otherwise it will break off, and the edge of the nozzle will remain in the concrete. To free the drill, you must first disconnect it from the drill, then put on a smaller diameter crown and remove the stuck part.

To perform drilling yourself and at the same time avoid various injuries and unpleasant incidents, you need to follow safety precautions and follow the recommendations of specialists.

When carrying out self-repair in an apartment or house, there is a need to make a hole in a concrete wall. It can be non-through (for fastening) or through (for utilities). Let's take a closer look at how to drill a concrete wall using various tools.

For this, it is best to use a puncher. This tool is professional, so it may not be at hand. And buying one just for repairs is expensive. Therefore, you can use a conventional household drill with an impact function.

Tool selection

The best option for drilling concrete walls is a drill:

power 600 W;
rotation of the working body up to 2500 rpm;
clamping drill diameter up to 12 mm in a keyless chuck;
with the obligatory presence of a reverse.

Drill

Drilling concrete requires a very hard metal drill. The most commonly used carbide products with edges of Pobedit or diamond. The first option is cheaper, and in terms of performance it will not yield to the second.

But it is necessary to take into account the moment that with the help of a drill you can make a hole in the wall with a depth of no more than 15 cm. For a through hole you will need a drill.

Boer

To make a hole with a drill, you need a drill with a shank diameter of 10 or 18 mm. The shape of the shank of the drill is with grooves, but they are perfectly clamped by drill chucks. If there is a need to drill a thick concrete wall, then it will be correct to use drills of different lengths.

For example, first drill a hole 15 cm deep, then replace the drill and drill a depth of up to 35 cm, then up to 50 cm. True, the deeper you drill into the wall, the more power the drill requires.

Checking for electrical wiring

First of all, you need to determine the place of drilling. In this case, the main point is not to get on the electrical wiring. According to the building law, all wires are located only vertically and horizontally. And if you have a socket in front of you, then its wire runs vertically to the junction box. True, conflicts do happen. This is when electricians decide to save cable or wire. Therefore, the likelihood that the wiring is not laid out as it should be is present.

As you can see, the wiring is located horizontally and vertically.

You can use another option. To do this, use a screwdriver or similar tool at the drilling site to pick out the concrete or plaster. Depth - 5 cm. If you don’t stumble on a wire, then you can drill.

Drilling process

To make a hole correctly, you need to follow a few simple rules. Firstly, for this it is necessary to keep the speed of the tool up to 400. Secondly, experienced craftsmen advise periodically lowering the drill into cold water. Please note that the drill removed from the concrete wall is very hot, so do not burn yourself.

Possible obstacles

In wall load-bearing panels, a reinforcing frame made of metal reinforcement with a diameter of 8-12 mm is installed during the production process. Plus, crushed stone or gravel can be laid in the concrete solution. All this is an obstacle to drilling concrete walls.

If the drill rested against something solid, and the process itself stopped, then it is most likely that you hit either the armored frame or crushed stone. What to do in this case?

Stone or metal?

First of all, it is necessary to determine: under the tip of the drill, metal or stone. If the depth of the hole is small, then this can be verified visually. If it’s deep, then pick up a drill or a metal pin with a diameter slightly smaller than the hole, insert the tool inside and hit the free end with a hammer.

If after a few blows they felt that the instrument had broken something and was moving deeper, then it was a stone. If nothing happens, and the tip of the pin is dull, then there is reinforcement under it.

We go around the armature

What to do with the stone is clear. That is, slowly break it and continue to drill a hole with a drill. But the reinforcement can be drilled with a conventional metal drill. Just replace the drill bit in the chuck with a regular one, drill a hole through the reinforcement, then continue to work with the drill tool.

If there was no ordinary drill at hand, then you can shift the direction of the victorious drill at an angle (down or to the side). Sometimes it works. By the way, if you use a hammer drill and a drill, then crushed stone pebbles for these two tools are not a problem. The drill simply crushes them with shock actions.

grandfather's way

More recently, when pobedite drills were in great short supply, and drills with impact functions were new, conventional drills were used using unusual technology.

For this, a pin was made from one drill. Its end could be flat, like a screwdriver, or it could be made tapered, like a tap. The periodicity of drilling and impacts was carried out. That is, a hole was first drilled, then a pin was inserted into it, which was struck with a hammer. Then again drilling, then blows. In fact, the person performed the percussion functions of a perforator.

The best option

And yet, the question of how to drill a concrete wall may remain completely unsolved, if a few words are not said about diamond drills. This is the highest quality tool, although expensive compared to Pobedit. Experts consider them universal, because they can drill almost any material. By the way, the drills themselves are not diamond, their cutting edge is coated with diamond coating.

