I just spent a week at a chair making class at Country Workshops where we had the opportunity to use several bits for drilling those difficult holes for Irish Stick/Windsor chairs. The particularly hard job was drilling 3/4" holes 1 1/2" deep in kiln dried oak chair backs at precise angles. The LV green wood bits and other auger bits were painfully slow, needed to constantly be sharpened and would over heat very quickly making them dangerous to touch. The frustrating thing about drilling the holes for these chair seats and arms is they need to be placed precisely in very hard wood. Holding a bit precisely on a sight line and resultant angle is not easy. Holding the bit along both planes, applying large amounts of pressure for more than a few seconds can be very challenging.

We finally decided to try the Wood Owl Ultra Smooth bit I had and the difference was amazing. The work was all of a sudden practically effortless. We did three chairs with the one bit with no problems dulling the three spurs or spirals. Probably the most impressive thing was the bit was much cooler after drilling an entire hole than the other bits were after just piercing the surface. Another benefit of these bits is they are so precisely made and hard to bend they produced very precise holes. The lead screw on the bit worked exceptionally well at engaging in a hand awl punched hole, keeping the bit on track, even when powered by a corded heavy duty electric drill. The lead screw never lost purchase or spun in place. We actually had to reverse the drill to back the screw out of the wood.

I was a fan of these bits before my class. All the students and our instructor were very impressed especially when they found how reasonably priced these bits are compared to other auger bits.