Any tips on milling V grooves?

Pcmaker

Pcmaker

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I want to mill V grooves on my regular vise's jaws to hold pipes and anything cylindrical. I don't have special 60 or 90 degree chamfer end mills, but I've read before that you can do it with a regular end mill and you just have to tilt the work piece a certain degree. I'm assuming it's a 45 degree tilt?

I want to mill 3 grooves. One inch from each end and one in the middle. How do I measure from the end to the one inch where I'm going to be milling when the work piece is tilted?
 
I don't know what mill you have... can you tilt the head 45 degrees? That's another way to do it. Then you can just move the table the same distance you want the spacing and you're all set.

If you angle the work piece, I would most likely just use layout lines and line up the sharp corner of an end mill with the lines. Plenty close enough for a vise jaw. If you wanted to play and get it closer you could trig it out and make the correct moves for exact spacing, but that surely seems like overkill for a vise jaw.

Ted
 
For equal sides on your grooves, use 45º. At that angle, the work is displaced by 1.414" for every 1" of horizontal motion. If you want a 1" separation, the horizontal motion would be .707".
 
Mr. Pete in one of his videos shows how to layout and mill V groves with an end mill. Sorry but I don't remember which one it is.
 
Vise jaws are hard, and will be difficult to mill. You will probably damage your cutters trying to do it, unless the jaws are soft enough to file. If hard, you would have to anneal them, mill them, and then harden and temper them again. Or, cut the grooves with a grinder.
 
Bob is right, give them the file test so you'll know what you're up against
 
I wonder if a 90-degree single flute D-bit (shop made) would work for these type of cuts. I haven't tried, so I don't know the depth of cut that can be taken, but for a small part that isn't giving you a warm fuzzy to fix with a sine bar or staggered parallels for using a square end mill with, this comes to mind as a possibility. Any thoughts?
 
D bits and endmills ground to 45* do not work well for cutting v grooves. In both cases there is zero cutting sped at the tool centerline. It is best to tilt the head of the machine or set the work on an adjustable angle plate.
 
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