I was a fitter and welder in a structural steel house for a little over ten years. With gussets we ALWAYS left a mouse hole in the corner. I was told by the engineers that it was for stress relief.
You might want to look a DU Bushing: http://www.ggbearings.com/products-detail.asp?MaterialID=1&Group=1
I have used these quite a bit and they have perfomed well.
I have some standard minimum tap drill depths I use for up to 1 1/4 NPTF taper reamed internal threads. I'm looking for standard minimum tap drill depths for the larger sizes up to 3" and I can only find an old chart in my files for NPT threads and it is largly illegible.
Thanks in advance.