End mill sharpening

I do not sharpen them, but you asked a great question, I will be watching for responses.

Anything under 1/2" I pitch. The others I send out, it's cheap.

snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

I have a Cuttermaster. But I found it far more cost effective to buy end mills on ebay. However, things are changing there and I'm not seeing the deals I used to. The Cuttermaster has been useful for making custom cutters, but I might rethink sharpening again, for manual use.

Jon

That's a good deal. I tried a local guy one time when I was real busy. He used to work for Robb Jack and I figured he knew a thing or two. Gave him a bunch to sharpen, including some large 2 flutes. On those, I told him to sharpen only the sides and bottoms, no need to regash the centers. Well I was rather shocked at the bill, and he'd not only regashed all the big 2 flutes, but had way too much angle on the bottom of the flutes. He told me he liked to get 50% of the value of the end mill for sharpening. Since I hadn't asked for a quote first, I just paid. I never called him back...

Jon

Also use indexable cutters for roughing.

Wes

I have a Cincinnati Monoset T&C grinder. sharpen my own cutters and can also make most specialty ones. I wouldn't get one of these unless you want to have making cutters be part of your hobby.

For most folks, get a surface grinder and an endmill end sharpening fixture. sharpen the end only. if they are worse than that, toss them or send out to a shop.

Karl

messagenews: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

============= I am looking for someone to form grind a radius on each side of a

1/4 inch square M2 lathe tool bit to make a involute gear cutter. The cutters should have radial relief so I can touch up the cutter by lightly dressing the top.

While a circular arc is not an involute, the approximation is closer than the approximation you get with the B&S gear cutters for a range of tooth counts.

Law's book has a table that shows the diameter of the arc, the C/C distance and the distance from the end of the lathe tool bit to the centerline connecting the centers of the arcs.

[and several other sources in the US]

for table click on

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 did this a number of years ago. I have a couple of fixtures that make it possible to do right on the Bridgeport.

BUT ----

I don't do it anymore. I stopped buying HSS endmills, and use some solid carbide, some indexable carbide arbors, and M42 Cobalt cutters. These only cost cents more than plain HSS, and last at least 3-4 X longer.

1/8" solid carbide end mills can be had in packs of 10 or 12 for about $4 now. (Maybe this has gone up lately, I haven't bought any since last year.) For heavy stock removal, the indexable carbide arbors are totally amazing, they shower the room with chips, and you just rotate the inserts when dull.

Jon

I send mine out, $2 for up to 1/2" $3.50 for 1"

I have a tool and cutter grinder that I use less than 1/year, only if I need a special. I'm going to move it over to the unheated warehouse side of the shop to make room for a CNC lathe. I still feel a need to keep it just in case. Thank You, Randy

Remove 333 from email address to reply.