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ON T H E E V O L U T I O N OF D R I L L - B I T S H A P E S
Summary
Drilling tools play important roles in woodworking,metalworking, mining and quarrying. The
markedly different physical properties of wood, metal and rock have largelyinfluencedthe variety
of tool shapes and different techiques employedfor drilling these materials. From the wide range
of shapes four groups can be segregated, viz. semi-cylindrical,flat, helical and hollow, dictated in
part by the tool materials and manufacturing facilities available to producers. All users have ex-
perienced problems of procuring, servicing and manipulating drilling tools. The present study is
devoted to an examination of the evolution of the basic shapes of drill bits and offers a hypothesis
which unifies them.
1. Introduction
T h e shapes of m a n y drill bits in use today appeared before and during the
n i n e t e e n t h century. In the absence of precise data on drill performance, artis-
ans sought to improve the shapes of these tools guided by their intuitive un-
derstanding of the cutting behaviour of materials, by the m a n n e r in which the
bits were to be manipulated (manually or by steam power) and by the con-
structional materials and facilities t h a t could be utilised for tool manufacture.
A complete account which explains the evolution of drill bits must consider
also creative skills, ethnic attitudes towards innovation, trade practices, frac-
ture properties of solids and the influences of economic conditions in creating
demands for these tools; an analysis of each of these factors lies outside the
scope of this paper. T h e discussion which follows presents the results of some
deliberations on features c o m m o n to drill bits employed in cutting a wide range
of materials.
Since drilling and boring operations are pe rform ed in m a n y industries, dif-
ferent terminologies relating to these techniques have emerged. In the wood-
working and metalworking trades, for example, t he terms "drilling" and
One shape of bit is not necessarily confined to drilling one particular type of
material. In general, the markedly different physical properties of wood, metal
and rock have exerted the most profound influence on the shapes of drill bits.
Therefore, to provide a framework for discussion, each shape will be assigned
to one of the three main groups of users of drill bits in woodworking, metal-
working and rock drilling.
Many drill bits in current use were developed in Europe, Great Britain and
North America after the mid-eighteenth century, a period regarded by many
economic historians as the beginning of the industrial revolution in Great Brit-
ain. Drilling developments that originated in other areas of the world have not
been included and will be the subject of a separate study.
2. D r i l l bits b e f o r e c . 1 7 6 0
Evidence exists of the use of pointed flints during the late Palaeolithic and
Neolithic periods for gaining access to the brain through the skull. Prehistoric
practices of making openings in human skulls were apparently widespread and
in many cases successful because there is clear evidence of healing of the bone
around the edges of the holes in recovered skulls. Egyptian stoneworkers em-
ployed a similar piece of pointed material attached to the lower end of a wooden
shaft with two stone masses attached to the upper end to provide rotary mo-
mentum [4].
There are many examples of the early uses of drilling tools [5] but they
usually lack sufficient clarity to enable the type of bits to be positively identi-
fied. The connection between spears and boring tools appears in Anglo-Saxon
literature [6]. The word auger is derived from nafu, meaning "the nave or
middle of a wheel", and gar, a word associated with a dart, javelin, spear and
arrow. Subsequently, the initial "n" became attached to the indefinite article
to form an a[ugar which eventually changed to "augar" and then to "auger",
its present form. This description neither indicates the shape of the bit nor
how it was used. However, a drill bit found in Hurbuck, County Durham, and
dating also from the Saxon period [ 7 ] was of a shell form similar to a gouge.
A collection of Russian carpenter's augers which has been dated at some-
where between the tenth and thirteenth centuries [ 5 ] is particularly interest-
ing. In addition to spoon augers, the collection contains spear-point twist augers
with an eye at one end to receive a transverse wooden shaft. This fits the de-
scription of an auger given some five hundred years later by Abraham Rees
[81.
A gimlet is a variation of a twist auger incorporating a screw point which
gradually merges into helical flutes. These were probably first made in Nurem-
burg about 1525 [9 ]. An unusual design of wooden auger, intended for boring
timber, was patented by William Wheeler and John Cropley [10] but no de-
tails of the instrument have been given. Some of the earliest evidence which
234
enables the identification of the types of augers and gimlets in general use
before 1760 is provided by Joseph Moxon [11 ]. His illustrations are not clear
but one can discern a flat spade-bit used in smithing, a screw-point helical
gimlet and the gouge-shape bit for woodworking.
