Is there any difference between cheap imported carbide endmills and USA made ones

Forget carbide. You don't have the spindle speed or axis feeds to benefit from them, and they are a *lot* easier to chip or break than HSS endmills.

There is a world of difference in carbide. Shop eBay for brand name stuff. For regular end mills Hanita is my favorite. Many other made in USA brands

For really removing metal FAST, get Sandvik R390 replaceable inserts. Makes steel cut like AL. It calls for no coolant - all the heat goes in the chip. STAND back cause you get a shower of dark blue chips. I've got a 1 1/2 inch unit I run at 2000 RPM 15IPM and .200 DOC and these really are too conservative a numbers.

"The Kid" says every shop in the country must have people stealing cutters and selling on eBay. The deals on top end stuff is unbelievable.

Karl

Well, I now do a LOT of work with 1/8" solid carbide end mills. Yes, clearly, I don't have the spindle speed, either, but they are so much stiffer than the HSS cutters. Also, because the solid carbide ones have

1/8" shanks, they are actually CHEAPER than many HSS with 3/8" shanks. I've had great results in aluminum with the carbide.

Jon

How many have you broken? Iggy is just learning CNC *and* general machining speeds and feeds, in my opinion, he doesn't need to be using carbide tooling that he will have a much greater chance of breaking at this point. He should also not be doing much with end mills under 1/4" dia or so for a while until he gets the hang of things.

A broken 1/8" end mill is not the end of the world. When I need one, I use one.

i

No, but you will have a much lower risk of breaking one if you use HSS instead of carbide, and you will get comparable milling results with either type, so there is no benefit to using carbide and the is a drawback to using it.

Pete, I always had bad luck with HSS. But, perhaps, it was because I did something wrong or they were dull. Anyway, I am willing to give it another try under ideal conditions. So, would you recommend one particular HSS drill bit (say 3/8), I will buy that one and will give it an honest try, at the exat recommended speeds and feeds.

I run carbide on the Clausing 5914 and the Millrite MVI, and it works just fine. These machines are big enough to handle carbide. I also use HSS, and that too works just fine. But carbide is far more brittle than HSS, and so is more vulnerable to accident or misuse.

Chinese carbide and HSS are not as good as western carbide and HSS, but I have been using Taiwan-made carbide-tipped boring bars with great success.

Joe Gwinn

A lot of it is because the shops that used to buy/own this stuff..are now empty buildings and there is a serious glut of tooling that cant be sold for what it used to get.

Gunner

I am the Sword of my Family and the Shield of my Nation. If sent, I will crush everything you have built, burn everything you love, and kill every one of you. (Hebrew quote)

True indeed, if he only has 2500 rpm

Gunner

I am the Sword of my Family and the Shield of my Nation. If sent, I will crush everything you have built, burn everything you love, and kill every one of you. (Hebrew quote)

Surprisingly few! They are amazingly tough, too! I had an accident once where I forgot to set the Z, and a 1/8" carbide end mill plowed full depth and width through a 1/8" aluminum panel at 60 IPM. It was cutting like it was meant to do that until I hit estop, and it broke then.

I cut a lot of 1/8" and thinner instrument panels with small holes for pots and switches and connector cutouts, and the 1/8" is just about perfect for that. Generally, I cut everything with the same cutter except for small holes for 4-40 screws and the like. So, the 1/8" end mill is becoming the general purpose tool here. At $3 - $5 each, I don't cry a whole lot when I break one, I buy 10 or a dozen at a time.

Jon

The Chinese HSS end mills in the blue plastic tubes with paper labels with the size rubber stamped on them are abominable crap! I used to buy HSS end mills from some surplus flyers, and got Hanita, Iscar, etc. brands. Then, they started sending that Chinese CRAP and I stopped buying from those outlets. Some of them were very CLEARLY sharpened freehand!

Now, if I buy end mills larger than 1/8", I get M-42 HSS, with Cobalt. These have much better wear properties than plain HSS. I have to admit I am spoiled, I learned on a big box of surplus Pratt & Whitney Stellite cutters, which are the best of both worlds. Tougher that HSS, but wear hardness nearly as good as carbide. The M-42 is nearly as good, and a FAR cry above plain HSS, which I tend to wear out darn quick, even on aluminum.

Jon