The most important thing is that such a device can be drilled with a drill without an impact function. You need to work with a diamond drill correctly. It, like other species, must be periodically moistened in water to reduce the temperature. High turnover is also unacceptable here.

It is impossible to provide for all holes and niches in the walls during the construction of the premises. Therefore, after the construction of the monolith, it is necessary to drill it.

The most common structural material is concrete. The technique of making holes in this material is different from the processing of wood, brick and metal.

Drilling concrete - pitfalls

Concrete generates a lot of dust during processing. It's bad for the respiratory system moreover, abrasive particles get clogged in the ventilation holes of the tool. Cooling is difficult, and dust trapped inside contributes to accelerated wear. It is necessary to use devices for trapping suspended matter. There are special nozzles for a vacuum cleaner, sometimes it’s enough just to substitute a container.
The structure of concrete does not form chips, so the removal of material from a deep hole is difficult. In order not to overload the drill, it is necessary to periodically (every 3-5 cm of the passage) clean the pit with a vacuum cleaner. When working in a hole clogged with slurry, you can break the drill.
The abrasive constituents of concrete contribute to strong frictional heating. The metal of the drill is “released”, loses its hardness and quickly wears off. Therefore, it is desirable to provide liquid cooling, or at least take breaks during prolonged drilling.
Power tools for drilling concrete (drills, hammers) have a considerable weight. It is difficult to control the horizontal level. Therefore, for such work, it is recommended to equip the tool body with a small bubble level.
Concrete is a heterogeneous material. In the thickness of the wall there are hard stones, steel reinforcement. When hitting such an obstacle, the drill tends to leave the trajectory. If you come across a rebar- you should choose a different place for the hole or go through the area with a drill for metal. Then again continue to work with the previous nozzle.
The walls are usually thick. The drill may not be long enough. If you are making a through hole, you can go through it from two sides. If possible, make an accurate marking, or determine the drilling point on the other side using a magnet and a compass.

Examples of drilling holes in concrete with various tools - video.

Tools for drilling holes in concrete

With regular HSS or hardened steel drills, you will be able to drill one or two holes. After that, the tool can be thrown away. Harder material is needed to process concrete.

Pobeditovy drills

This alloy is so hard that it does not grind off under the action of an abrasive. However, hardness also implies brittleness - it is impossible to make a drill neck out of a win, it will collapse from vibration and torsional force. Therefore, drills for are made of ordinary steel, and a winning nozzle is soldered to the working end.

The spiral for removing sludge is made wide, the edges are not intended for cutting impact on concrete. The nozzle itself looks different than the cutting part of a conventional drill. There are no habitual hooks on the edge, the winning part is made in the form of a pointed chisel.

Important! Holes with a diameter of more than 20-25 mm are not possible with drills. Tubular crowns are required.

Diamond drill bits for concrete drilling

It is irrational and impractical to make a nozzle from a diamond (even if it is technical, artificially grown). A large crystal will quickly collapse, and the cost will be too high. Therefore, for drilling concrete, steel crowns are used, on the working edge of which diamond chips are soldered.

The tool is a hollow pipe. The working end has cuts for removal of slime. The advantage of such nozzles is that the hole is neat and accurate. The disadvantages include the impossibility of centering at the beginning of drilling, and the high power of the power tool.
For centering, either an axial victorious drill is used,

or a guide for a drill (perforator).

Diamond drilling of holes in concrete requires forced cooling. The friction area is large enough, there are thermal overloads. From high temperature, the bond of diamond chips loses its strength, and the crown begins to wear out.

When landscaping an apartment, it becomes necessary to mount all kinds of objects on the walls and ceiling - photographs, paintings, lamps, mirrors, curtains, shelves, TVs, skirting boards and much more.

In order to hang a photo or a small picture, of course, you should not drill into the wall. It is enough to hammer in a small nail. Not every carnation is suitable for this business. It is best to use a dowel - nails from mounting brackets that fix computer network cables to the walls. These studs are long enough, thick and hardened. It turns out, to score even in a concrete wall.

Performing the operation of drilling holes in the walls with modern equipment with power tools will not present more difficulty if you know how to properly drill. It will save you from unnecessary cleaning and keep your property intact if you use a jig for dust-free drilling.

How to drill a wall

A better tool than a puncher for drilling holes in brick and concrete walls has not yet been invented. But rarely anyone can afford the luxury of having such an expensive tool in the household. Usually buy an electric impact drill.

Drill selection

When buying an electric drill, you need to be guided by the following technical specifications.