Metals, unlike wood and stone, can be shaped by casting and forging using
well established techniques. Gun drilling had evolved its own specialised tech-
niques. Before the eighteenth century, cannon were cast hollow and the bores
finished using multi-blade cutters resembling reamers. Rifle barrels were made
in a similar manner from forge-welded twisted strip and the bores finished with
the aid of a series of long rods, of increasing size, which scraped away small
amounts of metal until the required bore size was obtained. In these methods
the cutters had a tendency to follow the axis of the original rough bore and
alignment could not be guaranteed. This problem was largely overcome by
casting or forging the barrels as solid pieces and then drilling out the central
material to form the bores.
Slender drilling tools were used also deep within the ground for seeking water,
brine, coal and, later, oil. The need for salt taxed the ingenuity of engineers to
devise methods of extracting it from great depths, where it could not be ob-
tained from surface deposits. Needham [ 12 ] has described how Chinese engi-
neers, as early as A.D. 1036, employed a round boring tool, the size of a bowl,
and drilled to depths of several hundreds of feet. Blows were delivered to the
bit by a team of men jumping on and off a beam while the bit was rotated
between blows. A single well could take up to ten years to complete by this
means and depths of 3,000 feet have been recorded. Large bamboo stems, with
the nodes removed and fitted together by male-female joints, were inserted to
form boreholes after which fresh water was poured down the side of a tube
forcing brine to ascend and emerge. Pieces of bamboo tube, with a leather flap
at the bottom end, were used as buckets. A similar method was to be used about
eight centuries later for oil drilling in California. In Western Europe, water
was obtained from shallower depths and the sandy soils in countries such as
Holland enabled wells, literally, to be scoped out of the ground. In the early
seventeenth century Marinus Mersennus gave an account in his Phaenomena
Hydraulica, communicated to him by a "Mr. Hugens", of the sinking of a well,
to a depth of 232 feet, in Amsterdam using an instrument resembling a semi-
circular iron hoop fitted with a close-mesh bag for holding dislodged sand [ 13 ].
This was essentially a rotary scoop and was unsuitable for use in hard rock at
great depths.
For drilling holes through hard strata there is no indication that the bits
were much unlike those employed in the late eighteenth century in Europe and
North America, see below. Crown drills, which have fixed teeth of corundum
(opaque ruby and sapphire) - or gem stones, were used for cutting cores from
quartz rocks in Egypt about 6,000 years ago and in Greece about 4,000 years
ago [14].
235
William Hooson [15] describes three type of drill bits used by miners for
cutting holes to receive blasting charges. "Winged bits" (presumably carpen-
ters' bits) were sufficient for drilling into soft stone while square-section pointed
spikes and wedge-type chisels found applications for cutting holes in harder
rock. Hooson claimed that the chisel, made of good steel and well tempered,
became the most popular implement since it could be easily made to any size
to suit the miner.
Robert Multhauf [ 16 ] has provided a useful summary of drilling techniques
employed in the salt industry in various parts of the world and the bits that he
describes generally subscribe to the foregoing details.
Details of some early drill bits have not been included in this brief summary
since they can be discussed more conveniently in their appropriate group.
3. D e v e l o p m e n t s after c . 1 7 6 0
surface of the wood, enabled a suitable rake angle (see Appendix) to be ob-
tained by trial and error, unlike a twist auger, in which the rake angle was
determined by the helix angle. Round-end pod augers were very useful bits, one
beneficial characteristic being their facility to drill holes in inclined and curved
surfaces; for this reason they were adopted by chairmakers and brushmakers.
Cutting occured when the bit was rotated in either direction so that it was not
necessary to make a full sweep of the brace; this enabled holes to be drilled in
confined spaces. Absence of a screw point meant that an arbitrary feed was not
imposed on the bit; there was less risk of splitting in wood and the bit could be
used to drill a hole to within a very small distance of the full thickness of a
piece of wood without breaking through. Cutting a notch to one side of the
point produced a parrot-end pod auger; the function of the notch was to sta-
bilise the bit at the c o m m e n c e m e n t of drilling.
