Cutting Hss Blanks

[BillWood]

Hello,

I am vaguely aware of various methods used to cut HSS tool blanks

1. Notch the hss on the corner of grinding wheel, put in vice, cover with rag, tap with hammer

2. Some sort of abrasive wheel in a dremel - I tried this and the wheel wore away to nothing, very quickly, in a 1/4 hss blank

3. Very thin wheel on a bench grinder ? Keywords for this type of wheel ?

4. Very thin wheel on an angle grinder ? Keywords for this type of wheel ?

5. This morning I was able to use an el cheapo diamond blade in the dremel - worked very well

6. Carbide parting tool on lathe ? Not sure about this one - anybody done it ?

Is there a way I havent listed ?

Bill

 

[John Hasler]

I use a cutoff wheel in my angle grinder to rough out parting tools.

 

[T Bredehoft]

I'm not sure what you're cutting, if making lathe tooling, I use a grinding wheel and a pot of water, the grinding wheel removes a little metal and puts heat in it. The pot of water takes the heat out so I can take a little more metal off.

 

[Bill C.]

Hello,

I am vaguely aware of various methods used to cut HSS tool blanks

1. Notch the hss on the corner of grinding wheel, put in vice, cover with rag, tap with hammer

2. Some sort of abrasive wheel in a dremel - I tried this and the wheel wore away to nothing, very quickly, in a 1/4 hss blank

3. Very thin wheel on a bench grinder ? Keywords for this type of wheel ?

4. Very thin wheel on an angle grinder ? Keywords for this type of wheel ?

5. This morning I was able to use an el cheapo diamond blade in the dremel - worked very well

6. Carbide parting tool on lathe ? Not sure about this one - anybody done it ?

Is there a way I havent listed ?

Bill

Depending on the width and length of your stock try abrasive cutoff saw and a large pot of water. Cut it oversize if it turns blue on the cut edges, that is called the heat affected zone. I don't know to many who have cut their own blanks. The manufactures must cut their stock somehow then use a surface grinder to finish their blanks to size. By-the-way most blanks are parallel but are not squared.

Good luck and post some finished photos

 

[BillWood]

I'm not sure what you're cutting, if making lathe tooling, I use a grinding wheel and a pot of water, the grinding wheel removes a little metal and puts heat in it. The pot of water takes the heat out so I can take a little more metal off.

Sorry about the confusing post.

Am talking about pieces of very hard strong steel that are mounted in a metal lathe toolpost and used to shape the metal that is spinning on the lathe - I have various pieces up to 4" long and up to 0.5" square and I sharpen them on a grinding wheel exactly as you describe. What is the correct name for them please ? (I call them HSS tool blanks but I can now see that that could mean anything)

What prompted the question was that recently I ground a piece of 1/4" square HSS at an angle of 30 degrees ( see photo) - took me aaaages to grind it and was wondering if there is a way of rough cutting it first and then grinding to finish it. By the way the angle was a mistake - should have been 30 degrees the other way ie 60 degrees to longtitudonal axis of tool.

Another example - it takes me a long time to grind a 60 degree threading tool.

It would take me a long time to grind the parting tool shown in attached photo called Example..

Cutting the slits shown in the two photos was done as an experiment with a dremel diamond blade and compared to my grinding wheel was quite fast and would very quickly give me a rough shape that I could finish on a white Alox wheel. My roughing wheel is a 36 grit grey wheel that came with the grinder - my finishing wheel is a 120 grit white Alox wheel.

Bill - and yes I got into a confusing mess with the below photos.

 

[martik777]

Good to see someone grinding their own tool bits! A 1/4" blank shouldn't take more than 5 mins to grind a threading tool, maybe a 2-3 more mins for a parting tool.

Here's a video:

 

[Tozguy]

Bill,
If you are doing the roughing on a grey wheel it will take forever!
The best wheel for roughing is a white AOx. I will get back here with the specs for the one I use. It actually makes grinding fun.
Also, how often do you dress the wheel?
Mike

 

[Tozguy]

The white AOx wheel mentioned above is a HK2A80H12. it does not load up like a grey wheel. It still needs to be dressed regularly like any other wheel.
BTW your photos are great. Why are you cutting the tools so short?

 

[Tozguy]

To cut a HSS blank in half I would use a thin kerf (.040'') cut off wheel for steel in a 4.5'' angle grinder.

Re your question about carbide parting tool on a lathe, not sure it relates but some of us have cut sections out of a carbide circular saw blade for wood to use as parting tool on lathe.

 

[BillWood]

The white AOx wheel mentioned above is a HK2A80H12. it does not load up like a grey wheel. It still needs to be dressed regularly like any other wheel.
BTW your photos are great. Why are you cutting the tools so short?

Thanks for the specification for the AlOx roughing wheel. I will try it. Didn't realise AlOx was better for roughing as well as finishing.

I dress the grey wheel whenever I think it is too glazed - too shiny - too much metal in it. I dressed it before I started and halfway through whilst cutting that 30 degree angle.

Am cutting the tools short to fit into a tangential holder that I built - see photos in POTD thread. This particular one was a mistake - I cut 30 degrees but should have been 60 - or in other words I cut the 30 the wrong way.

I should be able to use it for something - not sure what yet - maybe a drill press circle cutter ?

I was wondering if people use carbide tools to cut hss on lathe - I have seen a post about that somewhere - somebody turned a square bit into a round one - and wondered if a carbide parting tool would be a valid way of cutting up a HSS toolbit.

Bill