Drilling hole in 600XL

[dkerfoot]

I don't know if this will interest anyone, but I thought I'd share the setup I used to drill monitor holes in two 600XL cases. The problem is that the case bottom is wobbly and awkward. The problem is made worse by the square hole for the chan 2-3 switch being right on the edge of where you want to drill.

 

As you can see, I used a drill press with the case bottom clamped to plywood. I then used a step-drill bit ($11 shipped via Amazon prime) to drill the holes. The setup worked great as far as holding the case steady. It is hard to judge exactly where to center the bit and I got it a hair too far left on the first one and then over-compensated on the second. I ended up drilling one step deeper in order to make the hole large enough to overcome my bad aim and easily allow the monitor jack to fit. Not as perfect as I had hoped, but not a disaster either.

 

The other problem is that each step on the bit is not quite deep enough to go all the way through the case without starting to cut the next step. An exacto knife cleaned up the remainder pretty nicely.