Member postings for Sam Longley 1

Michael

I removed the grease cover & shone the torch in & saw the 2 gears. Glad I did this as you suggested because although it is not the cause of the graunching noise it did highlight that in high gear the gear was only just engaging & that I have to turn the gear knob far more than indicated on the dial. So thanks for that bit of info

However, i sometimes turn the mill on in low gear & the machine fails to rotate properly making a horrible sound .

If I turn the gear to high & then start it again it goes. Then if I stop it & go back to low it starts Ok. This has happened about 3 times so far. I have been away sailing so have not tried it much in the last few days.

No idea what it is but it could be something major building.

I bet the firemen loved it !!! evil bar stewards !!!!

On Wednesday I took the boat to Ramsgate for the last trip of the season. Whilst crossing the Thames estuary 6 miles north of North Foreland I saw a ship approaching from the east. Turned on the plotter to see its AIS fix & get its closest point of arrival to see if we were on collision course. I could not understand why its icon seemed right by me rather than 1.5 miles away. Then it dawned on me that there was another ship the size of a block of flats 200 feet away approaching from the west behind me & i had not seen it . A quick change of course & a wake up call with tightening of b.m cheeks followed. I know I was not looking but it seems that very few of these ships ever post a watch because I have had 2 near misses this year & several over the years in the English channel where ships have changed course towards me without apparently seeing me first. My nearest was 3 years ago when a container ship missed me by less than 60 feet in mist.

Sailed back today. Left Ramsgate in pitch black at 04-00 hours winds 25kts average for a lively 10 hour sail home & something to remember for the winter whilst the boat is laid up. Glad to see that my replacement milling cutter has arrived from ARC ( see other thread on milling cutters) & tomorrow I will have a go at machining on this confounded milling machine of mine to see if I can actually sort my machining woes.

Jason

I really appreciate the time you have taken to do this. You are right about the cutters . It is too late to go into the workshop to photo them but the 4 flute is chipped having done less than you have done in your video from new. The 2 flute is also very finely chipped when viewed through a magnifying glass. So one can only assume they are both rubbish. The 4 flute did not cut as much as you have & was feeding slower than shown in your video.

That makes me query what sort of steel you are cutting? You made half a T nut in a few minutes whereas I spent a couple of hours fiddling & getting nowhere.

I am meeting the engineer when I get back from my trip & i will ask for his advice re what sort of cutters to purchase. Clearly cheapo ones are not worth the bother, but it may not be sensible just to throw money at it. This trip is the last one of the season( should be windy too!!!!) before I lay up so then I will spend more time in the workshop & somehow I will nail it !!!

So once again , many thanks, I now at least know what i should be aiming for

Michael

Thanks for the details. I have decided to take a couple of days sailing up the coast on the boat so the mill will have to wait until I get back as I have had enough problems with it trying to make a T bolt ( see the thread using milling cutters) but I want to pick you up on your statement

"If you halved that depth it would probably be okay. End mills can take facing cuts much better than plunging ones, as i'm sure you know, slot drills are more suited to that."

No I did not know as I have never had a mill before so everything I do is totally alien to me. No one on the other thread has suggested that i cut on the side of the cutter nor have they suggested that i run at such a high RPM. Once I get back I might try that !!

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 27/09/2016 18:19:18

Proper milling chuck with collets. Cutter has screwed end. As supplied by Warco

My WM 16 has only had 2-3 hours very light use on plastic & a bit of drilling. I have just started machining steel with it. Not had much luck but that is another story. However when milling a piece of free turning mild steel 12 mm wide * 2.8mm deep at 650 RPM with a 12mm end mill feeding very slow the machine suddenly stopped. Cannot recall if it was motor or just drive.

When I backed off from the work I re started & it ran very noisily & only about 150 RPM. I changed from H speed gear to low & it then ran Ok. went back to H again & it ran ok but slightly noisier.

If I wanted to have a look at this offending plastic gear some have mentioned, to check for meshing, can someone fill me in on how to find it before I rush in blindly in please.

It may be that it just jumped out of the main gear change( as suggested by an earlier post above) but I am not sure if that would explain the low RPM afterwards - or would it?-I only ran it like that for a couple of seconds & thinking back it may have been simple friction rotating the spindle

I would like to look inside first just for self satisfaction but where to look first would be useful

Thanks

Jason

I am really having a " bad hair day" today. Seems that I may have done some damage to the new milling machine although I do not know what.