Another version in common use about 1846 was the spear-point pod auger.
This bit was used by coopers for drilling dowel holes in tables and indeed it
acquired the names coopers' dowel-bit or table bit.
In 1816 J o h n Sorby [22 ] incorporated screw points into a pod auger and into
a straight-fluted auger having an "S" section. Unfortunately, regarding the
latter innovation, Sorby does not provide details of what would appear to be
an interesting and unique cutting tool. It seems that he was attempting to
utilise two curved cutting edges that operated simultaneously, instead of the
single shearing action employed in the split-lip pod auger.
Small sizes of split-lip pod augers were employed by cabinet makers, carpen-
ters and shipwrights, and the larger sizes from two inches to four inches in
diameter were adopted for boring trees for producing pumps and wooden water
pipes. Wooden pumps usually comprised two lengths of tree aligned by a con-
ical joint. Each tree could have a length of up to about fifteen feet; it was
squared up on site and then bored from each end. It was claimed that some-
times the cutting action of the bit could be heard two miles away! Alignment
of both bores, in each tree, was essential for efficient operation of the plunger,
or bucket, when in use [23,24].
A flat end on an auger seems to have been the most common design and it
was this feature that created difficulty in starting a bit into wood. An obvious
solution was to provide a screw point to stabilise the bit initially, although
Richard Timmins seems to have been the only manufacturer to illustrate such
a bit in his catalogue [25]. There is a similarity between this design and those
patented by J o h n Sorby, mentioned earlier; the similarity is apparent in the
straight-flute gimlets which appear also in Timmins' catalogue. Evidence of
the manufacture of twisted gimlets goes back to at least 1526 [9], though the
origins of straight-flute gimlets are not known. Gimlets constitute a link be-
tween screw-ended pod shapes and twist augers.
An unusual development in pod augers appeared in 1868 when Cornelius
Whitehouse, an edge tool maker in Cannock, was granted a patent [26] for his
(a) SPOONAUGERS or SPOON BITS C~
OO
(hollow, closed end, spoon shaped)
I
I" I
Plain Screw point Hook point
(parrot)
l
I
I
I
Taper Taper
(c) POD AUGERSor POD BITS
(semi-cylindrical, hollow, closed or p a r t i a l l y closed end)
I
I 1 I I I
Round Spear Screw Square Open
end point Doint end
I I
I !
Plain Parrot Split Screw
lip point
I
I
I
0 t
Taper Taper- Gimlets
lipped 1
I I
Straight Hel~cal
flu te flute
the cutting edge broke through the wall of the cask, thus preventing discharge
of the contents. The provision of a cylindrical plug in front of the drill point
enabled a recess to be cut into the surface of a component concentric with an
existing hole.
To obviate the necessity for using one size of bit for drilling one size of hole,
the notion of an adjustable bit attracted the attentions of inventors during the
latter half of the nineteenth century and centre bits provided the inspiration
for these cutters. Between 1855 and 1894 all the British patents for adjustable
I,. ,
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
and renewable bits were, with two exceptions, granted to, or on behalf of, for-
eigners, mostly Americans. Some of the patentees displayed an understanding
of the cutting properties of wood in the design of their bits. Those who did not
devote the same attention to detail soon saw their invention become obsolete.
In addition to the sliding-blade design [29], shown in Fig. 2(b), there were
hinged-blade arrangements [30] and one incorporated an eccentric cutter [31 ].
A useful feature of these tools was that the adjustable blade could be renewed
if it became damaged.
Renewable blade bits were patented [32,33] but the use of a separate blade
was generally deprecated and the trend was to adopt a single-piece solid con-
struction to obtain maximum rigidity.
It was only a small step to adopt a separate profiled blade and this consti-
tuted the essential feature of a group of cutters employed in surface sculptural
work [34 ].
