How close to ends of boards can I place a hole

[Gary Nalen]

Hello All, 

 

I am new to wood working and the Kreg system, That being said I have a question.

How close to the end of the board can drill a hole. I would like to be at  @15/16.

 

I am making a set of cornhole boards and want to make sure the edges of the top picece of plywood is securly fastended in the corners.

 

The frame is made of 1x4 Poplar, fastened 90°

 

Thanks

Gary

[John Schaben]

Hi Gary - 15/16" should be good. I just rebuilt one of those things that was just put together with screws. Suggest a couple of corner blocks underneath just for luck.

[Gary Nalen]

I have built several of these the traditional way.  I wanted to use this system to hide all the screws and not have to have any playing surface. i wanted to stain the birch plywood.  That being said, this is a new design, nested suitcase style so corner blocks wouldnt work.

 

I will have to experiment i guess  anybody ?

 

attached is a drawing for my set.

[John Schaben]

HI Gary - That is different than the one I had to rebuild. I don't see you having any issues with what you're doing. The board I had to fix just had a piece of ply attached along the end for a leg and that took a lot more stress than screws/plywood could deal with. I took the short way out and just added corner blocks instead of redesigning and rebuilding the thing.

[Gary Nalen]

I am just trying to get the gorners locked down tight.   They will be very cool when done

[Gary Nalen]

I was just laying it out, I can fit the hole 1/2 in from the board edge,  Does anybody know if this will hurt the strength?

 

I will have to attach all the 90° corners on the outside and plug them, this way I will have room to keep the screws close to the corners for the top

see my pictures,  does anybody see a problem?  if you look at the wireframe you will see that the screws won't intersect

 

i will have to make some plugs out of poplar rod though, for the outside

[mo khan]

Gary,

If the holes are in the direction of the grain, there's no problem- you can place them very close to the edge. If the holes are perpendicular to the grain the i suggest staying about an inch or 2 away from the edge. I've seen cracking when I placed the hole too close to the end grain and perpendiclular to it.

[Gary Nalen]

would the micro block allow me to install closer ?

I will re adjust for 1" minimum

[Gary Nalen]

Could I drill thru the pilot hole so it wont crack, or is it the pressure of the screw cracking to the edge ?

[mo khan]

the wood will crack if the boards are not perfectly parallel to each other. The micro jig will not help either. What you could do is cut your piece a little wider than required, then install the pocket hole about an inch in from the end and then trim to final width.

Don't drill through the pilot hole- I've seen many people suggest it here but I don't like the idea. 

[Gary Nalen]

I am a bit confused?

 

Will it crack when I am drilling to pocket hole. or when i am screwing the boards together ?

[mo khan]

when you are screwing the boards together..

[Steve]

I build cabinets out of white pine shiplap, this is a soft wood and buying from home depot, I get 2nd or 3rd grade. When I have to screw close to the edge I will pre-drill, I use a countersink drill setup and will do the holes about 3/8" from the edge. I use #8 screws, so the countersink is also for #8 screws. I have never had a split end with this setup. Hard woods may be more prone to splitting, so pre-drilling would be a must.