End Mill

[bigbeast]

Any suggestions on milling Machines? I am re-restoring a M422A1 :D and need to make a lot stuff. Examples are brakets, repair axle splines, fab some custom parts. I have had some machining experience, but am still a novice at it.

Thanks
Ken

[m016324]

end mills or milling machine? Cutter or machine need to know which you want to discuss if it's the machine I like cincy's and bridgeport. End mills you'll need to be more specific on the jobs that you are doing but probably will want a couple sizes 2 flute probably a fly cutter and possibly some 4 flutes. If you are planning on doing axles you'll need a spline cutter (I think dd machine on here sells one for a reasonable price) an indexer and some machine books to understand the indexer. I'm sure I will be able to answer some more of your questions when I understand what you really want

ben

[hoehand]

Pardon my ignorance, but I am quite interested myself. I honestly do not know the difference between an end mill and a milling machine.

I don't know what the original poster was looking for, but I would really like this thread to become somewhat of a tutorial for milling. And just in case anybody throws out a link to any of the machinists sites, I frequent those but feel as if I am reading through one of Hawking's articles.

[BadDog]

Milling machine is like a giant drill press but much stronger and more capable. "End Mill" refers to a thing comparable to a drill bit (goes in the milling machine like a drill bit goes in a drill press) but they are designed to cut going side ways or down. That's the simple description...

[hoehand]

So with a regular milling maching, you cannot cut on a horizontal plane? Or are most milling machines equipped with a end mill?

[bigbeast]

I was originally refering to a milling machines. I have only used Bridgeports in the past. At my last job I had access to a Bridgeport on the weekends (if it wasn't being used). Now I have quite a few projects that I could use a mill on. What should I look for in a milling machine? I plan to put it in my garage. Any recomendations for milling machines.

Here are some of the projects I would like to use the mill on?

Short term projects.
I need to make some small brackets.
I need to respline some half-axleshafts.
Need to make some tooling for rivet repair.
Make a tranny plate adaptor

[Gen. Nonsense]

So with a regular milling maching, you cannot cut on a horizontal plane? Or are most milling machines equipped with a end mill?I think you mis-understood.
Mill
http://www.mbari.org/staff/pami/mill.gif
End Mill
http://www.mscdirect.com/ProductImages/0170001-11.jpg

[hoehand]

okay, that answers a few questions. What about different types of tooling?

I hope this is not too elementary. But the reason I am interested, is that a friend/aquaintance of mine recently acquired a very nice cnc milling machine. He is not able to keep it covered up with work now, so he offered it to me for small projects.

[JeepinDoug]

Go to commercial auctions and find a Bridgeport or Bridgeport clone. One with a Vari-drive would be nice, changing pulleys is so 'yesterday'.
Many end-mills (3 or more flutes) will not cut in the Z axis (down) unless they are ground with a center cut.
If you have money to drop on a decent machine without getting into serious stuff, try to find a Bridgeport retrofitted with a ProtoTrac CNC system. Very nice and conversation line programming for machine newbies. 1 year ago I seen four go at auction for under $7K each, all four had 3 axis control, I prefer 2 axis, X and Y only.

[hoehand]

Go to commercial auctions and find a Bridgeport or Bridgeport clone. One with a Vari-drive would be nice, changing pulleys is so 'yesterday'.
Many end-mills (3 or more flutes) will not cut in the Z axis (down) unless they are ground with a center cut.
If you have money to drop on a decent machine without getting into serious stuff, try to find a Bridgeport retrofitted with a ProtoTrac CNC system. Very nice and conversation line programming for machine newbies. 1 year ago I seen four go at auction for under $7K each, all four had 3 axis control, I prefer 2 axis, X and Y only.
Why do you prefer 2 axis control. And, how do you not have the third axis control. I would assume that it would be mandatory?

