![]() ![]() You’ve got two choices: Move the hole in a direction where you’re less likely to hit rebar, or buy or rent a specialized rebar-cutting masonry bit. It will stop a masonry bit dead in its tracks. Sometimes, it even has embedded electrical conduit in it. Be cautious drilling concrete.Ĭoncrete has everything in it from reinforcing bars (rebar) to metal wire mesh to large pieces of stone. ![]() Take your time and work your way through. Don’t force the bit.ĭrilling in masonry is inherently slow, especially in concrete when you hit a lot of stone. Use a hammer drill set to, naturally, hammer drill mode. Yes, you can make a hole in soft masonry materials like brick using a regular drill, but it’s slow and inefficient. Here’s a list of tips to make sure you don’t. Staff Best Practicesĭrilling in masonry is simple, but there are some things you can get wrong. The screw cuts its own threads into the concrete and the fastener tightens down beautifully against the surface of whatever you needed to fasten.Ī Tapcon masonry screw is intended to be used in a hole made with its matching masonry bit. Set the drill driver to screw-driving mode and drive the screw through the pilot hole in whatever you’re fastening to the concrete: lumber, a metal bracket, or some other fitting. Set a hammer drill to masonry-drilling mode and tighten the Tapcon bit in the chuck. It’s intended to be used with a precisely sized matching masonry bit. The Tapcon (for Tapping Concrete) is a hardened steel screw. But you don’t have to be an old timer (like me, ahem) to welcome the Tapcon. Drill a hole, clean it out, drive the screw. If you’re old enough to have fastened to concrete using a variety of the systems that preceded the Tapcon era, such as lead plugs and anchors that wedged themselves into the hole, you appreciate the beautiful simplicity of these things. ![]() It was in America’s bicentennial year, 1976, when Illinois Tool Works (ITW) patented what went on to become one of the most productive fastener systems ever invented, the Tapcon masonry screw and matching masonry drill bit. Staff The Famous TapconĪll those are good for creating the hole, but then comes the fastening. Simply insert the bit in the drill’s chuck. SDS bits are meant for use in rotary hammers. Setting a rotary hammer to drill in masonry is as easy as turning its dial to the double icon that has both a drill bit and a hammer. Three-setting rotary hammers can drill, hammer drill, or move a chisel bit in a linear back-and-forth motion (obviously, never attempt to use a chisel in either hammer drill or drill mode and never use a drill bit in chisel mode). Two-setting rotary hammers can drill (in wood or steel) or drill with hammer action. Rotary hammers have two or three settings. If it doesn’t seat, turn the bit slightly (in either direction) until it does. You simply line a modern SDS bit up with the drill’s chuck and insert it. The Americanized version of the acronym remains the same (SDS) but is understood to mean Spline Drive System or Slotted Drive System, perhaps a better description of these bits and how they are held in the chuck, not by tightening but by the slot on the end of the bit.
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