Iam looking to buy a good set of drill bits, anyone have any suggestions?

What is the intended purpose??

Metal drilling bits?
Silver and Deming?

Plastic drilling bits?

Spade bits for wood?

Forstner bits for Wood?

Augers?

I'm looking for a set that has wood and metal and maybe hole saw bits altogether in a set.

For LOW PRICE shop Harbor Freight. Get the TiN bits (titanium nitride coated)

Next up in price

Lowe's and/or Home Depot have good selections, also.

Don't waste your money on HF hole saws -- well mine eventually burn a hole through LOL

Ryobi has a kit with hole saws, spade bits, wood twist bits, ordinary twist bits, screwdriver bits, and a set of sockets with hex drive shafts. My set isn't handy to get to right now or I would check to see bit sizes and what else is in the kit.

Quality is reasonable to good, Not what I use for metal though. I prefer either a titanium coated drill bit or better yet is an extremely hard drill bit made for drilling metal (very pricey - over $100.00 15 or more years ago). For any metal work I prefer a split point drill bit. Hole saws all use a common mount that screws together (very good style of hole saw).

For hole saws, If you plan to use them a lot, I'd recommend purchasing the various sizes as needed. Quality hole saws can be expensive. I have a couple of larger Lenox hole saws that cost close to $20.00 each, but they work very well and I've been very satisfied with the ease of removing the wood plug after drilling thru pieces. For drills capable of drilling metal or wood, I use quality hardened steel bits. They cut very well and I've sharpened them over and over with much success. To me, coated bits are only coated on the outer surface. A quality bit has to be able to hold that sharp cutting edge. There is no coating on the cutting edges of titanium or tinned bits.

I"ve got a set of Black and Decker TiN twist drill bits that have been good for several years now. I do touch those up with a Drill Doctor periodically. I picked up a set of Neiko(?) hole saws off Amazon fairly reasonable. They are bimetal but I must confess I haven't used them on metal yet, just wood. Forstner and Brad points are from Peachtree with no complaints on those.

Posted By Horace Puckey on 11-05-2011 09:38 PM
Don't waste your money on HF hole saws -- well mine eventually burn a hole through LOL

    Let the tool do the work...............

Use them last longer then I thought they would.

 H R tools are..............

I got a project tool..

 When project is done tool is shelved or past on.

Can't believe I am using them on a day to day basis.

 Well it the past few years.......

Seems a lot of tool manufacturers have gone China or India.

 Have a new Craftsmen 1/4" socket set......

 It's work to get the socket on the extension.

 Almost need help to get it off.

So buy crap at a cheap price or buy crap with a Name paying 3X as much.

 Case in point paid $20.00 for a thumb drive at Sears that only excepts sockets and a little bigger than I wanted.

 H D had one takes sockets on one end and bites on the other.

   PERFECT SIZE FOR $0.50.

Bought a dozen!

Posted By JSchaben on 11-06-2011 02:52 PM
I"ve got a set of Black and Decker TiN twist drill bits that have been good for several years now. I do touch those up with a Drill Doctor periodically. I picked up a set of Neiko(?) hole saws off Amazon fairly reasonable. They are bimetal but I must confess I haven't used them on metal yet, just wood. Forstner and Brad points are from Peachtree with no complaints on those.

    Drill Doctor:

 THE BEST THING SINCE SLICED BREAD!

 Was wanting one for years.

 Did not want to pay the price.

 After Christmas Sale at H D Picked one up for under $25.00.

 Sharpened every one of the 20,000 bites I had laying around.

 Filled the few hundred drill cases that were here too.

 Good investment!

Going to get the one that does all the sharpening...........

After Christmas.