The power of the drill must be at least 600 watts. Revolutions up to 2500 per minute and the possibility of their smooth adjustment from zero to maximum. The presence of reverse rotation (switch the direction of rotation of the drill clockwise or counterclockwise). The chuck is best quick-clamping, you won’t have to waste time clamping drills and searching for a constantly lost key. The diameter of the drills clamped in the chuck is up to 12 mm.

The presence of the included function of drilling with impact. Of course, when this function is turned on, a drill will not become a full-fledged hammer drill, but drilling walls will be much easier and faster, and that's why. Brick, cement and concrete withstand static load - pressure - very well. But they are easily destroyed by dynamic influences - impact. Due to a strong blow, karatekas easily break the brick in two with the edge of the palm. When drilling with a drill without an impact function, there is a simple pressure of the drill and it is difficult for the cutting edge to catch on the material, so drilling is slow and the drill gets very hot due to friction. Drilling with impact is completely different. The drill, on impact, punctures a part of the material with its cutting edge, and, hitting with a blow into the formed recess, breaks off a portion of the material particles. There is something like chiseling.

Drill selection

Walls made of wood, drywall, foam concrete are successfully drilled with an ordinary drill. For walls made of brick, stone or concrete, you already need a carbide drill. It differs from steel by cutting edges made of carbide material welded onto a conventional drill, which usually wins. Rarely artificial diamond.

Pobedit insert is clearly visible at the end of the upper drill. It is enough to have 2 Pobeditovy drills with a diameter of 6 and 8 mm on the farm.

Drills with victorious surfacing can drill a hole with a depth of no more than 10-15 cm. For drilling to a greater depth, for example, to drill a wall through, use a drill. Drills for drilling brick and concrete walls are up to one meter long and are designed for drilling holes only with a hammer drill. At the drill, even the cutting edges are not made sharp, but rounded to increase their wear resistance. A drill with a hammer function can also be successfully drilled with a drill.

Drills come with a shank diameter of 10 and 18 mm, with special grooves of the SDS + or SDS-max standard for fastening, but they also clamp well in a conventional cam chuck. The standard and diameter of the drill are knocked out on its shank.

If you need to go through a thick wall with a drill, for example, half a meter, then the passage is performed in several stages with drills of the same diameter, but of different lengths. This is necessary for safety and faster drilling. First, the wall is drilled with a drill 20 cm long to a depth of 10-15 cm, then with a longer drill to a depth of 30-35 cm and drilling is completed with a drill 50 cm long. The drill for such work must be powerful enough. Of course, the drill is not designed for such a load and its use is permissible only in exceptional cases. It is better to perform this kind of work, rent a real hammer drill.

How to drill a wall

Before you start drilling a wall or ceiling, you need to make sure that there are no electrical wires or other cables running under the intended place in the plaster. Otherwise, you can damage the wiring and get yourself under voltage.

How not to get into the wire

It is necessary to inspect the wall for the presence of a switch, socket. Usually in the vertical direction, wires go up from them to the junction box. But verticality is the ideal case. This rule is rarely observed in practice by electricians, saving wire, often hidden wiring is laid diagonally. Here's an example. When I was doing repairs and moving the counter to another place, after removing the old wallpaper, the following picture opened. You can clearly see how the wire leading to the meter was laid.

But still, the wire will run from the switch to the nearest box. From the chandelier, too, the wire will also depart to the nearest box.

Usually the wires are recessed to a depth of no more than 10 mm. To check with a rather blunt tool, for example, with a screwdriver, dig the wall to this depth. If no wires are found, then you can start drilling. And yet, just in case, up to a depth of 20 mm, you should not press hard on the drill and, after deepening for every couple of millimeters, visually check if the wire has caught.

There are special devices that allow you to determine the location of the passage of wires in the wall. Here are some of them not expensive, made in China, but, nevertheless, they work well. It also has a metal detector function, which allows you to identify the location of metal reinforcement in concrete walls. The device allows you to find copper wiring with a drowning depth of up to 10 mm. Electrical wiring made of aluminum wires is detected only in metal detector mode.

Detection of wiring is indicated by a flashing LED and an intermittent sound signal. In metal detector mode, the detection diode glows constantly and the sound emitted is continuous. There is a sensitivity regulator, the finder is powered by a Kron type element. Such a device is especially necessary when installing suspended and stretch ceilings, since the supporting structures are mounted on self-tapping screws near the ceiling, just where electricians usually lay wiring.

