carbide end mills

[jem]

I have been using HSS endmills for years, but have heard that Carbide is much better, and now I see there are Carbide End Mill Tungsten Steel Milling Cutter Tools. which are much cheaper, and the review seemed good too. I am not sure what this means, does it mean that it is just coated, or that the tip is carbide or what. I would be very grateful for your expert advice on this subject please.

best wishes

Jem

[goldstar31]

Hi Jem

I think that you may be mixing things up a bit. You can alloy Tungsten with HSS and you can also get a bewildering variety of milling cutters with all sorts of 'performances'

You can also get ' carbide inserts 'either bolted in or brazed in milling cutters.

Having merely began to sketch the topic, I was also utterly confused when I got some inserts called Plansee and being quite baffled, realised that Plansee was an lake in Austria and it took a lady oboe player to explain that the tungsten clay was also mined nearby.
Having rambled on- on Austrian Alps as well, the problem with carbides are quite brittle and can chip very easily. So the only two things( ) which can sharpen then are CBN and diamonds on a decent tool and cutter grinder. Yea, somebody will correct me and add 'green grit wheels' but you will cloud the workshop with abrasive dust and you will become a COPD sufferer-like me.

So have a try with carbides which do not have a negative rake needing horsepower which most of us( well, me) don't possess.

Others may express their own views.

Cheers

Norman

[92220]

I used HSS cutters for many years, then got persuaded by Roger, to try carbide. I hardly ever use HSS now. The cutters I buy are the cheapest on Ebay, though I do buy EW cutters when they are having a clearance sale, so are dirt cheap. Carbide cutters can be bought so cheaply from China and they are fine for use on our lower powered machines. If they get dropped on the cutting edge they chip a lot easier than HSS, but because they are so cheap, it doesn't hurt the wallet to just throw them in the bin. Norman is right about not using negative rake cutters, but the cutters listed on Ebay are rarely negative rake. If nothing is mentioned about the rake then it will be positive rake.

If you use a Clarkson collet chuck and threaded end milling cutters, you will need to buy an ER32 or ER20 collet chuck and collet set, to cover all sizes of cutter, as very few carbide cutters have threaded shanks, and if they do, they will be expensive because they will have a HSS threaded portion brazed to the carbide cutting portion. The Clarkson chuck won't hold the carbide cutters.

Bob.

[goldstar31]

Of course Bob's comments are excellent but;===========

Well, I'm old fashioned because I abhor both E-Bay and 'buying from China'

Right or wrong, I try to support local industries and hate to see empty factories and shops- in my parish.
Again, I cannot find time to try to sort out customs duty on purchases made there. It doesn't make economic sense to me

It's ME thing and I don't mind attempting a good 15 course Chinese banquet locally and this far outweighs the food recently offered at a certain model engineering exhibition recently.

As I said, it's a ME thing.



Norm

[92220]

Hi Norm.

I agree with your comments but sometimes 'needs must', and in this case 'needs' is the contents of the wallet. I more often than not, buy British cutters anyway, because the supplier L use has a 24 hour service and that outweighs their slightly higher cost. The Chinese cutters take up to 4 weeks to arrive so I rarely buy from there now. They did get me into using carbide though, and finding the advantages for myself. Incidentally, customs duty doesn't generally come into it unless your purchase is over £15.00 (duty-free limit) value, and the Chinese have always marked the envelope below this....regardless of what I paid! As I said, I buy carbide cutters from EW Equipment Engineering Supplies, of Stockport, when they have them in their clearance sale, which is quite regularly. They have small carbide milling cutters, sometimes, as low as £2.00 each, which is almost comparable with the cheapest Chinese ones.

Bob.

[jasonb]

Are the EW cutters British made or just from a British supplier? I suspect they are from China but to a reasonable quality.

[jem]

Hi everyone,

thank you very much for all your help. the cutters that I was looking at were a set 2mm to 12 mm and their description was 'Carbide End Mill Tungsten Steel Milling Cutter Tools"
they seem to have had a very good write up, and cost $22 so cheap enough. anyway for that price I had better get a set, and then maybe I can let you know what they are like. I am afraid that I have bought quite a lot of tools from China, and apart from having to wait 4 or 5 weeks, have found them to be pretty good, for my workshop.

best wishes

Jem

[jasonb]

They probably use that description so the item comes up on as many searches as possible.

