Patent ID: 8074869

Claim:
A method of joining components of a drill bit cutting element for drilling boreholes in earth formations, comprising: providing a polycrystalline diamond compact (PDC) cutting element and a separate substrate extension; selecting the PDC cutting element to comprise a base and a PDC cutter attached to a first end of the base; positioning an exothermic reactive material and a braze alloy layer between an opposite second end of the base of the PDC cutting element and the substrate extension; applying pressure to force the base of the PDC cutting element and the substrate extension toward each other while the exothermic reactive material and the braze alloy layer are positioned between the base of the PDC cutting element and the substrate extension; and delivering a pulse of energy to the reactive material, igniting the reactive material, and causing the braze alloy layer to melt to join the base of the PDC cutting element to the substrate extension.