Mill Tooling Setup

[Marty 69]

Hi Guys ,
Finally time to join and ask for some advice after lurking here for a while .
I've done a search thru the forum which has given me a lot of general information , but its time to start asking questions .
Turret Mill , 5hp , 40 taper , 1600 kg's .
Brand new Taiwanese machine , in house maintenance work and machining new jigs and setup fixtures for our manufacturing equipment .
Majority of work is Ali , then some mild steel .
I have a ER Collet chuck , drill chuck and a 45 degree face mill as of now , that's getting the job done but lots of tool swapping so I'm starting to look at options on what extra tooling to buy.
Side lock vs Er chucks , initial thought is to have 3-4 side locks set up with dedicated end mills for the general stuff and a couple more ER's for the odd sizes ?.
Drilling and tapping , majority of tapping is M4 to M12 ,for this I'm thinking a dedicated ER chuck and collets .
Square shoulder insert end mills , 16 to 25 dia , pro's/cons for mixed work . Any advice on what insert types that are nice and free cutting vs proprietary inserts to steer clear of ??
Boring heads vs Boring & Facing heads , I know I've got a job coming up that will need a boring head , for those that have both , how much use does the facing side of the head get ?
I know those are all very general questions and there's a lot of "what ifs" , what I'm doing is very simple low accuracy work .
Interested in the thoughts of you guys that do this work for a living .
Cheers
Marty

 

[Toolmaker51]

Generally, boring heads are less cumbersome than dually capable boring-facing. The size range of facing heads is considerable too, my preference leans toward a population of boring heads, to lessen offsets for particular bores. Search out Criterion, ENCO (were French made, very satisfactory), Wohlhaupter and NAREX, which are probably most prevalent. Their kits build around a multitude of tooling for many potential configurations.

 

[Overland]

There's lots of 40 taper tool holders on ebay (mainly Cat 40), even top quality used ones for low prices. Easy to get some side locks to fit typical endmill sizes.
I have some if you're interested.
Bob

 

[Marty 69]

Generally, boring heads are less cumbersome than dually capable boring-facing. The size range of facing heads is considerable too, my preference leans toward a population of boring heads, to lessen offsets for particular bores. Search out Criterion, ENCO (were French made, very satisfactory), Wohlhaupter and NAREX, which are probably most prevalent. Their kits build around a multitude of tooling for many potential configurations.

Hi Toolmaker ,
The budget at the time got me a Taiwanese boring head , it's doing what I need it to do so far .
When it stops doing what I need , a Wohlhaupter or Narex will replace it (they aren't cheap here in Australia) .
A couple of different sizes wasn't something I'd thought about until you mentioned it , makes sense and I'll keep that in mind when its time to upgrade .
Merry Xmas , kick back , relax and enjoy .
Cheers
Marty

 

[Marty 69]

There's lots of 40 taper tool holders on ebay (mainly Cat 40), even top quality used ones for low prices. Easy to get some side locks to fit typical endmill sizes.
I have some if you're interested.
Bob

Hi Bob ,
I was trying to keep my initial post shortish so I think I missed some relevant info , this machine has a pneumatic drawbar , M16 thread .
Swapping out drawbars for inch tooling isn't a quick thing unfortunately .
I'm in Australia so metric seems to be the predominant system .
Took a bit of searching but Iscar got me set up with side locks and ER collet chucks .
Merry Xmas , kick back & relax .
Cheers
Marty

 

[doug8cat]

You might reach out to Curtis at Cutting Edge Engineering in Queens Land.
He is a very talented and meticulous chap, he has some very good tooling and is knowledgeable as where as to obtain it.

 

[rons]

I use a Criterion head. I have few square ones but don't use them. I have a nice set of HSS from India. Freebie with the head. One of the
shanks does not fit into the Criterion, even after a little adjustment with 400 particles.
Walter face mill and Iscar threading holders are others I use. But a useful tool is the brazed carbide bit for a couple of bucks.

I can hog off long sections with one of those bits and then re-sharpen it on a diamond impregnated stone.
Saves the inserts for the final work.

 

[Toolmaker51]

Hi Toolmaker ,
The budget at the time got me a Taiwanese boring head , it's doing what I need it to do so far .
When it stops doing what I need , a Wohlhaupter or Narex will replace it (they aren't cheap here in Australia) .
A couple of different sizes wasn't something I'd thought about until you mentioned it , makes sense and I'll keep that in mind when its time to upgrade .
Merry Xmas , kick back , relax and enjoy .
Cheers
Marty

There are less issues with Taiwanese products - due partly to who the businesses are commissioning the work. Don't care what the brand name is; if label says Made in China, its repulsive. I'm no geo-politico, but every problem with China was built out of what we bought. Thats how Communism works, no matter how much they decry capitalism