TOOLING SURVEY

A little side note, that I prefer indexable carbide tips, now that I know where I can get them from at good prices. They sell them off for a song.

I've tested these economic ones against branded ones and I can't really tell a lot of difference between them just looking at the outside and taking a test cut. I would suspect that the real question of superiority would come about when you tried taking deeper cuts into hard steels. (See how it performs under plenty of heat and stress)

So it's got my vote, but it doesn't tell the whole story that I still need to grind HSS tools for the jobs that my indexables just cannot do. 

Michael W

Edited By Michael-w on 10/02/2018 12:15:52

Interesting question. Of course the normal HSS tool tip sinks lower and lower with every sharpening until you have to grind it all the way back and start over. The tangential must have similar problems should you deviate from it's set shape.

When rummaging through the box of stubs and nubs looking for a volunteer to become that new tooth form you can often avoid a lot of grinding by simply turning it sideways on or upside down.

The tangential is probably much the same, but it is damaging my brain trying to visualise it

Talking of carbide inserts, I was turning some ball screws down to fit pulleys and bearings and stuff. They seemed to have a hard case, possibly work hardened after a tough thread rolling.

The insert invariably broke and then cut. The shattered tip worked better than the original sharpness.

Made me wonder if I knew what I was doing. Life is mostly surprises for me, I muddle through somehow

I am surprised you didn't allow multiple entries. I use carbide inserts for some things, self ground HSS , brazed carbide either as received or specially ground, or tangential HSS. There id a different favorite for each task.

I voted for grind my own HSS. But to be honest I bought some home ground HSS from a pro user and they are great. But I do resharpen them often so in that respect I grind my own. I also have some really self grinder HSS but it can be quite tedious.

It's well over a year since we ran this survey, but i see it has now received well over 200 votes, and it's interesting to see that Carbide inserts now have a small lead over home-ground HSS.

I'm sure this would have looked rather different 20 or even 10 years ago!

Neil

Very late response(!) because then one person of fickle opinions could make several votes, outweighing the views of a person with a clear preference.

If in doubt, just vote for your favourite general purpose tool that you usually leave in the toolpost

Neil

Just to update the vote; I use tangential as my preferred tool ( 95% 0f the time ) followed up by inserts as the # 2 choice, followed by a couple of specifically ground HSS.

George.

I don't know if I missed the survey, but I'd now find it impossible to answer because which I use depends on tool purpose. *Mostly* I grind my own HSS, but I note that nobody's selected HSS inserts when I'm sure those HSS parting blade inserts (which I wouldn't want to be without) must be reasonably popular or they'd no longer be available.

So most people would have to accept that other types are also essential to their activity.

The survey asks which you "prefer", which I would take to mean whichever one you use the most. I don't think anyone uses only one type exclusively.

Interesting. I've never thought of a parting blade as an insert. It is the whole tool, just mounts in a purpose built holder. HSS inserts to me means the pre-ground HSS inserts that were a bit commonish before carbide took over. Used to be more common on large milling side/face cutters than on lathe tools in places I worked at in the last century.

Interesting to see the use of carbide inserts rising in the poll. I've started using them more myself in the past two years since good quality inserts cheap cheap from China came online. They seem to work a lot better on the ML7 than the old Drummond M.

.

That's rather intriguing, Hopper ... given that the Drummond M is more heavily built in some areas.

Any thoughts as to why ?

MichaelG.

Well, it's something where you could replace the cutting element without removing the tool from the post or having to reset it afterwards - but I reckon it'd be sophistry to debate that at any length. I certainly wouldn't *prefer* to grind all parting tools from solid or butt-welded HSS, but I've got a selection of a dozen or so HSS tools that I've ground to cut forms and get in to various places at angles that suit me.

I don't think I've ever seen HSS milling inserts, even though I also did a few years' milling last century - nor turning 'tip' -style ones either; that's why I thought parting blades were the obvious example.

Bigger spindle diameter and headstock bearings are the big difference I think. I never could get the Drummond to produce a good finish with carbide. Plus the old flat belts on the Drummond can slip under heavy load with the not-so-sharp-edged carbide tools that take more power to cut. Once the belt slips and the spindle slows down, it just tears the tip off the insert. So you can't really take advantage of the carbide's ability to shift metal at a high rate of knots. Poly-V belt run on the flat pulleys helps but long term plans are to machine the proper Poly-V grooves in the Drummond pulleys using the ML7 to do the job. One day...