Increasingly, both the professional installer/tiler and the simple do-it-yourselfer find themselves in need of drilling small holes (5; 6; 8; 10; 12 mm in diameter) in ceramic or stone coverings (walls or flooring).
The traditional
water drilling
with classic cutters is difficult because it requires the user to take many dedicated steps such as purchasing accessories for the proper inflow and subsequent collection of the water needed to cool the diamond tool. In addition, water drilling needs specific power tools with appropriate safety systems/protections. To solve this problem, a series of
dry cutters
applicable on classic power tools (standard electric or cordless drill). These continuous sintered diamond crown* tools (drills), when properly used (see video), are capable of drilling numerous holes with an excellent level of precision and good drilling speed on any type of ceramic or Porcelain Stoneware.
A classic tiler’s question concerns the amount of holes that can be drilled with these drywall cutters. The correct answer obviously varies depending on the type of material to be drilled (Ceramic,Porcelain Stoneware, Granite, Marble etc) and the thickness of the piece. In any case, we can say with certainty and from direct experience that, for example, the Montolit FTJ dry drill (properly used…!) on a 7 or 8 mm thick porcelain tile is capable of making more than forty holes.
For dry drilling of these new materials, there have also been on the market for some time now so-called “vacuum electroplated” diamond drills such as the FS Mondrillo by Brevetti Montolit series, which have among their prerogatives extreme universatility but also poor performance (limited number of holes) since for technical reasons they are not revivable unlike the drills presented above (MONTOLIT FTJ Series) .
The need for high-speed use of these drills (minimum 10,000 rpm) then limits their application to the angle grinder only and thus their use to professionals in the field. The fields of application of these diamond cutters are numerous, we can mention the main ones:
- Fixing Sanitaryware
- Fixing Furniture
- Fixing Window Frames
- Fixing Air Conditioners or Radiators
- Making holes for cable and pipe routing
Dry diamond drill bits are now a small revolution for tilers ,electricians, plumbers and installers and are fast replacing the classic and inappropriate Tungsten Carbide (Widia®) drill bits, which are no longer suitable for the new and very hard materials such as the latest generation of Porcelain Stoneware.