(Cooke,1772)
(Smith,1816)
(Church,1824)
(Ash, 18/40)
(Palmer, 1845 )
(Gedge,1854)
(Jennings,1866)
(Whitehouse, 1868)
Fig. 3. {Continued.)
with a cutting blade, originated from the same country sixteen years later. John
Cleaveland Palmer dispensed with the central rod in his single-flute twisted
version, but described how it could be manufactured [38]. Although twisting
methods were not abandoned entirely, die-forged double-flute shapes began to
appear in North America around 1854, when Ransom Cook introduced a va-
riety of point shapes. In England these became known as the Gedge pattern,
named after the British representative in whose name the British patent was
filed [39]. Twelve years later the famous Jennings pattern made its appear-
ance [40]. Between 1824 and 1896 twelve British patents were granted to, or
on behalf of, Americans for innovations to twist augers, out of a total of eight-
een granted during that period [41 ].
The solitary unique British contribution came from Cornelius Whitehouse
of Cannock [26 ], for his eyed and winged augers, for which he obtained patent
protection in North America. These types of auger can still be found in wood-
workers' toolchests today. The Whitehouse family had learned the craft of
auger-making at the factory of William Gilpin nearby.
In 1891 Gilpin experimented with the manufacture of triple-fluted bits. The
helical versions included a winged point, for drilling wood, and a vee point for
drilling metals. His straight-flute designs were reserved for parallel and taper
reamers. Though he was skilled in the production of hand tools, for use by
farmers and woodworkers, his venture into metal cutting tools was abandoned.
245
has been cut. There is the obvious attraction that a saving of time can be
achieved if a cutter can be devised that eliminates the additional operations.
This problem was approached in three different ways, in America.
In 1864 Benjamin Merrit patented a piece of apparatus comprising a vertical
shaft with pinions attached to the upper and lower ends. Rotation of the upper
pinion was through a rack under the control of a follower in a square track.
This motion was transmitted to the lower pinion meshing with opposed racks
attached to cutters [42]. However, the motion of the follower in the track is
not clear, since it would appear to lock in the square corners.
A simpler piece of apparatus was patented by Alexander Allan in 1869. He
adopted a guide plate, into which a square hole had been cut, to receive a drill
bit having an equilateral triangular section; the length of the side of the tri-
angle corresponded to that of the square. When the triangular-section bit rolled
around the inside of the square hole in the guide plate, a square hole was gen-
erated in the workpiece [43 ]. A similar arrangement has been retained in mod-
ern equipment.
A yet different approach was adopted by Azariah Yeldon Pearl, in 1896, by
actuating two opposed cutters from a starwheel. The popularity of the broach-
ing process effectively stifled further interest in this type of drilling technique.
!iil: - _~ .~v~
8 !
C
Fig. 5. "D" bits and gun drills. (a) "D" bit, ca. 1846; (b) gun drill, ca. 1868; (c) gun drill, ca. 1890.
section, see Fig. 5. A point is ground on the end and some care is needed when
"backing off" the point to obtain a satisfactory cutting edge. Finally the point
may be hardened by heating it in a flame followed by quenching in either oil
or tallow, depending upon the size of the bit. This technique has been practised
by instrument makers since at least the early nineteenth century. The same
type of bit, with minor modifications, was adopted for drilling gun barrels of
up to 16.5 inches diameter bore at Woolwich Arsenal in the 1860s and it has
formed the basis of the subsequent design of modern gun drills.
Fig. 6. Spade bits. (a) Watchmaker's drill bit; (b) bow; (c) double-cutting spade bits; (d) single-
cutting spade bits.
rigid sliding constraint for the flat drill-bit. A similar type of bit was adopted
in lathe work and is still used today.
It was customary for watchmakers and jewellers to make their own spade
bits, see Fig. 6. The type of cutting edge provided at the point was dictated by
the m a n n e r in which the bit was rotated. A bow, or fiddle drill, a pump drill
and an Archimedean drill all provided an oscillatory motion and the bit scraped
away metal during each stroke. A brace enabled a continuous rotary motion to
be imparted to the bit, which could therefore be provided with a positive rake
angle. Mechanics succeeded in drilling larger sizes of holes using a bow in con-
junction with a thrust pad strapped to their waist.
