Milescraft 1318 DrillMate Portable Drillling Guide – Precision Drilling Jig Attachment for Drilling Angled or Straight Holes, Adjustable Drill Guide Attachment, Portable Drill Press with 3/8” Chuck

I recently received a Milescraft Drillmate 1318. Assembly went smoothly, and the parts appear to be well made and nicely finished. The angle adjustment seems easy to use and should be useful, although perpendicular holes are its main attraction for me. With a little work, I could set the drill angle at something other than one of the 15 degree increment pre-sets.So far my use of the Drillmate is admittedly limited. Not surprising, I found the Drillmate to be somewhere between a handheld drill and a drill press. It does not have the precision or controlled feed of a drill press, but the Drillmate is much more portable and versatile. It certainly offers a lot more precision than a handheld drill, at least in my hands, where perpendicular holes are embarrassingly rare.Attaching a power drill to the chuck shaft requires working around the post extensions in order to tighten the power drill’s chuck, which felt a little odd. Apparently I have only dealt with chucks in wide open spaces in my, up to this point, sheltered life. But it is certainly doable, and I attached an 18v Makita drill. I don’t have any handheld power drills around anymore that have a keyed chuck, but like my drill press, the Drillmate does. Using the Drillmate actually requires dealing with two drill chucks.My first project with the Drillmate was to enlarge the dog holes on my workbench from 1/2 inch diameter to the more common 3/4 inch diameter, using a spade bit. With spade bits, I find it easier to control the feed, although there would not be any material to guide the center point in this case. Twist drills sometimes want to grab and chip. In my experience, It is relatively easy to enlarge holes using a drill press and much more difficult to do with a handheld drill. But enlarging these workbench holes on my drill press was not possible. Enter the Drillmate.To give myself a better chance of minimizing tear out and avoiding irregular holes when enlarging them, I like to make a template with a hole drilled in it of the desired size. I made a template with a piece of 1/2 inch thick panel about 10 by 10 inches, and drilled a 3/4 inch hole in the center with the Drillmate. I then positioned this template hole over a bench top hole to be enlarged, centered the template as best I could, and clamped it to the bench top. I positioned the Drillmate’s base onto the template, lined up the drill bit in the template’s hole, and powered on the Makita. I proceeded to make a 3/4 inch dog hole out of a 1/2 inch hole.I was quite pleased with the results - the edges were clean, the hole was round, and the drilling was quick and drama free. Thirteen more holes to go, and all went well. I was impressed with the holes and the Drillmate. It worked smoothly and precisely. I never felt that I was fighting the return spring. Perpendicular holes - at last!The Drillmate has a rather small base, but a larger, auxilllary base can be used unattached as I did, or attached, which I am considering. I found the auxilllary base or template to be necessary when drilling holes near edges where the Drillmate base alone would hanging over the edge and unstable.One thing I remember about chuck keys is that every stinkin’ one of them disappears. And that drills with keyed chucks are worthless without the correct key. And that no key ever fit another other drill’s chuck. So I just ordered a couple of extra chuck keys for my Drillmate. FYI - extra keys are available from the Milescraft website by clicking on Products, Drilling / Precision Drilling, 1318 - Drillmate, View Replacement Parts.Inexpensive, nicely made, versatile, a quality of work improving device, this Drillmate. Yet another tool I wish I had picked up a long time ago.

this unit is not stable enough unless it is screwed into some kind of base

I wasn’t sure if this would work for what I needed it for but it worked out quite well. I needed something like this to drill 1” holes with a paddle bit into some 4x4’s to make a bird feeder stand and even though this setup is probably designed for use with a regular drill bit it worked just fine with a paddle bit as long as I took things slowly so the 4x4 wouldn’t spin out of my hands. Definitely worth the price and considering it’s quite a bit cheaper than a lot of the other brand ones it feels really heavy duty, is an all steel construction, and the press part of it moves really smoothly.

For what it is, I give it 5 stars. If you’re expecting this to be a replacement for a freestanding drill press, your expectations are unrealistic.This is a drill guide not a drill press.I used it to square up the dog holes in my bench that I drilled with no guide. Some of them were a bit off and I had to force the bench dogs in. Now, all of the holes are straight thanks to this guide.I also used it to fix the holes in the candle holder I made for my wife. My largest forstner bit wasn't large enough, so I used my dremmel to make the candles fit. I was able to use this drill guide and larger forstner bit to make the holes perfect.I was hesitant to purchase this because of so many bad reviews, mainly saying how unstable it is. Then I watched a video about putting a base on the unit to stabilize it.I did not have to do that as mine was stable out of the box, but, I will put a base on it in the future.I am happy with this guide and I definitely recommend it.

This is somewhat helpful, but I can't decide whether it hinders more than it helps.- It's heavy.- It's mechanism gets stuck in the down position and doesn't want to come back up. The rails are not parallel, so it gets narrower at the bottom causing the slide to bind and get stuck in place. It takes a lot of finagling to get it back up for the next cut. Even a healthy dose of lithium grease did not solve it, although it was a bit smoother. (The shorter distance of the rails at the bottom than the top still caused it to bind and stick somewhat.)- The spring reduces the movement downward. This reduces the drilling depth by a half inch.I had to dissemble the unit to get the spring out and drill deeper holes, as I needed that extra reach.- There is too much play. About a quarter inch movement from side to side, even fully tightened.- It comes loose with heavy use (after 30-40 holes). If you don't notice this, you will drill angled holes without noticing, because you're convinced that they're straight. Hand-drilling them would be much straighter in this case.For light drilling, and under the right conditions, this can still be cheaper and more convenient than a drill press.And it has a superpower:Drilling a new hole that overlaps an existing one! I was able to fix some holes that were in the wrong place with new ones that overlapped the wxisti one by 1/3 the bit diameter. Amazing.It took some pressure, and a slow progression, but this would be impossible freehand.

This cannot replace a dedicated drill press, but when portability and moderate accuracy is needed this is near perfect! The only design flaw is that the spring is only on one side and this causes binding. The manufacturer should either reduce the force of the spring or remove it from the design. I took it off after just 2 holes.I just finished a project that required 240 - 3/4" holes to be drilled into 3/4" plywood at a depth of 5/8" and this did not skip a beat. Over the project the depth stop never moved. The chuck is also great quality the bit never slipped i did tie a short string around the key and the slide assembly so it doesn't get lost.

Good on big flat surfaces. Hard handling for stability at angles