Feed Rates

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DanielBEE
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Posts: 185
Joined: Thu May 21, 2009 7:49 pm
Model of CNC Machine: n/a
Location: Richardson, TX

Feed Rates

Post by DanielBEE »

I did a quick search for feed rates on the forums and got about 1000 hits all saying something slightly different..

So I'll just ask my quick question. Finishing with a 1/8" Round Nose with a 1/4" shank, what is a good feed rate. I really need to be able to produce carvings much faster than I currently am without risknig a bit breaking.

Thanks!

-Daniel

(I did a little more reading and saw some people run as fast as 6 inches per second, I told my boss that and he said 1 inch per second is too fast.. So I'm not really sure what to think.)
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GripUs
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Re: Feed Rates

Post by GripUs »

Hi Daniel,
You have asked a trick question :D

There are many variables here, including the power of your router, Router speed, depth of cut and material being cut. For example, you can cut deeper/faster in pine than you can in oak. You can cut faster in any material with a .0625 cut depth than you can with a.125 cut depth.

I am afraid. like the rest of us, you will have to break a few bits and wait for some long cuts to get a real handle on what you can do on your machine.

That said, I work mostly with mesqiute which is 2.5 times harder than oak. I usually run my 1/8" bits at .125 cut depth and 150-180 ipm. As mentioned in some other posts, if you have a lot of "Z" movement you can run your feed rate up because your "X" and "Y" speeds never have a chance to reach full speed before the router has to change direction up/down. Basically, you can use a higher feed rate on 3D projects than you can on 2D.

I hope this helps you get in the ballpark. I am sure some of the real wizards who have been at it longer than I will have some additional/better advice.

Regards,

Joe
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kilrabit
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Joined: Thu Feb 26, 2009 4:04 am
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Re: Feed Rates

Post by kilrabit »

Everyone's machine is different. Tell you what , put a half full glass of water on your table, and air cut the pattern you want to you want to cut, when you see waves start in the glass, that means your acceleration of your axis movement is will start to appear in you work if you look close at the finished product. This will be your top speed to travel before your speed degrades your work.
You are talking about finishing, which usually means the roughing is done and you only need to cut a maximum of 40 to 60 thousandths. My 1/8 really likes to cut about 13400 rpm and I usually run from minimum of 50 IPM to around 200 IPM depending on the complexity of the cut. This is for the 3D work like on the vectric site. I have never broken a bit that was not pilot error.
As far as how deep and how fast for 2 deminsional work this depends on your machine, they all have a sweet spot that works great for that machine, it usually does not take too long to find out how fast is to fast.

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