[dscott]

Wonderful 2 or two. Yes come out of the Car park opposite a famous racecourse and turn right!
Go across the roundabout where I photoed a bus having hit a car earlier in the day and proceed about 2 miles. Wonderful is on the left and has parking outside. Scruffy Shop but the food was excellent! We took our own food and drink for lunch and Lily had lunch while we sat around Roger and admired! Lily has instructions to only talk in Chinese if ever questioned!!

I am almost converted to tipped tools, the only ones HSS being specials ground into form tools and thin boring bars etc.
The finish is superb and the speeds almost twice the HSS ones. A side and face multi cutting tool pays for itself the first day it is out of its box! In fact drawing out the curved front of the new modified Simples frames, made sure that this was the radius of the tool. Job done almost instantly. In fact Tracy Tools sold a small one cutter End mill of about 5/8" diameter several years ago. Use one tip and edge as roughing cut. Change it round for the finishing cuts!

Love David and Lily.

[Roger]

It's worth looking at what sizes are the cheapest because there's a 'U' shaped cost/diameter curve that has a minimum around 2.5-3mm on the eBay sites I use. Obviously you need a range of sizes, but often you can select the cheapest cutter for the job even if your preference might be for a slightly different one. Costs start to escalate out of proportion as you go bigger, so I tend to stick to sizes from 6mm and below wherever practical.

I've never bought any milling cutters made in China that weren't excellent. They wouldn't be in business very long if they were rubbish. They aren't making them for the hobby and DIY market, they're mass produced for industry. That's why they're so cheap.

eBay is my one stop shop for just about everything, I've been using the site since 2005 and must have made thousands of purchases from cotton buds to Cars, everything imaginable! I don't recall ever being bitten. Larger purchases take a little more care and common sense, but for the trivial everyday stuff, what's to lose?

[jon38r80]

If you are not in a hurry you can find solid carbide cutters on Aliexpress (china) at very nice prices, the post times can sometimes be a bit extended. I bought some carbide roughing ones having seen how they are good for removing material quickly demonstrated by Roger in his build thread. 2,3and four flute cutters I buy from EBay or Alie depending on price and whether I'm in a hurry or not

[Roger]

May 31, 2019 21:10:51 GMT jon38r80 said:

If you are not in a hurry you can find solid carbide cutters on Aliexpress (china) at very nice prices, the post times can sometimes be a bit extended. I bought some carbide roughing ones having seen how they are good for removing material quickly demonstrated by Roger in his build thread. 2,3and four flute cutters I buy from EBay or Alie depending on price and whether I'm in a hurry or not

I've done this too, and they're exactly the same as the ones you get from UK stock as far as I can tell. I'm sure the UK suppliers just buy them in big enough numbers from Alibaba to be able to add their margin and still make enough profit for it to be worthwhile. The problem with Alibaba is that you are likely to get a nasty surprise from UPS to pay for tax. You need to be aware of that since it undermines the savings. It's still cheaper than any other source, but it's not quite the bargain that you might imagine.

[jon38r80]

The question of tax only arises if you place large orders with one supplier. If you keep the size of your order down it will fall under the import duty limit that the post office will then have to levy. I don't get through many and try to make mine last by carefully listening to the machines as I am cutting. I don't have CNC ( I haven't been able to justify the expense) so the machines are not left to run on their own as yours are.

[Roger]

Jun 1, 2019 6:18:37 GMT jon38r80 said:

The question of tax only arises if you place large orders with one supplier. If you keep the size of your order down it will fall under the import duty limit that the post office will then have to levy. I don't get through many and try to make mine last by carefully listening to the machines as I am cutting. I don't have CNC ( I haven't been able to justify the expense) so the machines are not left to run on their own as yours are.

That's worth knowing then. I've tried to keep the coast down by ordering a lot, but that seems too have backfired. There's no need to buy outside of the UK now though, there are at least two major importers on eBay.

[92220]

I learned the hard way about import tax. I got a Christmas present from relatives in New Zealand and they quoted the value as £20.00. I had to pay duty on it and there was a note with it saying that import duty is payable on all imports with a value over £15.00. I have bought cutters from China recently and the order came to over £15 but when the package came, the value was quoted at £7.00. I am sure some Chinese suppliers will reduce the quoted value so that you don't pay duty and will come back and order again.

Bob.