Patent ID: 6854168

Claim:
A method of perforating hollow thin-walled tubing, the steps of the method comprising: slidably mounting a drill head on a support frame for reciprocating movement between a tube receiving and a tube discharging station of said support frame, the drill head having opposite ends and at least one drill for forming an opening in the wall of the tubing, axially advancing the tubing at a predetermined speed from said tube receiving station to said tube discharging station, said advancing juxtaposing a length of tubing between the opposite ends of the drill head, simultaneously advancing the drill head in unison with the advancing tubing and without clamping the tubing and actuating the drill whereby to form an opening in the pipe while the drill head and tubing are moving, and discharging the perforated tube portion at said tube discharging station and returning said drill head to said tube receiving station to receive another section of unperforated tubing and repeat the process.