Face milling with a small mill.

[Ken from ontario]

Ken, I was commenting on your post #4 where you said your mill is an LMS 3960. I withdraw my suggestion to call LMS. They may not be too keen on commenting on a Craftex machine. Ha!
Have you decided which insert style you're going to buy?

Tom

Tom, contacting LMS to find out whether an 1.5" end mill could work with a 3960(identical to my Craftex) , would have been pointless since they already advertise a 2" indexable end mill as "compatible" with a 3960.lol.
http://littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=5427&category=
I have not decided on which end mill or what style insert to buy yet, there are so many choices but the truth is , a 3/4"(fine tooth) roughing end mill could most likely do a better job than an indexable type.for facing and side milling, I just love my 1/2" roughing EM and use it often for many milling operations including facing although facing with it does get tedious on wider projects .

 

[Bob Korves]

Bob, your opinion is what I count on because it is based on experience, thank you ,I'll be looking for a single insert 1" or 3/4" end mill.
Thank you for taking the time to explain.
Ken.

That will probably work well, Ken, and will give you some experience with that style tool with one your mill should be able to handle. Still, watch out for oddball inserts, and it would be best if you can find one that has or can use relatively sharp edges, positive rake, or both. I have experience with fly cutters but zero with face mills. If I had a mill like a K&T or Cincinnati horizontal or vertical, a face mill would be high on my list, but I have no plans for that. I have some solid HSS end mills in 1-1/4 and 1-1/2", and holders to fit them, but no plans to use them on my Millrite, which has way too little power, way too little rigidity, and too high of a minimum spindle speed (250 rpm) to use them. Maybe on Delrin...?

 

[bfd]

all this size talk has me wondering if you are thinking of depth of cut you could use the largest face mill you can swing if you only take a .005" deep cut for a nice looking finish. I guess you need to indicate what you are after. production, nice finish , fast stock removal. bill

 

[Bob Korves]

Tom, contacting LMS to find out whether an 1.5" end mill could work with a 3960(identical to my Craftex) , would have been pointless since they already advertise a 2" indexable end mill as "compatible" with a 3960.lol.
http://littlemachineshop.com/products/product_view.php?ProductID=5427&category=
I have not decided on which end mill or what style insert to buy yet, there are so many choices but the truth is , a 3/4"(fine tooth) roughing end mill could most likely do a better job than an indexable type.for facing and side milling, I just love my 1/2" roughing EM and use it often for many milling operations including facing although facing with it does get tedious on wider projects .

Big end mills are expensive, so an insertable type might be a good choice, where you could replace just the insert instead of the entire end mill. I have no experience with them.

 

[Ken from ontario]

all this size talk has me wondering if you are thinking of depth of cut you could use the largest face mill you can swing if you only take a .005" deep cut for a nice looking finish. I guess you need to indicate what you are after. production, nice finish , fast stock removal. bill

The whole point of going for a bigger end mill was to take off wider cuts in a single pass, ever since I got my mini mill I have learned to only take shallow cuts like .020" max anyway.
The only time I've gone deeper than that was when I was milling a shoulder on a project using a roughing EM, that time I went 0.50" or about in each pass.
Nice finish is not my main objective ever.

 

[Doubleeboy]

I would look into the Tormach Superfly. Its stupid expensive for what it is, but it works very well. Save yourself a lot of money and buy the inserts on ebay, you could buy close to a whole pack of ten for what Tormach charges for a single insert.

 

[Dabbler]

An alternative for Very Wide cuts might be Suburban Tools fly cutter. it's stupid expensive, but very rigid, and leaves a great finish. it is for a standard 1" arbor, which is usually easy to find.

 

[darkzero]

A 6" vise is overkill for a RF45 style mill. A 4" is more appropiate for that size mill & IMO 5" max. I have a 5" GMT vise on my PM45 & it's slightly too big. Not enough Y axis travel to make use of the 5" full capacity. Better to save your money rather than getting something too big & most importantly the weight. I take my vise of the table quite often, a 6" is still light enough for me to be carried by hand but I'm glad I have a 5". I also have a 4" vise as well. I prefer the 5" though.

But those GMT 6" Premium vises are pretty nice. I'd love to have one but don't need one on my current mill. But if you plan on upgrading to a full size knee mill in the future than the 6" will be perfect.


Here's what the 5" looks like on my mill.



I couldn't even complete this cut without my bellows & DRO scale getting in the way. Not enough Y travel & the 5" vise is not even maxed out.



Here's what a 6" vise looks like on another PM45 (gt40's)
View attachment 253544

 

[coherent]

I have a fairly small mill and bought a set of inexpensive carbine indexable end mills from Shars that have R8 shanks. The set came with 1", 1-1/4" and 1-1/2". They aren't bad for surfacing and the finish is acceptable. I mostly cut aluminum though. I bought a bunch of Kennametal inserts off of ebay which provided better results than the ones they came with. If I remember right they were about $80 for the set of three. I have seen some examples of the finish from the Tormach Superfly. About the best I've seen. Not sure what makes it so special, but it works well. Problem is the price which I just couldn't justify for my needs.

 

[Ken from ontario]

Thank you all for your views and comments, I did ask for them and you guys didn't disappoint ,also thanks for taking the time to post links, pictures, etc. I learned quite a bit, it's always good to know what others are using , that superfly thing is not only out of my league it also out of my small mini mill's league,lol. I'd hate to spend good money on a tool just to find out it wouldn't work with my small mill.

Dark Zero, thanks for the pics,( you got a great deal on those fly cutters,) you also asked if I wanted "a facemill for hogging material or for a nicer looking surface finish (less passes as opposed to multiple passes with smaller endmills) or a bit of both?"
I actually don't care much about nicer finish, maybe mainly for less passes than for hogging material but if I could get a little of both it would bet great. I found two candidates that fills my need, one is a smaller(1") version of the one with APKT inserts but it takes two and I hope having two inserts doesn't mean it's twice as hard on my mini mill , I also found a seller on ebay that sells a 3/4" shank end mill but the head is 1" with a single TPGB-2 insert,which is most suitable for a small mill.
I haven't decided which one to get: