HSM or High Speed Machining is becoming more and more popular each day.
Many of us have seen those youtube videos where endmlls remove large amounts of material at high speeds/feeds.

While definitions of HSM may vary between tool manufacturers and even individual shops, the physics behind it remain the same.

In this article i would like to explore flat endmills.

HSM is not about ramping up your speed/feed overrides to 200% and puling out your smartphone to record another youtube-worth video.

What is HSM?

HSM is a complex of programming, machining and tooling techniques aimed at radical increase of productivity.

Programming

The cornerstone of HSM is low radial and high axial engagement of an endmill with the workpiece.

There are many CAD/CAM systems that allow you to create HSM tool-paths. Mastercam's Dynamic milling and SurfCAM's Truemill are some of them.

When radial cutter engagement with the material is smaller than the radius of the tool an interesting thing happens.
Chip load- the distance the tool advances per cutter revolution per tooth- does not equal the actual chip thickness anymore.
Chip thinning mainly happens at radial engagements below 30% of the diameter.

In order to get compensated chipload you need to multiply recommended by manufacturer chipload by the chip thinning factor.

Usual Radial Engagement for HSM toolpaths however is between 5 and 15%.

Axial depth of cut varies depending on geometry, but Read More 

Radial Chip Thinning HSMAdvisor Screenshot

Sevaral weeks ago i saw a post on CNCZone.

A HSMadvisor user Peter Neil used it to calculate cutting conditions for cutting a block of pre-hardened stainless steel.
His machine was Tormach.

Here is an exact copy-paste from that forum post:
_____________________________________________________________________________________

Did a test cut on the Tormach today using feeds & speeds from the latest version of the excellent HSM advisor.
To make it interesting, I did the cut using some 1.2085 pre-hard Stainless Steel as I have plenty of stock of it and have a job in mind for this, and wanted to see how it cut on the Tormach.
The material is like a stainless P20, at 16% Chrome/1% Nickel & 0.5% Sulphur (which makes it slightly free-er machining) and is hardened to around 33-35 Rockwell C, so I used the HSM advisor guidelines for machining P20 rather than Stainless. Cutter was a 10mm 4-flute Carbide TiAlN coated EM.

So...... ticking the HSM/Chip thinning option I got a speed of 5120 and feed of 2214mm/minute( 87 IPM). I used a DOC of 10mm and WOC of 0.5mm/0.020" - and turned off the flood cooling to machine it completely dry. The finish pass on the 1st level was 15mm DOC and 0.5mm WOC and slightly lower speeds/feeds.

Loaded up a 40mm x 63mm block , pressed the start button, and it went from this....





...to this!

Read More 

This HSMAdvisor v0.200 release is a major step forward.

Aside from major rewrites that i did to improve stability of the code there are also new features that will improve user experience 
and move us one step ahead towards making it the best tool for machinists. 

New Features

• Circular Interpolation feedrate compensation
  Now you can get compensated feedrates for milling inside and outside round features.
• HSM and Chip Thinning 
  are now two separate check boxes.
  Chip thinning allows to compensate for thinning chip thickness at low radial and axial engagements.
  HSM allows to increase cutting speed when chip thinning occurs. 
• Manufacturer's Speed and Chipload input
  For when you need to enter manufacturer recommended S&F values.
• .NET 2.0 Framework 
  Starting from this release i have downgraded required framework version from 4.0 to 2.0
  This will allow us to target wider audience as it immediately drops requirements for Windows computers.
• UNEF and UNS threads
  New thread sizes were added into the Threading section. 
• Drill Chart 
  was expanded to drills up to 1.5" in diameter

Bugs Fixed

All the existing bugs were tackled when code re-write happened.
I took a long time testing and fixing all of the problem and suspect areas, so at this poing it should be bug-free.

HSMAdvisor_v0.200 program picture.JPG

I have just released HSMAdvisor build 0.017!

First you should uninstall the previous version.
As some of the data files are not compatible with the version 0.017

After downloading and installing it you will receive another 30 days to play with my software.

New things:

• A bunch of new materials
  Structural steels added 1035, 1045 and some other
• Grooving turning tool added to the tool list
• Several Tools and Cuts can now be selected at the same time and deleted or moved to a different Library
• Double click on myCut ToolLibrary now causes the Tool/Cut to load
• HSM Cutting speed compensation now only turns on when HSM/Chip Thinning is checked.
• Huge number of bugs fixed.

Get it HERE ->http://hsmadvisor.com/

Enjoy and don't forget to leave your feedback.
You can do so support forums.

Unfortunately because of high number of spam messages You will have to register first (unless you already did)

Forums are located at http://zero-divide.net/index.php?page=forums&shell_id=170&category_id=1123, a simple registration on my web site (zero-divide.net, register) allows you to post your questions/feature requests/suggestions.

Need i remind you that registered users who actively participate get full version for FREE?

FSWizard Online is:

FSWizard is here

It is the most accurate Online Feeds and Speeds Calulator.

In order for every user to enjoy latest modifications and most accurate results, it is WEB Based.
This means that you can use it across all imaginable operational systems and devices.
All you need is an internet connected WEB browser.
No download or installation is required: Just visit the web page.

Also a full functioning mobile version is available.

Key Features of FSWizard:

Read More