First here are the pictures

I then went to photo the cutters & realised that the brand new 4 flute cutter now has 2 chunks out of it so i threw the piece of steel & changed back to the 2 flute cutter ( From Tracy tools)

I then remembered that I had a couple of metres of free turning steel rod & when I looked at it i found that I could get my T nuts out of the round. So I cut off 4 inches & began working on it. I have to say it was a lot better & at 650 RPM & with gib strips V tight & small cuts I was doing OK. Then I got to the top part & because I was using an old HSS cutter as a parallel the top sat below the vice so to avoid hitting the jaws I needed to run the cutter between them & take a full width cut. But as this was part of a round & only 2,8mm at the highest & only 12mm wide & as a 2 flute cutter is supposed to be ok for slots I decided to take it off in one go

Going very slow I was doing OK then as I turned to dip the brush in some oil the mill stopped dead.

When I removed the work it would only run at very slow revs & V noisy. I changed from slow to high gear & it ran OK . When I went back to low gear it now runs OK again but it may be that I have stripped a tooth off the infamous plastic cog. Will have to go on the Warco thread to ask forumites for advice on that one me thinks

Here is a picture of the offending bit of steel & you can see the cut which is by no means large. It was clamped across the width with a pack under the wide flat & the part I was cutting was below the top of the jaws hence I took the full width cut so as to miss the jaws

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 27/09/2016 11:51:47

Tried a brand new 4 flute cutter today & with only a light cut the machine would have danced all round the workshop if not bolted down. I have not done anything with the gib strips yet as I have only just found the manual but I am not holding my breath.They feel fairly tight. I was using a 12mm HSS cutter cutting about 1-1.5mm deep * 4mm wide at 600 to 750RPM with 1 turn of the wheel every 2-3 seconds. Somehow the 2 flute one seemed just as good

Something definitely wrong. Wife has arranged for me to see a professional machinist next week ( husband of one of her golf friends) & he has offered to show me how to do this, so hopefully this will sort the problem

Unfortunately I see that is No 35 in the series & I had purchased No 49 which is not much help

Jason

Thank you for the video which gives a clearer indication of the feed speed & amount of cut. Both are far higher than I have tried. The cutting action is also much quieter with much less vibration. I suspect some of that is down to the 4 flutes. If I made the gibs much tighter the handwheels would be quite difficult to turn.

I do have some 3 flute cutters which I will try tomorrow but I expect that these are low grade chinese so do not expect much.

It may be that a small investment in some better quality tooling might help

deleted

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 25/09/2016 12:01:25

Any excuse not to tell if you are sticking to the diet

I had some yellow handled Marples chisels that were sold as warrantied for life. I split the handle on one & it was changed without quibble. Why not send them back & complain about the handles. You might get a new set for free

After I sold my joinery business I found I still had 2 No 10ft lengths of light roller conveyors left.( no legs just laid flat on the ground) I used them for moving all sorts of heavy loads from sections of my timber framed house when I built it, to some RSJ's & pallets, plus my safe which is a bit more than 250 KG. Just a case of load it on, & a light push, & away you go. Just do not let it roll off the end !!!

Thanks that gives me something more definite to measure against. i will try that. & see what happens .

It was a brand new cutter

I am really having difficulty understanding the milling operation using end mill cutters & would really appreciate some guidance in simple terms please.

I want to make a couple of clamps as detailed in Harold Hall's website. So the first thing to make are the parts to go in the T slots. So using some old 25 mm square mild steel, I had my first go at machining these with a 2 flute HSS end mill.

It took ages to make a simple rebate on one side & although i tried various RPMs & feed rates & depths of cuts I still felt that I was missing something. You tube does not actually show someone machining something like this in detail. Looking at various tables i get some weird findings. When I run at slow speeds the result is a lot of what I would describe a "knocking" as though it is too slow but tables suggest only 450-650 RPM & I wonder if I am taking enough off too little or too much. I am just hand feeding on the table which is quite slow.

So working on a half inch HSS 2 flute cutter on mild steel in a Warco WM 16 mill may I ask:- (Rather than " how long is a piece of string?"I really need definitive values to start with rather than formulae)

1 ) what RPM would one suggest?

2) How much depth & how much side cut in each pass to form the 12mm * 10mm rebate. in a piece 25mm long ie alternatively how many passes should that take to complete it - should I cut the full 10mm each time & go a certain depth until I get to 12 mm or should i go say 1mm * 1.2 mm each time taking some side & some depth in each cut?

3) As to feed speed how long should it take for the cutter to engage on the end of each cut until it comes off the other end of the 25mm cut?

Are there any links where one can actually see this process being done at the speed one might expect so i can get an idea of what I should be doing that anyone is aware of

Any help gratefully appreciated

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 23/09/2016 16:22:07

The top, base sides & front are probably bomb proof whilst the back can be opened with a tin opener.

What make ?  Chubb, Chatwood Milner, SLS ??

Edited By Sam Longley 1 on 21/09/2016 20:33:10

Thanks