[JeepinDoug]

The retrofit come in two differnet control kits, 2 axis (X and Y) or 3 axis (X,Y and Z), not to mention they could also come with Conversation line programming or Fanuc controls.
Why only 2 axis, that's just the way I prefer it. If I need to drill something I want to feel the resistance of the cut and not the gears. This retrofit allows you to hand machine, program machine and even learn machine. Learn machine will copy your hand moves and recreate them in program.
The last place I worked for got me a 2 axis kit with all the bells and whistles, it cost $14K and we supplied the BP mill.
Check here for more info on ProtoTrak (http://www.southwesternindustries.com/swi/prod_retrofit.shtml)

[rusted]

How often are people cutting splines? Is that a common practice? Splines should be rolled.

[hoehand]

O.k. lets ee if I have this straight. If it only has 2 axis control, the operator manually controls the z axis of the quil. And if the machine has z control it will move in the z axis on its on accord through the program being utilized.

Also, the machine that I have acces to has 2 software systems auto-cad, and a better program that determines what tooling, and also determines where to begin and where to make the cuts. Does anyone know what program this is, and if you can directly transfer a plan from autocad to this other program.

[hoehand]

How often are people cutting splines? Is that a common practice? Splines should be rolled.

I have been told that very few shops have the capabilities to roll splines, so most are generally cut.

[JeepinDoug]

Thread rolling is a very common practice, such as spoke threads for bicycle, motorcycles and head bolts for engines are all thread rolled. The same machine is used to roll splines. Old school splining takes place on a hob machine, such as spline hobbing. I don't know much about how they work but from pics that I've seen hobbing removes material rather than displacing it, like rolling.

As for auto-cad and other softwares, some depending on version levels can write program and transfer data to the machine, some can't. The ones that can't are only for engineering a part, work out the details and and visualize the end product and it's workability.
Every CNC machine uses one of several different types of language, such as Fagor or Fanuc and within those languages there can be many different dialects, so to speak. I have four Hardinge machines with Fanuc controls and within these four I can not use the same programs due to certain codes and protocall or sintax. Only slight editting between them will correct each "version" of Fanuc language.
Rather than wasting time trying to figure out a software and it's application to the machine, spend less time by reading the control manual and program it manually, especially for short run stuff. This will also get you much more familiar with the machine and it's capabilities.
Conversation line programming is totally different than these other languages. The machine asks you what you want to do and which tools you are using. It sounds expensive but it's really a simple effective way to run one-off proto work and it's really not that expensive.

[PTSchram]

So with a regular milling maching, you cannot cut on a horizontal plane? Or are most milling machines equipped with a end mill?

Depends on whether you have a vertical or horizontal milling machine.

the machine pictured in the post is a vertical milling machine. Horizontal machines have fallen from favor (as evidenced by my having wached many of them sell for only $25 with tooling at an auction two years ago) compared to the vertical style.

The auction house down the street from me has recently sold lots of 40 verticals (the hallowed Bridgeport model 2J) for only $800. In one case, an entire lot was from a big name piston manufacturer and the machines had been maintained in as-new condition and were only tne years old. I was told folks shied away from them as the machines had been set up for single operation machining and had things like handwheels removed, yet the handwheels were included in a box of parts for the machines.

The deals are there if you look for them. Just wish I had the cash.

[MC]

So with a regular milling maching, you cannot cut on a horizontal plane? Or are most milling machines equipped with a end mill

Hoehand I am not picking on you here but this is one of the funniest comments I have heard in 2 days...the other was from a friend who came from texas...we got a drill a new little drill press in the shop and he said...."did it come with a drill bit" I almost lost a hand when he said that :D

watch out for ebay endmills.........I bought a lot of 100 pcs and they turned out to be cleveland twist rejects :shaking:

[m016324]

Do answer your question I would say look for the largest size that you can fit in your garage. Second make sure you have the electrical capacity to handle it. I would then look for included tooling because usually the machines are too expensive but the tooling will kill you. Next I would look for power feeds most larger machine have power feed but not all. Then I would look for vari drive (means you can change speeds with a knob or wheel instead of change gears or belts.) .

