Carbide end mills are cursed!

As you know, carbide is more brittle, won't take deflection force.

My rule of thumb is less than 1/2 diameter DOC and turn the RPM way up. My machine tops out at 4000, that's the speed I use for 1/8 and under. 1/4 at maybe 2500.

You may want to wait on other responses, this is just what I do from my own self taught personal experience. I've also broke A LOT of small carbide end mills.

Karl

I'm with Karl,

Anything under 1/4 inch and it's RPM to the max, (My BP will do about 3K) and no more than 1/2 Diam DOC.

And working AL (especially the sofy 6016 kinda stuff) use plenty of lubricant to wash out the chips and cool the tool or you'll chip weld followed shortly by the dreaded "bink"....

--.- Dave

You are lucky. You have Roger right there! Write down ALL the variables and work at figuring out how he handles each one. Then look for the differences between you and he. Prepare a couple of setups that are, for you, worst case. Invite him over to perfrom his magic and take notes. Bribes are encouraged here. After he "does his thing", you duplicate it as exactly as you can with him critiqing.

Pete Stanaitis

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Tom Gardner wrote:

Erratic feed as in a momentary overfeed is fatal. HSS are so much more forgiving.

I'm afraid I don't have the hand for using them either Tom.

Wes