CNC Software: Digital Tooling for CNC

Our recent article on Digital Tooling has been very popular so we recently started working on a new Cookbook series around software. The first installment is an overview of all the different kinds of software available for CNC Manufacturing called “CNC Software: Digital Tooling for CNC“. We’ll be following up with a series of sub-articles that look at the various categories in more detail.… Read the rest

New Installments for the Milling Feeds and Speeds Cookbook

Speaking of the Milling Speeds and Feeds Cookbook, we’ve added a couple of additional installments there too.
First, we delve into Tool Deflection in great detail in the “Tool Deflection Control:Critical to Your Success” article. In it, you’ll find topics like:
- When to use climb versus conventional milling based on accuracy, surface finish, tool life, and material removal. The results may surprise you.
- How controlling tool deflection can help minimize chatter.
- How to decide the optimal depth and width of cut based on tool deflection.
And, a whole lot more.… Read the rest

Performance Recipe: Cheating on the 2 Flute Rule for Aluminum and Going to More Flutes Elsewhere

This article is from our Milling Speeds and Feeds Cookbook
Many beginners are taught to use a 2 flute in aluminum for chip clearance, but must we always use 2 (or perhaps 3 flutes) for Aluminum and never 4? Now that we know why fewer flutes must be used (chip clearance), we can think effectively about when we might not be restricted to fewer flutes. In general, when you have plenty of room for the chips to escape, you can use a 4 flute cutter, and you’ll get a better surface finish.… Read the rest

Time for a Crazy Idea: Making an Inverted Spindle Lathe Out of a Mill

I’ve been talking a lot to a friend who is trying to create a bar-fed milling machine. He’s been so successful with his bar-fed lathes that he wants to be able to do the same on the mill. I know he’ll eventually get there, as he’s very creative. Talking to him has caused me to keep eyes peeled for this sort of thing and that’s how I discovered “Inverted Spindle Lathes”. First I saw mention of one on eBay and wondered what it was, then I came across a Hardinge brochure on their VL series lathes, and finally an MMSOnline article.… Read the rest

The Alpha (dog) of Flashlights by Jason Hui, Feeds and Speeds by G-Wizard

It’s always a kick to see what kinds of parts machinists are making with the aid of our G-Wizard Machinist’s Calculator. We’ve got customers making all sorts of interesting products from household brands for things like shotguns and big yellow tractors to the much more exotic I-could-tell-you-but-then-I’d-have-to-kill-you sorts of things. The other day I received a very nice note from Jason Hui telling me he really loved G-Wizard and had written a review of it as a result to share his experiences. Jason was modest and didn’t even mention what he was doing with G-Wizard, but I soon discovered while prowling his blog that he makes some very cutting edge flashlights.… Read the rest

A Mechanical Iris

Some mechanisms are fascinating to watch and play with. I’ve always liked Geneva Mechanisms, for example. The mechanical iris is another intriguing mechanism. This video was forwarded to me by Sebastian Larsson to show the iris he made on his Sherline mill and lathe:

A Mechanical Iris…… Read the rest

Breaking Cutters With Tool Deflection: An Anecdote

This is article is part of the new Tool Deflection page in the Milling Feeds and Speeds Cookbook.
Not long ago I got a call to go visit a shop and check out their new Volumill HSM module for GibbsCAM. Being a fan of HSM techniques, I couldn’t resist. Volumill is indeed very slick, though we noticed it was leaving some pretty severe nicks in the walls and rough spots in the floor of a pocket. My friend commented that the dealer had suggested Volumill was focused on roughing, and so not having a smooth finish was really not an issue.… Read the rest

Spudgun Madness

Time to blow off a little steam!
They say anything worth doing is worth overdoing, and a machinist with a well-tooled shop is in a position to overdo a lot of things. I recently came across a site called the Spudgun Technology Center. What a hoot!
First, a spudgun is a homemade device that shoots potatos. The same technology has been adapted to shoot ping pong balls, T-shirts at rock concerts, empty 2 litre soda bottles, and probably an assortment of other crazy things (see the women’s garter shooter below). They’re fun, probably somewhat dangerous (we hear a lot about NOT using PVC for air systems because it gets brittle, but I don’t know if these spudguns last long enough to get brittle).… Read the rest

What’s Your Digital Tooling Budget?

When I was learning to be a manual machinist, people used to say, “Budget as much for tooling as you do the machine.” Danged if they weren’t spot on right. In fact, if you wanted to be well tooled up (and what machinist wouldn’t?), you could even leave off your measuring tools from that budget and focus on workholding, fixturing, toolholding, cutters, and the like. If they aren’t already on the machine, you have to put a DRO and any power feeds in this category as well. Powered drawbar is mighty nice to have too.… Read the rest

How Do You Mill A Piece Taller Than Your Z-Travels?

Manual machinists with knee mills will recognize this trick of hanging the workpiece off the table’s edge, but it’s the first time I’d seen it done on a CNC:

A very near thing!
I asked the machinist about the rigidity of this setup and he pointed out the workpiece is PVC plastic–cuts real easily if you don’t get carried away and melt it. He said if it had been metal, he would’ve machined a special subplate to go under the chuck with a pass through for the workpiece, and he would likely also have stacked some 4-6-8 blocks to raise the chuck up so much less of the workpiece protruded above the jaws.… Read the rest

Introducing the Milling Feeds and Speeds Cookbook

We’ve had the idea of a “Cookbook” with “Recipes” here for a long time. You can click the Cookbook tab over on the left and see our various recipe articles. Simple put, they’re reference information that’s been gathered up about some particular subject. One of our most popular recipe articles (over 3000 visitors last month) has been our Milling Surface Finish page. There’s a tremendous amount of useful information there, but it isn’t all that well organized and I have a ton of material to add to it. Since it won’t all fit on a single page, I decided to drop back and do a special Cookbook dedicated to milling feeds and speeds and related information that has to do with maximizing material removal rates, surface finish, and tool life.… Read the rest

Feeds and Speeds “Sweet Spots”

This article is an excerpt from our Milling Feeds and Speeds Cookbook, Basic Concepts for Beginners. Be sure to check it out!
There is a Sweet Spot for every cutting operation. It’s not a point that has to be hit exactly, but at the same time, it is not very large either, and there are penalties if you miss it completely. The more difficult the material you’re cutting, the smaller the sweet spot and the greater the penalties. Once you know where the Sweet Spot is, you can tweak your cutting parameters within that envelope to maximize Material Removal Rates, Surface Finish, or Tool Life.… Read the rest

Updated the Breakout Board Page

I noticed a lot of traffic recently to my page on Breakout Boards. Apparently there are a lot of new CNC projects in the wings–cool beans!
For those who are wondering, the breakout board is used to interface between your PC or other controller computer and the various motor controls, relays, and other devices you want to control on a CNC machine. There are several different types of breakout boards and related devices used to deliver this I/O (Input/Output) capability, including parallel breakout boards, usb breakout boards, keyboard emulators, and motion control boards.… Read the rest

Back Tanned and Rested!

We’re just back from a family vaca in Cozumel, Mexico to go diving. If you like to scuba dive, Cozumel is one of the great destinations. We like it so much the whole family is certified and we’ve been going every year. This is our 8th trip since friends introduced us to the pleasures. I was definitely ready for it. My head was feeling pretty burned out after fighting my way through the basic foundations that had to be added to G-Wizard Editor to do lathe canned cycles. Now I’m back, batteries fully recharged, ready and raring to go.… Read the rest