For your projects: making brackets are almost always easier to make by welding and cutting. But I guess if you don't have a welder or plasma a mill would be a way to do it but it takes a lot longer than you think because usually people don't know how to machine quickly and efficeintly without some practice. Resplining shafts like I said before need the cutter and an indexing head. Granting rolling spines is better but to repair splines economically (without having a production system) cutting them with a tool is much better. Not really sure what you mean by rivet repair when I think of rivet repair that to me means drill it out and replace or make a larger hole and replace. Maybe I don't understand the project. Tranny plate adapter should be relatively easy; miling out holes, slot, ect just need the right tooling. I'm sure you have it but if you don't buy a machinist handbook I would recommend the large print version not the workbench or the cd version. Although the cd version is nice for looking up stuff quickly that you don't do very often you aren't always by a computer. Well hope that helps some.

In reply to the other posts I agree with the feeling the mill going down for the vertical milling but you can also program everything these days for it to be pretty easy on the machine but I understand the personal preference thing, but I wouldn't want to do production drilling by hand that would suck nuts. I could go on and on about this post but I think I'll stopp there. Good post though

-ben
"Here are some of the projects I would like to use the mill on?

Short term projects.
I need to make some small brackets.
I need to respline some half-axleshafts.
Need to make some tooling for rivet repair.
Make a tranny plate adaptor"

[hoehand]

Hoehand I am not picking on you here but this is one of the funniest comments I have heard in 2 days...the other was from a friend who came from texas...we got a drill a new little drill press in the shop and he said...."did it come with a drill bit" I almost lost a hand when he said that :D

watch out for ebay endmills.........I bought a lot of 100 pcs and they turned out to be cleveland twist rejects :shaking:


No offense taken :) . Sometimes you have to venture into areas you are unfamiliar with in order to achieve your desired goal, no matter how stupid you are going to look, and this is an area I am very unfamiliar with. But, if anyone ever needs any help with trucks, excavation, railroad construction, rerailing operations, or emergency management issues I can help(although there doesn't seem to be much of a demand for those specialties around this site :) )

One more thing. Is there a link that could point me to a tooling catalog. I would like to be able to foster some type of understanding of what tooling is required for specific projects.

[PTSchram]

help with trucks, excavation, railroad construction, rerailing operations, or emergency management issues I can help(although there doesn't seem to be much of a demand for those specialties around this site :) )

One more thing. Is there a link that could point me to a tooling catalog. I would like to be able to foster some type of understanding of what tooling is required for specific projects.

Emergency Management-after 19 years of EH&S engineering, I "Retired" to wrench :flipoff2: . I got real tired of being on-call 24-7.

www.use-enco.com cheap machinery and tooling.

[hoehand]

Well I only have about 19 more years to go :flipoff2: . But, I have been in our corporate office and not on call for the past three years, but that is soon to change :( .

[MC]

:shaking: dont send him to enco :eek: try jlindustrial.com they will ship you a free catalog

[71Dauntless]

The auction house down the street from me has recently sold lots of 40 verticals (the hallowed Bridgeport model 2J) for only $800.

40 B'ports for $800??? :eek: What part of the country are you in?


www.practicalmachinist.com

This is an excellent home/shop machinist site and it has some great reading.

www.mscindustrial.com

I haven't bought mill tooling from MSC, but I have bought taps, dies, etc.. from them and have been very happy. :)

[PTSchram]

Only a coupla hours North of you. They sold for $800 each, but there were 40 of them that sold for that amount.

There is a big auction today in Warsaw Indiana where they will sell four plasma cutters and several TIG welders.

[glfredrick]

You will also want to get the Enco master catalog. They are over 1100 pages and FULL of tools, equipment and other things for machine shop work. If for no other reason, they give you an idea what is out there and how it is used.

www.use-enco.com

Catalog is free... Just got mine - now to start shopping!

[PTSchram]

You will also want to get the Enco master catalog. They are over 1100 pages and FULL of tools, equipment and other things for machine shop work. If for no other reason, they give you an idea what is out there and how it is used.

www.use-enco.com



Catalog is free... Just got mine - now to start shopping!

I caught hell for suggesting Enco :flipoff2: