Questions On Face Mills

[Pmedic828]

I am a new machinist and only have a light machine that is not too rigid. I recently read that when you use carbide, it did not like interrupted cutting as the continuous beating of re-entering the work piece would cause it to fracture. I noticed that most of the face mills have carbide cutters. I am trying to use a 90 degree profile as others say that it is better on a small mill without much horsepower.
Here is my question: When starting a face mill, I guess that you start at the edge of a work piece and move in across the face. How can you prevent the carbide from slapping on the work piece when starting - only one cutter will engage for a short time until the face mill gets twice the diameter of the mill and all cutters are engaged. My mill seems to be trammed correctly and I am only starting with about 0.005 - 0.010 cut but the cutters will still slam into the work in a circular fashion until the mill sits over the work. Help please?

 

[wrmiller]

I have a 2.5" Glacern face mill that is 45 degree. Interestingly, Glacern says the 45 degree requires less horsepower, not the 90. Given my smattering of physics and mechanical engineering, I would agree with them.

I have not used mine extensively, but I have done light facing cuts in both steel and aluminum (using the mill in my avatar, or whatever you call that pic under my name) without any difficulty. Deepest cut was 0.015. For aluminum, the polished, razor sharp carbide inserts are the cats meow. But changing inserts back and forth is a pain so now I'm stashing my pennies for another face mill so I can keep one set up for aluminum, the other for steel.