Pittsburgh Arts, Regional Theatre, New Work, Producing, Copyright, Labor Unions,
New Products, Coping Skills, J-O-Bs...
Theatre industry news, University & School of Drama Announcements, plus occasional course support for
Carnegie Mellon School of Drama Faculty, Staff, Students, and Alumni.
MAKE: Interested in CNC routing but clueless about tooling? Can’t tell an end mill from a drill bit? Here’s an overview of end mill anatomy, some basic cutter types, and tips on how to choose the correct tooling for basic wood or plastic jobs.
This article is a great starting point for someone who is just starting to learn about rapid prototyping/machining and, cnc routing. Admittedly there are more than one or two things the author discusses that I didn’t know before. This is partly because when I learned about machining and cnc routing there were only ever a handful of mills stocked and that’s just what we used. Each mill had its recommended settings posted on near the programming computer based on tool size and material type and thickness. This kind of takes some of the learning out of it…I never had to think of what the best tool for the job was because I was just told these are your options, this one is for plastic and this one is for plywood, so on and so forth. After reading this article I can now make a somewhat more educated decision when selecting the tooling for a project.
Good introductory article with some basic information and good graphics. I especially like the graphics showing the relationship between chip load and number of flutes. Of course the article scratches the surface of what milling/cnc routing can encompass, but clearly that's the point. A new term for me was "fish tail cutter." I would have loved to read some specific uses for this tool and it's advantages over a standard flat end mill. There's so much tooling variation in routing and milling it's hard to know what to choose for specific operations. It's also confusing because people use the same names for different things. For instance, the picture the author posts under the discussion of "O" flute cutters, is not an "O" flute, as far as I know, which has a distinctive crescent shaped tip when view from the side. It seems to me with the maker movement wandering into realms once reserved for journeymen, the definitions of things have become even muddier as we all try to make a hobby of a trade so rich in history.
2 comments:
This article is a great starting point for someone who is just starting to learn about rapid prototyping/machining and, cnc routing. Admittedly there are more than one or two things the author discusses that I didn’t know before. This is partly because when I learned about machining and cnc routing there were only ever a handful of mills stocked and that’s just what we used. Each mill had its recommended settings posted on near the programming computer based on tool size and material type and thickness. This kind of takes some of the learning out of it…I never had to think of what the best tool for the job was because I was just told these are your options, this one is for plastic and this one is for plywood, so on and so forth. After reading this article I can now make a somewhat more educated decision when selecting the tooling for a project.
Good introductory article with some basic information and good graphics. I especially like the graphics showing the relationship between chip load and number of flutes. Of course the article scratches the surface of what milling/cnc routing can encompass, but clearly that's the point. A new term for me was "fish tail cutter." I would have loved to read some specific uses for this tool and it's advantages over a standard flat end mill. There's so much tooling variation in routing and milling it's hard to know what to choose for specific operations. It's also confusing because people use the same names for different things. For instance, the picture the author posts under the discussion of "O" flute cutters, is not an "O" flute, as far as I know, which has a distinctive crescent shaped tip when view from the side. It seems to me with the maker movement wandering into realms once reserved for journeymen, the definitions of things have become even muddier as we all try to make a hobby of a trade so rich in history.
Post a Comment