Drilling holes in reinforced concrete

Brick walls are drilled with a Pobedite drill without much difficulty. We decided on the place, attached the jig and, pressing hard on the drill, drilled a hole. It happens that a burnt brick comes across in the wall, which is drilled more slowly, the dust is not red, but black. The main thing is to drill at low speeds (200 - 400) with the shock mode turned on, pressing harder on the handle of the drill, and make sure that the drill does not overheat.

I bring to your attention the largest video on which you can see how a brick wall is drilled using an ordinary drill with a hammer function and a drill with victorious overlays. A selection was made in the brick wall for a box to install an internal electrical outlet.

As you can see, drilling a brick is not at all difficult. Be careful, the drill during long drilling heats up to a high temperature and touching it can result in severe burns. It is necessary to periodically stop drilling and dip the drill into water.

Unless the concrete wall or ceiling is 600 or 500 cement, it drills just as well as brick. In domestic construction, only cement grade 400 is used. In old-built houses, columns and ceilings made of high-strength concrete are sometimes found. They drill very hard and take a long time.

In the manufacture of concrete blocks and wall panels, for strength, iron reinforcement welded together mutually perpendicular to each other, which is corrugated rods with a diameter of 8-15 mm, is mounted in them, and crushed granite is added. A Pobedit drill cannot overcome such an obstacle. But there is a simple solution. When, during drilling, the drill suddenly stopped deepening, it means that it stumbled upon rebar or granite. The reinforcement is successfully drilled with an ordinary drill. If you didn’t have a simple drill at hand and it’s permissible to move the hole, then you can move diagonally up or down. Granite pebbles in concrete crumble from blows to a drill or a narrow chisel inserted into a hole with a hammer. After each impact, so that the tool does not jam in concrete and the work goes faster, it is necessary to turn it a quarter of a turn. After removing the obstruction, drilling continues with a winning drill. For a drill with a perforator, granite pebbles are not an obstacle and are successfully drilled.

Drilling tiles

For drilling in tiles with a carbide-tipped drill not specifically designed for tiles, the glaze must first be removed after marking the drilling point.

This is done very simply, with a core, and in case of its absence, you can use an ordinary self-tapping screw or even a thick nail with a sharp end to chip off the glaze in the place of the future hole with very light blows and then drill it like a brick wall at low speeds.

Drilling large holes in the wall

When equipping ventilation ducts and hoods, it becomes necessary to make a large diameter hole in the wall, for example, 18 cm. Sometimes you want to hide an electric meter in the wall, and then you need to make a niche in the wall.

At home, this problem can be solved with a carbide drill. With a pencil, the contour of the future hole is outlined on the wall. From the outside of the marking line, holes are drilled with a carbide drill with a diameter of 8-12 mm with a distance between the edges of the holes of about 10 mm. For a hole in the wall with a diameter of 18 cm, you will need to perform about 30 drillings with a drill diameter of 10 mm. Next, the wall material is sampled using a chisel and a hammer. With a smaller drill diameter, the edges of the hole will turn out to be more accurate, but more holes will have to be drilled.

If the wall is thick and the length of the drill is not enough to get through drilling, then in this case it is possible to drill in two stages.

If it is possible to drill a wall from two sides, then first drilling is performed, as described above, on one side of the wall, then a hole is drilled in the wall in the geometric center of the resulting sample, that is, through. Relative to the resulting hole, marking is performed on the opposite side of the wall and the operation is repeated.

If it is not possible to drill a thick wall on both sides, then drilling and sampling will have to be done in two stages. Another line is drawn from the marking line from the outside, at a distance sufficient so that after the first selection in the wall and further drilling, the drill can go deep into the niche made without touching the edges of the wall.

To reduce the complexity of the work, it is better to immediately purchase a drill of sufficient length.

Drilling depth gauge

To control the depth of the resulting hole during the drilling process, you can put a piece of cambric (tubes) of the required length on the drill bit of the drill until it stops in the chuck.

If you didn’t have a suitable cambric at hand and you need to drill a small number of holes, then you can use ordinary PVC insulating tape by winding a few turns of it. This simple tool will speed up your work and save you from having to stop drilling to measure the depth of the hole.

Dust free drilling jig

Due to the heterogeneity of the walls, especially those made of brick, the drill often “leads” away from the intended place, and if there are more than one hole, then the suspended shelf does not hang horizontally or even worse, it cannot be hung, since the installed dowels do not match the mounting ones. loops. You can use a jig in the form of a sheet of plywood with a pre-drilled hole, but when drilling from vibration, it can also move and again the result will not be what was expected. But there is a simple technology that allows you to drill two or more holes strictly in the specified places.