A spade bit wears quickly across the corners, causing a reduction in diame-
ter, and does not readily maintain its alignment in the hole. Neither "D" bits
nor spade bits eject cuttings from the hole. There is the additional, and impor-
tant, limitation of obtaining suitably shaped cutting lips. Woodworkers had
overcome all of these difficulties with twist augers and it was natural that me-
chanics should adopt a similar approach.
249
a ~___~~------ ~3r~>
b
Fig. 7. Twisted bits. (a,b) "Screw" drills; (c) rolled section.
250
1860, was in response to developments that had been taking place in the ma-
chine shop.
American mechanics made twist drill-bits by filing them out of solid pieces
of rod and, in 1861, Joseph R. Brown, of the Brown and Sharp Company, Rhode
Island, was approached by Frederick W. Howe to resolve this situation ur-
gently by devising a method for machining helical grooves in twist drills to
replace the slow and expensive process of hand filing [46]. Brown's Universal
Milling Machine proved to be not only an ideal solution to this particular prob-
lem but also found wider application in the machine shop. The principle of
synchronising the rotation of the drill blank with the table motion as it trav-
ersed past an inclined rotating cutter embodied in this machine was quickly
adopted by other machine-tool builders. Problems associated with point ge-
ometry and the manufacture of these bits in large numbers were resolved by
Stephen Ambrose Morse, who set up a workshop in East Bridgewater, Mas-
sachusetts, for producing these bits. Smith and Coventry of Salford, Man-
chester, was one of the first British companies to manufacture twist drill-bits
commercially around 1878 and tests carried out by them over the next five
years demonstrated the superiority of these bits over spade bits.
Fig. 8. Samuel Colt's taper shank and taper sleeves, 1854 [48].
t
Fig. 9.Trepan boring of copper billets, 1871.
252
printers and one of their problems was to machine holes down the centres of
the billets. For this purpose they made a thin steel tube with teeth at one end
set to provide clearance between the tube and the surfaces of the hole and the
central core. Coolant was supplied down the centre of the tube to flush away
the cuttings [49], see Fig. 9. This principle, but with a modified cutting head,
has been retained in modern trepan-boring machines. In this type of work the
words "drilling" and "boring" are used synonymously - the technique is as-
sociated with gun-boring practice.
In the mining and civil-engineering industries, drilling tools are used for
activities which may be classified according to size, under two broad headings.
For the first are examined tools employed for drilling holes to relatively shallow
depths, for example, to receive explosive charges, fencing posts, telegraph poles
and land drains and for the second are considered larger tools employed in
geological exploration and in the sinking of wells and mine shafts, which will
be treated in Section 7 below. These operations require additional equipment
for removing or by-passing broken bits and for lining bore holes. These activ-
ities are not encountered in other drilling situations and require specialist skills.
@
b
i~ j?'
e
a
Fig. 10. Percussion bits. (a) Pidding's impact tool, 1852; (b) cruciform bit, 1854; (e) Low's bits,
1863; (d) percussion bits, ca. 1865; (e) percussion bits, ca. 1892.
254
Evidence of the now familiar cross bit appeared in a patent granted to Jon-
athan Worthington, of Llancaiach & Gilvach Main Collieries, near Cardiff,
and Fennell Allman, a consulting engineer of London, in 1854. The bit con-
sisted of an iron body with four cutting edges arranged at right angles, to which
thin steel plates were welded, brazed, screwed or rivetted. As the soft iron was
eroded, hardened steel was left standing proud providing a cutting edge that
was constantly maintained by the action of drilling - in the same way that the
hard enamel of the teeth of some animals always maintains a sharp edge; the
inner part of the tooth is more rapidly removed by mastication than the en-
amel, which it leaves proud and sharp [51 ]. Inventions arising from biological
observation are rare in the history of drilling tools, but one other instance is
that of Brunel who referred to the activity of teredo navalis boring into ships'
timbers [27 ].
Improved point shapes are of particular interest in this study. A Notting-
hamshire engineer, George Low [52], used both a curved edge-bit and one of
zed shape. He found that the latter gave better results, presumably because it
provided a longer length of cutting edge in contact with the rock. Other shapes
were tried out but ten years later he had returned to the chisel edge. It must be
remembered that tools were continually re-forged and re-sharpened on site and
this practice exerted a strong influence in favour of simple shapes, although at
the end of the nineteenth century crown bits were being used for drilling soft
rock.