I have 2 Ryobi bit sets.
#1 is 215 pieces consisting of: coated drill bits - 3/64" to 19/64", ordinary drill bits - 3/64" to 3/8", wood twist drill bits - 1/8" to 3/8", spade bits - 3/8" to 1 1/4", cement bits (several in each size) - 1/8" to 3/8", 3 long cement bits - 5/16", 3/8", 1/2", 4 piece hole saw set - 1 1/4" to 2", 4 nail sets, 10 piece socket set for cordless impact, 30 short assorted screwdriver bits, 21 long assorted screwdriver bits, 1 bit for countersinking screws into wood, 3 depth stops of different sizes for the drill bits, 3 1 have no idea what they are plastic pieces with springs inside them, 3 drill bits for a quick change chuck (such as a cordless impact has), 1 adapter to use screwdriver bits in a drill,

set #2 consists of: coated drill bits - 3/64" to 3/8", cement bits - 1/8: to 5/16", ordinary twist drill bits - 3/32" to 5/16", wood twist drill bits - 1/8" to 11/64", spade bits - 3/8" to 1 1/4", 35 assorted long screwdriver bits, 10 sockets for cordless impact,

I have no idea of cost of these sets as they were gifts.

I'm one of those drill-bit-junkies.

I have two sets of numerical drill indexes, that I got a long time ago at a surplus stand at a flea market. Not Chinese, and gradually filled one but the other has some missing (broken or lost ) in the popular tap sizes.
I have quite a few B&D basic sets that I bought at the B&D outlet at about $2 each.
When I break one of them I replace the broken bits with loose bits from HF.
Others were bought when the price was right or the need was there.
Sources, well HF has pretty good bits and B&D outlet stores are about 1/2 price what they sell for at box stores.
I've got bits small enough to drill eyes in needles.
These are some, by all means not all...

















Hole saws, ah heck, too many pictures already.....

Point is there are a lot of good serviceable drill bit sets available, shop around....

EDIT: One more thing... Check out this Google link.

Gerry didn't you buy a drill at a yard sale or somethint that had drill bits with it? where are they, and are they useable?
THOMAS(handy)

Gerry D,
That looks like a good collection.
I bought an old millwrights' tools at an estate sale nearly 30 years ago and still haven't catalogued all the different bits, taps, and dies that were in that collection. I have bits from hair size to 1 1/2". Most are old time HSS and sharpen real well. Taps and dies up to 1 1/2" also. Only time I used one of those was rethreading the gang bolt on my tandem disk. (ag. stuff)

Have a HF hole saw kit and various independent hole saws that were bought for a specific purpose. Yes, they are bimetal and drill through 1/4" steel fairly soon. Only use them in drill press. Don't want my wrist broken from hole saw hangup using a hand drill.
I really like the shank length of your Forstener bits. Mine are PC and somewhat shorter.

I have a couple of 'boat augers' that I use for drilling through studs for electrical wiring. They get a grip and cut through 2X really fast without taking too much power or push. An old time electrician pointed me toward them.

Of course I still have the hand brace and augers that I bought at a junk store 45 years ago. Kinda nice feel to chuck one up and 'slowly' drill through a board without splintering.

This has been an interesting discussion.

You can never have too many bits. It is a" man thing".

Gerry!

Do your neighbor's know that you're photographing their drill bits?

You can never have too many SHARP bits. It is a" man thing".

Gerry, with all of those bits, the one that stood out to me was that old auger bit. It looks lost among all the others.

Cedar, Gerry was trying to camo that one with other bits, he doesn't know how to use it. HAHAHA
THOMAS(handy)

Dewey, I have more and they are not the neighbors.

Ruddt & Cedar, That is a 2" monster I bought many years ago for installing central vacuum tubing. It is not for a bit & brace, it chucks up into a 1/2" slow rpm drill. I have a few more of them in other sizes also a set that fits into my bit & brace.

H.R. & Scooter, Yep on the man thing. Bits are a good thing. One of these days I'll get a sharpener because I have about 1/2  coffee can of twist drills that are not so sharp. Some bits I sharpen by hand with a jewelers file, some on the grinding wheel, but any attempts to sharpen the twist drills provided less than desired results.

Ruddt, Yep on the craftsmen antique set, they ain't pictured.