VIDEO: HOW TO Select the Right Tool for Aluminum

JACOB SANCHEZ: Welcome to How To. I'm your host, Jacob Sanchez. I am back again at AWT, the Alliance for Working Together with another Back-to-the-Basics episode in getting ready for the things you need for a good foundation when it comes to manufacturing and starting your CNC machining career. And if you saw episode five, which I applaud you if you did. If you didn't, check it out, it's a good refresher. It's good for you to check out what it means to ready your mill. I'm in a room full of apprentices right now. You're starting your careers and hopefully a long career in manufacturing, CNC machining. Literally how we get the things that we use every single day is made by people like you. And I'm happy to say that we had a special guest last time in episode five and she is coming back again today. Melissa Ramos. How's it going with you?

MELISSA RAMOS: Hey Jacob, how are you?

JACOB SANCHEZ: She is the owner and operator of a machine shop, M95 in Hayward, California.

MELISSA RAMOS: California.

JACOB SANCHEZ: She's the owner and operator. She has two machines and runs a lot of prototyping. And say a little bit about yourself.

MELISSA RAMOS: Prototyping and production. Anything that comes into the shop, we make it or I make.

JACOB SANCHEZ: Would did you bring for us to check out today?

MELISSA RAMOS: I brought some tools and some material and these awesome parts that my buddy Jacob made.

JACOB SANCHEZ: So the cool thing about the manufacturing industry is they've been putting a lot of requests into How To to do more of these Back to the Basics. They wanted to go back to school and learn what it means to get your foundations going. Like I said, episode five was about readying your mill. And I'm going to let Melissa let you know what today's episode is going to be all about.

MELISSA RAMOS: Sure. Are you ready to learn How To select the right tool for aluminum?

JACOB SANCHEZ: So when we're talking about selecting the right tool for aluminum, I think it really starts with your end mills. That's usually the first thing I think about after face milling is am I going to be roughing? What tool do I need? What are my flute lengths? So for something like this, when you're roughing a tool, you may already know three flutes are your friend in aluminum.

MELISSA RAMOS: Maybe even two flute.

JACOB SANCHEZ: Two flutes a lot of the time as well. Just because when you have, let's say on the two flute side, you have a bigger gash. Which is this right here, and that just allows you to fit more chips inside that gash so you can take larger cuts. When you start filling up your end mill with more flutes, you get smaller gashes and you really have to adjust what you're doing for your step overs. The cool thing with selecting your tool for roughing is like, okay, I'm going to be removing as much material as possible with this tool right now. Once you do that, you can move on to picking a tool for finishing. And what do you usually do with a finishing tool?

MELISSA RAMOS: Finishing we want to just come by and take off the remainder about 10 to 20 thou, I really don't ever like to leave more than 15 thou. And I would, I would personally go with the three flute for finishing and roughing but definitely not the same tool.

JACOB SANCHEZ: She just said, not using the same tool for roughing and finishing. Does anybody know why you don't use the same tool for roughing and finishing?

MELISSA RAMOS: You can, but it's not good practice. I don't like to do it.

JACOB SANCHEZ: That's exactly right. What's the point of running this end mill as hard as you can to rough up your material and then use the same tool to finish and you ruin a beautiful part. You really need to make sure you're having one end mill for roughing one end mill for finishing.

MELISSA RAMOS: So you also want to go ahead and look at your actual depth of cut because that's going to determine your flute length. Like, obviously we can't cut this part with this end mill. Like, there's no way it's going to rub and this hole will eventually break. That's also really important.

JACOB SANCHEZ: Another thing, too, is when you're picking your end mill for, let's say, roughing, for example, you really need to look at your feeds and speeds. Your end mill can change your feeds and speeds and vice versa. If I'm running this three flute right now and I go to running a two flute, I'm going to have a different feed per tooth depending on how many teeth my end mill has. So you really have to look into, this is the end mill I’m going to use, this is the process I’m going to take to attacking this part and also look at your feeds and speeds. So it's a big trifecta that goes into choosing a tool.

So something else, there's three other critical pieces I think, that go into making a lot of the standard parts that you all probably make every day. And I think that's face mills, drills, and taps. And when we're talking about we'll start, for example, face mills. The reason that you use a face mill is because you're trying to hit as much area as you can in one pass. There's a big difference between doing this, and doing this, or this. One's efficient, one's not.

MELISSA RAMOS: You also won't get the same finish with the end mill close to the face mill.

JACOB SANCHEZ: And the other thing that we were talking about too, is drills. I like to think there are three common drills that I've used in my experience as a CNC machinist. High speed steels, which I don't use anymore, carbide drills, and then there's actually three flute drills, that I used a lot for aluminum. They’re called twister drills, that’s what we call them. And the cool thing about jumping up from high speed steel like this to go into carbide is you can start doing things especially if you have your spindle coolant and a thru-spindle tool lets you, like the name suggests, blast coolant through the tip of the tool. So instead of, imagine if this was a solid part and I had to make some holes in it. Instead of going peck peck peck peck peck peck peck, you can use something called the G81 with a carbide drill and a through spindle coolant drill. This thing just, shhhhhhh and it's throwing dimes at the windows.

MELISSA RAMOS: And any end mill material too, doesn't have to be aluminum.

JACOB SANCHEZ: Yeah, it's so amazing. So that's a cool thing to look into is not only okay, I have to use a drill for this operation, but what kind of drill should you use for that operation? Taps, that's another thing that has kind of just a trifecta of options. Roll form, cut taps, thread mills. And then correct me if I'm wrong on this, you use roll forms for blind holes and you use cut taps for through holes.

MELISSA RAMOS: Yes. But then there are different style of cutting taps.

JACOB SANCHEZ: What do you mean for, explain that bit.

MELISSA RAMOS: So you have your roll taps which will form the material and you have your cutting taps that will cut and form the material at the same time. And I personally like to use those because I feel like the thread, the threads look better with the cutting tap. That’s just my personal and yeah, I would use a roll tap for a blind hole.

JACOB SANCHEZ: Nice. And I'll pass this one around real quickly so you guys can just see some of the tools we've been talking about used on that part. And the other tool I mentioned was a thread mill, so if you've never seen one I use thread mills a lot for titanium and Inconel because if you know anything about titanium and inconel, they're very hard. And so it would be very hard to use something like a form tap to push that material into the shape you need. With a thread mill, it's almost like a a lot of them are singular flutes imagine right here, and you do this type of spiral with a pitch that gives you the exact thread that you need. It's a beautiful type of machining and I absolutely love it. Also, pass this guy around to see to check out some of the features I got done on that.

So key takeaways that I hope you all learn when it comes to learning about selecting the right tool for aluminum. Determine if you're roughing or finishing. Once you've got that, determine if you're using a two, three flute, whatever end mill you need for that task. Also, check out what that axial depth is going to be depending on what your cut is. Look into if you need to use different types of tools to hit some other features. I'm talking about drills, taps, face mills. And at the end of the day, it's all about choosing the right tool for the right application. I want to thank you real quick. For stopping all the way in from Cali going west to east side. I love it.

MELISSA RAMOS: It's my first time here and it was awesome. Thanks for having me.

JACOB SANCHEZ: And all of you for letting us come in and help you hopefully learn How To choose the right tool for aluminum.

Narrator: For more metalworking tips and industry best practices, stay tuned for the next How To episode and subscribe to the MSC Industrial Supply YouTube channel, a source of original manufacturing content Built to Make You Better.