I- J l-. .-
6.4 Terriers
In complete contrast, terriers, or ground augers, were designed to excavate
soft ground to receive fence posts and telegraph poles. The broad deep helical
blade, shown in Fig. 13 [ 54 ], illustrates the manner in which this was achieved;
the same arrangement is still used in its modern counterpart.
~J
GO
~0
CO
C~
257
-]
Fig. 13. Terrier, or ground auger, 1869. Fig. 14. Peat borer, ca. 1700.
passed over pulleys, causing the tube to oscillate and gradually remove a core
from the block [55]. This slow cumbersome process became obsolete with the
introduction of ceramic pipes in large numbers.
7. C u t t e r s f o r b o r e h o l e s a n d m i n e s h a f t s
As the population increased, so the need for greater quantities of clean water
increased. Early records of breweries provide useful evidence of borehole sink-
ings and of the mineral content of water. Sanitation, swimming baths, laun-
dries and fire brigades are some of the other services that depend heavily upon
water made available by boring.
The search for petroleum introduced into Britain drilling practices from other
countries, e.g. Japan, China, Burma, North America and Russia; Sir Boverton
Redwood's treatise [56] provides a useful summary of the methods used in
these countries. A French view of the same subject has been provided by H e n r y
Neuberger and Henri Noalhat [57 ], who refer also to contributions from other
European sources. British well-boring practice, in the water industry, has been
described by C. Isler [58 ], a hydraulic engineer and manufacturer of well-bor-
ing equipment. He has provided a reasonably clear account of tools, apparatus
and methods used in Britain around that time.
i L
]I
Fig. 15. Fabian free-fall system. (a) Rod assembly, I = free-fall instrument, II = auger stem, I I I = drill;
(b) detail of free-fall clutch; (c) successive modifications to the shapes of the bits.
the upstroke the lower end of the slot contacted the peg and snatched the bit
upwards. Fabian provided a ledge at the upper end of the slot, to hold the peg,
and a curved edge to guide the peg on to the ledge, see Fig. 15. In the walking-
beam apparatus the drill string was jolted at the top of the upstroke and a quick
turn of the sleeve by the master borer allowed the rod, with bit attached, to fall.
W h e n the sleeve descended again the curved edge of the slot re-engaged the
peg on the ledge. An additional piece of equipment provided a twist to the drill
string to ensure that the bit did not strike the at the same spot twice in
succession.
It is interesting to observe above, successive modifications to the hollow cone
bit through to the flat chisel. It illustrates an alternative approach to obtaining
an edge profile which maximises fracture of the rock during each blow.
16, which consisted of an iron ring into which recesses were cut to receive
diamonds, or "carbons" [59]. This idea was immediately taken up by Captain
F.E.B. Beaumont, R.E., who, on retirement from the British Army, established
a business to develop the technique. He competed successfully with French
engineers and carried out underwater drilling contracts in the Middlesborough
area. Improved drilling machinery speeded up the abrasive process that Mur-
dock had been compelled to perform manually.
There was a resurgence of interest in steel crowns from an unexpected quarter
which led subsequently to the introduction of a new drilling process. The price
of diamonds for drill crowns, when they were originally developed, was rela-
tively low but as time passed the stones became more expensive. In addition,
diamonds were not readily available in all areas of the world and some skill
was required to set them into the crown, which activity precluded their man-
ufacture in jobbing workshops. This difficulty was surmounted in one remote
area by constructing a drill for core extraction from readily available materials.
