We all have heard hundreds of times that when chatter is happening during machining, we should reduce our feed rate. The same advice we also hear for compensating for extra-long tools and unstable setups.

Let me explain why I think this is mostly incorrect.

Let’s list  the effects of reducing the feed rate:

1. Reduces tool life.
2. Reduces productivity.
3. Increases deflection.
4. Causes chatter.

Let me explain from my own experience and research I have made each of these points and a simple way to avoid chatter's adverse effects.Read More 

Look for the HSM machining of the round central pocket in the beginning.
Here we have a 12mm 6 flute Coated hi-performance endmill, cutting 1" deep at 0.047" (10%) rWOC.
at 10000 RPM and 300 ipm feedrate. the chipload works out to be 0.005". Material is 4140 pre-hardened steel.

Impressive isn't it?
Those results have been achieved with uber-expensive BlueSwarf tap-test technology.

This is one video that caught the eye of one of my HSMAdvisor trial users:

Being a geek and wanting to help the user make the right decision I immediately punched the numbers into my HSMAdvisor app.

Here is what I've got:Read More 

Don't you hate when "that guy" cuts your stock a little too short?

Holding on to just 0.060" here. The part is 1.5" tall made out of 4140, which helps it stay in place and not collapse under machining pressure. Pretty sure it would have moved if it was made out of mild steel.

PS. Did I eay I love those CR vise? I do. Can't lift that jaw with a lift truck.

Being a CNC Machinist/Programmer is sometimes more than simply creating a program and machining the actual part, often times it is about creating efficient and accurate fixturing.

In this little project:

I had to machine rectangular cut-outs and drill holes through an already-turned steel ring. Then I had to part each ring to 4 equal pieces.

There were about 100 such rings that worked out to 400 pieces in total.

After drilling holes on an indexer I had to machine a fixture to hold my part through 2 remaining set-ups.

First half of the fixture consists of the expanding mandrel:

The work-piece would be mounted on it like so. A hole on the side is used to properly position it:

Read More 

Being a professional CNC Machinist myself with a good manual background I often find myself watching various machining videos and blogs.

Unlike others I do not often share somebody-else's work, I could just not walk past this one and not tell everybody how great I think this is....

This story was posted on "Russian reddit" and here is the direct translation of the author's post:

Lets begin with tyres. Vladimir (guy's name) decided to create the mould to make the rubber tyres himself. Here it is:

Here are the tyres he made with it. Beautiful aren't they?

He also made little differentials. Housings, gears. Everything made himself:

Read More 

I personally use HSMAdvisor at work every day and trust its results 100%

I have to say my program now knows about machining more than i do. I certainly can not remember cutting speeds and feeds, reduction factors, depth of cut and a ton of other information for every material I have ever cut.

Now add to that the various possible combinations of tool/material/coating and it becomes a no brainier, that a good speed and feed calculator like HSMAdvisor saves a ton of time and money by improving your tool life and productivity.

It is not only good for HSM (High Speed Machining) but also for general machining, drilling tapping, you name it.

The algorithms it employs are far superior to what other calculators are using. Take for example the real-time depth of cut/deflection optimization, that other calculators do in a separate window and take a few seconds to complete.

Here is a quick video lesson where i show the steps involved in creating a simple contouring toolpath in MasterCam x9:

And here is the video of machining the actual part:

Sometimes I get asked whether hsmadvisor CNC Machinist Calculator is reliable enough out of the box.

I and many others test it at work every day. This 2"x1.5"x1.25" 4140 PH piece was programmed on masterscam with hsmadvisor speeds and feeds with all overrides set to default.

Worked out fast and awesome. As usual!

14497779489640.jpg

I regularly follow practicalmachinist.com forums.
Especially the cnc machining section of it.

I notice when CNC Speeds and Feeds questions come up people often suggest my HSMAdvisor Machinist calculator.
A referral by a satisfied customer is the best referral in my opinion. Thank you to everyone doing this great favor to me and my prospective users!

Other times users of HSMAdvisor question speeds and feeds it generates and instead of going to me, they ask on forums.
Which is always fine, because extremely often "wrong" results mean something wrong in users expectations or the data he feeds the calculator

In the process of discussion it usually turns out that the calculation results were correct, but because user decided to use a depth of cut or tool length, larger than he should have, HSMAdvisor compensates and gives a very conservative feed rate.

Just like in this forum post over here: Engraving with a 1/32 ball mill machinist wanted Read More 

Did you know there are three ways you can touch off your tools?

Because of how Machine Offsets add up, there are several ways CNC machinists can set their Tool and Work Offsets.

This is especially true for Tool Length Offsets.

Tool Offsets can be either Positive or Negative.
Depending on your Machine Shop equipment you should use one or the other.

Regardless of how you set your tool length offset, you apply it the same way.
Right after the tool change and after turning on your spindle and moving to your X Y position above the part.
The very first absolute Z movement should be the line where you apply the tool length offset.

Positive Tool Offsets (gage line tool length offsets)

In the case of Positive Tool Offsets, the offset represents the Length of the tool measured as a distance from the Gauge Line of the spindle (typically spindle nose) to the tip of the tool. The longer the tool, the larger your Tool Length offset will be.

Read More 

Before we run any G-Code program, we need to tell the machine where our part zero is.
A Part Zero is simply a bunch of numbers that offset the axis to give the machine a new coordinate point to work from.

Work Offsets is one of the most basic pieces of knowledge any machinist must-have.

Let us account for all the basic coordinate systems and definitions, available in a generic CNC machine

• Machine Home and (Absolute) Machine Coordinates
• Work Offset Coordinates
• Tool Length Offsets

Machine Home and Machine Coordinates: G53

Machine Coordinates (or Absolute Coordinates) is the absolute and constant representation of the machine axis position.
These coordinates never change between Machine Restarts and must remain such. In fact, there is often no way for an operator to adjust the Absolute Machine Axis Home position.

Machine Home is simply that magical place where all Machine Coordinates should become Zero.

To Home the Machine is to start a machine operation, that will move all Axis to their soft limit position where X, Y, and Z-axis reading will be set to zero.

Homing must be done every time you restart your machine. Without it machine does not know where is the position of its table or spindle.

When homed your machine coordinates will read X=0 Y=0 and Z=0 and it is going to look like this:

The point where Machine X and Y intersect is called Table Home Position and the one where the Machine Z-axis starts from is called Spindle Home.

Now, there is no agreement between machine tool manufacturers on where the machine home should be.

Read More