Problems with milling steel

[Charcole]

I know when I was making a drive shaft I used a steel rod I got from a scrapper, and since I didnt have a key cutter I took it to my biddy at his machine shop. He has 6 mills, 4 are HUGE, and when he tried to cut a key slot in this the metal just deformed and the cutter broke. He then informed me this was a very hard heat treated rod of steel, like the stuff they make impact chisels out of. He grabbed me a hunk of "normal" cold rolled rod and it was done in seconds.
From the type of "almost melting looking blobs" it may be really hard steel.

You can see some "hard" cold rolled steel. For the most part the crystallization process is correct but not always.

 

[marrtw]

Are these relatively simple speed calculators still available anywhere? For example, something like the Cincinnati calculator.

 

[Cheeseking]

When programming our Haas VMCs I use a freeware program called ME consultant. You can Google and download it. Gets you real close most of the time. Too bad its not a hand held slide rule type tho