Nobody told me drill bits wear out
April 10, 2025•412 words
I have all the things I needed, now all I had to do was put the shelves on the wall. A relatively simple DIY task.
It is only simple if you have the tools and know how to do it.
Tools are relatively cheap and YouTube makes everyone an expert (apparently).
I had the placement all marked out on the wall, the first of eight brackets, for four shelves were about to go up.
I pick up my drill, select a drill bit, and begin pounding the wall, I make a hole. It looks like crap. I had the tools, the correct size, correct placement, so why when I tried to fit the rawl plug, bracket, a screw did it just fall out?
I made another hole, the same result.
Realising that my handy work wasn’t too handy and it wouldn’t even support the weight of the bracket let alone the wooden shelf I decide to quit, slightly enraged.
I had done this before and it was fine.
It turns out my good organisation skills and ability to hold onto to tools for a long time has caused this issue.
Certain tools are perishable, drill bits. They are like circular knives, they get blunt and chipped, and they become very bad at making holes.
I ended up researching this (lightly) on the internet, and was surprised to learn that drill bits are only good for 50 – 100 holes. I had my drill bits for seven years. Nobody told me this.
There is a ritual you should do with drill bits, clean them, inspect them, care for them, put them to bed each night…
I drill a hole and throw it back in the organiser tray I have for them. Sometimes I leave the tape I wrap around them to mark how deep I want to drill.
This type of inconsiderate care and my iron grip on keeping tools for years is why whenever I try do DIY involving holes, it looks like mini explosions have gone off on the wall I attempted to make better. The mess I made of the wall for these shelves meant I had to pop down to the local building supply store to get some filler that will set like rock to fill in my mistakes, knowing that I will have to redrill that same area.
This new information albeit extremely boring, has called me to action. I chucked away all my drill bits.