Precise hole drilling

It turns out that the problem can be solved very simply by gluing a sheet of any sandpaper with glue or two-sided tape over the entire area of the side of the conductor, which is applied to the wall. At the same time, the grip of the conductor with the wall surface increases many times over and, when drilling, the specified accuracy of the positioning of the drill is ensured. The hole will turn out exactly at the markup.

Depending on the weight of the product and the density of the wall, it is necessary to drill holes for dowels of different diameters, usually 6 or 8 mm. For the versatility of the conductor, it is necessary to drill several holes of the desired diameters with an ordinary drill.

To top it off, attach the plate at a right angle to the end of the base of the conductor. Thanks to this refinement, most of the drilling products will remain on this shelf, which will prevent wallpaper contamination and reduce dust scattering in all directions.

The proposed fixture is also indispensable for drilling holes for fixing skirting boards. Drill a hole in the conductor at a given height from the shelf. When drilling, put the shelf on the floor and you will get all the holes exactly at the right height from the floor, which will guarantee a snug fit of the skirting board to the floor surface.

Sometimes you have to hang a product on the wall, for which you need to drill several holes in the wall and maintain the distance between them with greater accuracy. If the wall is brick and plastered, then it is impossible to perform accurate drilling without a conductor.

For the manufacture of a jig for precision drilling, a board, a sheet of plywood or metal is suitable. After marking, the required number of holes is drilled in the sheet with an ordinary drill. Consider the case for fixing the product with two screws. One hole is drilled with a diameter equal to the diameter of the drill with which the wall will be drilled, the second, with a diameter equal to the diameter of the self-tapping screw. After the jig is made, the first hole is drilled in the wall with the help of the jig, for the precise drilling described earlier, and a dowel is driven into the hole.

A jig is screwed to the wall with a self-tapping screw in a hammered dowel, leveled with a water levelso that the drilled holes are on the same horizontal line.

Thanks to the use of the simplest conductor, which can be made in a few minutes from any material at hand, the holes were obtained exactly at a given distance from each other.

Using the same technology, it is possible to drill a number of holes at a greater distance from each other. In this case, the extreme holes are first drilled according to the technology described above, the conductor is screwed with two extreme self-tapping screws, and then all the other holes are checked.

The proposed options for conductors are convenient when repairing an apartment, when dirt is a common thing everywhere.
However, when the repair is completed and clean, drilling becomes stressful. I don’t want to stain carpets and furniture with concrete or brick chips and dust at all.

Dust free drilling

During the drilling of walls, especially the ceiling, flour and grains of sand from the drilled material scatter throughout the room. This is because an impeller is installed inside the drill to cool the engine, which, rotating, sucks air into the drill body from the side of the handle, and ejects it heated in the chuck area. This measure allows, with small dimensions, to make a drill of greater power and protect the drill mechanism itself from dust. And the question of how to protect your home from dust when drilling is left to the owner to decide. I present a simple design that allows you to drill without dust.

The dust-free drilling jig is a modified version of the previous version, but the shelf has been replaced with a part cut off from a plastic bottle. A piece of 9 - 11 ply plywood 80 × 150 mm in size is cut, a hole with a diameter equal to the diameter of the drill plus 1 mm is drilled at a distance of 30 mm from the edge along the center line. From the side on which the sandpaper will be glued, a trapezoidal sample is made with a depth of 2-3 layers of plywood. The sample will serve as a kind of air intake when drilling.

A part is cut off from the plastic bottle so that the rest can be fixed on the jig. The width of the base of the jig is chosen based on the size of the bottle. I took a square bottle, but any 1.5 liter bottle will do. An electrical tape is wound around the threaded part of the neck of the bottle until a size equal to the inner diameter of the suction pipe of the vacuum cleaner is obtained. When the bottle is bent, holes are formed to form the desired configuration. We close them with pieces of the remaining plastic from the bottle and fix them with a stationery stapler. You can cover them with tape. There is no need for tightness. Gaps of a few millimeters will not play a role, since the suction force of even a low-powered vacuum cleaner is excessive.

Then, using a furniture stapler, along the perimeter of the end of the base of the jig, from the side where sandpaper is not glued, the formed part of the bottle is fixed. In the bottle we make a hole for the drill. It is better to use the melting method, as the edges forming the hole will become thicker and will last longer. I melted it with a soldering iron. You can melt the hole with a nail heated to red on a gas stove.

We connect the vacuum cleaner, turn on the minimum suction power, do a test drilling.

The result will make you very happy. You will not find a single speck of dust in the circle, nor brick flour on the drilling surface!