On Mon, 30 Dec 2002, Alex Fraser wrote: > Two flute is best for aluminum. High helix will help clear the chips. > You will be able to up the feeds and speeds if you use a spray mister. > The mister will keep the aluminum from welding to the cutter and provide > all the cooling you need. Consider having two misters running to cool > both sides of the cutter when you change directions.
Flood coolant is somewhat less messy than a mister. Either way, for CNC work some sort of coolant is a good idea. The additional hassle of cleaning up isn't that great, not on top of the routine care and feeding that a precision machine like a CNC mill needs. Splash shields are available through McMaster, as are rubber no-slip pads for the region right in front of the machine. My take on it is that there's a certain minimum amount of mess that goes with any given job, and coolant mess is part of the price for a mill - it need not be a problem if you plan for it. Also, the time spent cleaning up coolant mess is easily compensated for by the higher cutting speeds. > BTW The misters are OK as far as OSHA goes, but have been regulated > in England. I think you should be careful breathing the mist. A simple > mask will allow you to keep tasting your food ;-) Do clean out he > reservoir often as bacteria grow in the oil water mix. I got an infected cut through this route while working with stainless steel (for which coolant is a must) - turns out we had fungus growing in the coolant reservior (hadn't been cleaned in ~3 years!). ......Andrew -- Andrew Case | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | _______________________________________________ ERPS-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.erps.org/mailman/listinfo/erps-list