The Davis calyx drill which appeared towards the end of the nineteenth
century was of Australian origin and Francis Harley Davis explains how the
tool developed [60]. Surface indications in one region of the Australian bush
suggested the presence of coal below the surface but no drilling tools were avail-
able. A makeshift drill was constructed from some lengths of water pipe 2 inches
in diameter, a boiler tube 4 inches in diameter, an axle box, old dray wheels
and a few cart springs. The water tubes served for drill rods, and the boiler
tube for a core barrel, connected by means of the axle box, which was first
firmly rivetted into one end of the large tube and made water-tight by running
in tea-chest lead. Teeth were cut into the cart springs, which were then bent
around the lower end of the core barrel and rivetted into place. W h e n in use,
the appliance tended to become distorted, which made the work of removing
worn cutting teeth and their replacement by a sharpened cutter somewhat dif-
ficult. In spite of this, a hole 4½ inches in diameter was put down to a depth of
350 feet and a core 3 inches in diameter was extracted for the entire distance
entirely by manual power. A commercial version of this drill consisted of a
metal cylinder with the lower end shaped into a series of long sharp teeth (Fig.
15 (a) ), which, Davis claimed, was "perfectly scientific and novel". This drill-
261
ing tool received favourable comments from the United States Patent Exam-
iner and during trials the bit penetrated hard bluestone rock from the Hudson
Palisades at the rate of ½inch per revolution.
Later, steel balls were introduced into the bit to break up the rock by a roll-
ing-crushing action.
the sinking of mine shafts. The most impressive application of the borers art
was in the sinking of a shaft through water-bearing strata. Wet strata pre-
sented serious hazards to men working inside the shaft, with flooding and col-
lapse of the sides the chief dangers. The Kind-Chaudron process resolved these
difficulties in an ingeneous way. The cutters ("trepans") employed were a
small one about six feet wide weighing about four tons, for cutting the pilot
hole, and a large one for cutting the main shaft that was about ten feet wide
and up to twelve tons in weight. A large trepan, constructed from wooden spars
bolted together with metal plates, is shown in Fig. 17. Sometimes a centre-
piece was provided with the larger trepan, to guide it into the pilot hole. These
trepans were reciprocated up and down and rotated between blows to chop out
the ground. At a suitable depth, drilling was stopped and a complete annular
section of lining ("tubbing") was floated down the shaft, aided by the water
within it. A dome was fitted inside the tubbing to effectively seal off the shaft.
A central hole in the dome allowed the drill rods to pass through and a second
hole was provided with a valve to control the escape of water as the tubbing
sank into position. Large pumps drew off the surplus water while workmen
cleared debris from the hole.
The large trepans employed in the K i n d - C h a u d r o n process were not a spon-
taneous innovation as smaller versions had been used by Leon Dru [61 ] and a
cluster of chisels attached to a cylindrical body unit was a feature of a piece of
apparatus patented by William and Colin Mather [62] - two brothers of the
well-known engineering company whose business later became part of Mather
and Platt PLC.
Towards the close of the nineteenth century, the introduction of freezing
methods enabled shafts to be sunk through wet strata using more conventional
tools.
8. C o n c l u s i o n s
quires an adequate supply of fuel for its operation and consumes large quan-
tities of non-renewable metalliferous ores. Countries which are deficient in
these resources could benefit from simple tools that are capable of being pro-
duced and maintained by manual labour using readily available materials. This
is one potential application of the information contained in this paper.
A study of the development of any group of tools raises questions of wide
scientific interest such as, for example, "Was the pattern of development of a
group of tool shapes inevitable? Were other solutions overlooked?" Answers
to these questions could provide insight into creative skills in a community -
one of the wider issues that emerge from studies of tool technology. The two
conditions, namely, the limited range of available manufacturing facilities and
the inadequacies of tool materials, imposed severe constraints on the designs
of drilling tools that could be produced up to the end of the nineteenth century.
Demands for these tools did however stimulate innovations in forging ma-
chines and the invention of the helical milling machine for producing twist
augers and twist drill-bits respectively [4]. Now that restrictions on manufac-
ture and tool materials have largely been removed and more data on chip-
forming and other cutting processes have become available, the opportunities
to introduce new tool shapes and alternative drilling techniques [65,66] have
been considerably enhanced.
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267
Appendix
~ angle
T ~ ~ Motion tool
cutting of
_._--------3--
l
- 1Clearance angle
Metal /
~
~'~- - ~ - 7 I ~
Rake angle, maximum
(positive) value at outer
edge reducing to a negative
value at the web.
Fig. A.1. Tool angles. (a) Single point tool, orthogonal cutting; (b) twist drill bit.