Does the business area have an enclosure? If so, I would say flood, hands down. Much better heat dissipation, etc.
My impression is that mist is only for manual machines, without enclosures.
I also think flood is overall more economical, better from an environmental pov.
It should be pretty easy to hook up some kind of recirculating system, the centrifugal pumps for these apps are standard fare in supply catalogs, etc. In principle, a 5 gal pail for the pump could do.
I am setting up a used CNC lathe. It did not come with a chip conveyor/coolant tank. I'm considering supplying mist coolant.
I'm not necessarly looking to get maximum throughput from the machine. I'm wanting less manual machine operation on parts I repeat. I'm getting too old to crank out parts all day on a manual lathe.
I could be wrong, but I personally think of flood coolant for cooling, mist coolant for slight cooling and mostly lubrication and vortex cooling for medical or food grade cooling applications.
If you could, I would put a coffee-can type ditty at the drain, with 2 or 3 filters, getting successively finer. This reduces clogging, increases flow. Don't know exact fine-nesses. If you do 3, the last one could proly be as fine as screen door mesh. OR even poss. cheese cloth. Then you'd proly never have to clean the sump, but it could also be a pita.
You have to clean out the sump itself when you notice the locline tips starting to clog.
If it's in a production environment, with the machine making multiple parts - then the machine might be running automatically and no one would need to see the process, or even be near the machine. But, if it's a one off prototype part, then visual cues might be helpful in optimizing or altering the program. Seems to be one of those perspective thingies.
There have been quite a few of these lately. Some with motors, some without.
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GrayMills is the pump that comes with fadals, mine at least. Seems to be a good brand. They were, however, at a loss as to how to re-connect the pump for 220V!
The fadal graymills are much bigger than the 1/6 hp in the ebay thing, tho -- at least 1 hp, iirc, proly a 5+ gal/min flow rate, puts out a good
30+ psi at 1-2 gal/min.
1/6 hp would seem to be for mebbe single tool machines or big saws or sumpn.
No doubt. The 1/6hp would be pretty wimpy. I have a 1/2hp Graymills pump on my CNC Gang tool lathe. It's 11 years old, and still going strong. Had to replace a $30 ceramic seal in it twice so far. Pretty minimal maintenance, IMO.
My 1/2hp works OK, but for a bigger machine that could take healthier cuts, I'd want at least 1hp.
The OP said his machine had a pump, but that he'd have to build a tank. He might be able to find a tank/pump combo for cheap, then sell the pump and recoup part of his cost.
------------ It depends on what sort of problems you are having.
In many cases one of the primary functions of flood "coolant' is to keep the swarf/chips flushed out of the cutting zone by physical flow.
three other major factors are (1) actual cooling (2) anti weld/buildup (3) lubrication/anti-friction there are others such as toxicity, i.e. using carbon tet to machine aluminum and part contamination for aero-space.
These functions will have different priorities shop to shop and job to job, depending on what's the worst problem..
Some cutting fluids are better than others in each of these categories, which is why there are so many of them. Also the price may be a consideration for you.
FWIW -- Using Google w/ advance search options, Firefox 3.0.9 and a quality ISP: Results 1 - 100 of about 34,200 for stainless "cutting oil". (0.39 seconds)
Unka' George [George McDuffee]
------------------------------------------- He that will not apply new remedies, must expect new evils: for Time is the greatest innovator: and if Time, of course, alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end?
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman. Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).
I'm back. I got busy and didn't have time to read the posts. Thanks for all the info on cutting oils. I was looking for a water based cutting solution. Am I to assume this in not the way to go?
I have talked to a local lubricant distributor about cutting fluids but didn't get into details. I think he said he had a water based or synthetic solution but we got interrupted. I will go back and get details. I will post what he has suggested to see if anyone has used it.
"An innovative new metalworking fluid, CIMTECH® 610 meets the strict performance and chemical requirements of the aerospace manufacturing industry. Featuring a hybrid blend of patented and synthetic lubricants, CIMTECH® 610 provides synergistic performance on difficult-to-machine ferrous and non-ferrous alloys without corrosion or stain. For a complimentary trial go to cimcool.com."
Unka' George [George McDuffee]
------------------------------------------- He that will not apply new remedies, must expect new evils: for Time is the greatest innovator: and if Time, of course, alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end?
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman. Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).
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