Making a bottle opener on the Carve King

[Derek the Admin]

I made this bottle opener on the Carve King out of 6061 aluminum. I ran a ball nose around the perimeter just to break the edge of one side, then I ran a 1/8" end mill at 52 IPM (1300mm/m) on a .03" (0.75mm) stepdown. I held the quarter inch stock in a vise and tabbed it in four places.

[aforww]

Sweet. I'd look into some soft jaws for your clamping though. I cringed every time it got close to the vice lol.

[Derek the Admin]

Ha, It was all planned. I knew she was good.

[breslinmr]

So have a question maybe a few lol. I have seen in a few places that I have read about aluminum 6061, is the 6061 the strength off the material and is this the only type you can use with these machines ?
Also have an project in mind with using brass, I take it that that won't be a problem if aluminum is ok so should brass right ?
Is there a specific type off brass that you have to use ?

[aforww]

Jul 12, 2017 2:46:04 GMT breslinmr said:

So have a question maybe a few lol. I have seen in a few places that I have read about aluminum 6061, is the 6061 the strength off the material and is this the only type you can use with these machines ?
Also have an project in mind with using brass, I take it that that won't be a problem if aluminum is ok so should brass right ?
Is there a specific type off brass that you have to use ?

6061 is just the alloy. It machines well, is super easy to get, and doesn't cost much. It's pretty standard far in the milling world. You can definitely do brass. Just make sure you understand that different materials require different foreplay and different equipment lol.

Obviously you aren't going to Mill it like wood. I wouldn't use a cheap straight flute cutters. So on and so forth. Most large manufacturers of cutters have recommended parameters for various materials.

[activereality]

Jul 12, 2017 2:57:33 GMT aforww said:

Jul 12, 2017 2:46:04 GMT breslinmr said:

So have a question maybe a few lol. I have seen in a few places that I have read about aluminum 6061, is the 6061 the strength off the material and is this the only type you can use with these machines ?
Also have an project in mind with using brass, I take it that that won't be a problem if aluminum is ok so should brass right ?
Is there a specific type off brass that you have to use ?

6061 is just the alloy. It machines well, is super easy to get, and doesn't cost much. It's pretty standard far in the milling world. You can definitely do brass. Just make sure you understand that different materials require different foreplay and different equipment lol.

Obviously you aren't going to Mill it like wood. I wouldn't use a cheap straight flute cutters. So on and so forth. Most large manufacturers of cutters have recommended parameters for various materials.

aforww,

    This is what I am currently trying to learn more about. Since I will cut my teeth on the wood and plastic pack from MillRight. Learning the speeds and feeds will be a part of the overall challenge. However, if all of the bit manufacturers list recommended settings, this will help quite a bit. As I go along, I feel like I will also develop my own "settings" (or as I like to call it "my dope for that load" haha- PRS anyone?) based on the real world results I find with my set-up. 

Derek,

  That is awesome! This has prompted me to make a couple of different bottle opener styles in fusion. just the regular straight handled versions. I would like to see if I could make a few and even put some designs in the handle area of them- names or pic, etc. Its ideas like this that really get me excited to try new things!

Thanks everyone 
Aaron

[breslinmr]

Jul 13, 2017 13:51:24 GMT activereality said:

Jul 12, 2017 2:57:33 GMT aforww said:

6061 is just the alloy. It machines well, is super easy to get, and doesn't cost much. It's pretty standard far in the milling world. You can definitely do brass. Just make sure you understand that different materials require different foreplay and different equipment lol.

Obviously you aren't going to Mill it like wood. I wouldn't use a cheap straight flute cutters. So on and so forth. Most large manufacturers of cutters have recommended parameters for various materials.

aforww,

    This is what I am currently trying to learn more about. Since I will cut my teeth on the wood and plastic pack from MillRight. Learning the speeds and feeds will be a part of the overall challenge. However, if all of the bit manufacturers list recommended settings, this will help quite a bit. As I go along, I feel like I will also develop my own "settings" (or as I like to call it "my dope for that load" haha- PRS anyone?) based on the real world results I find with my set-up. 

Derek,

  That is awesome! This has prompted me to make a couple of different bottle opener styles in fusion. just the regular straight handled versions. I would like to see if I could make a few and even put some designs in the handle area of them- names or pic, etc. Its ideas like this that really get me excited to try new things!

Thanks everyone 
Aaron

[

Thanks I've tried reading about feeds and speeds but find it very confusing lol think it's going to be a lot off trial and error but think once I get stuck in when machine arives hoping i will pick it up. 👍

[markwisniowski]

Jul 12, 2017 2:46:04 GMT breslinmr said:

So have a question maybe a few lol. I have seen in a few places that I have read about aluminum 6061, is the 6061 the strength off the material and is this the only type you can use with these machines ?
Also have an project in mind with using brass, I take it that that won't be a problem if aluminum is ok so should brass right ?
Is there a specific type off brass that you have to use ?

I do a lot of milling with brass - and I prefer it over aluminum! It's much more forgiving and cuts like butter I use an 1/8" 2 flute endmill running at 10,000 rpm on the spindle, feed is going about 1000/mm and 0.15mm depth.

[breslinmr]

Jul 13, 2017 16:44:13 GMT markwisniowski said:

Jul 12, 2017 2:46:04 GMT breslinmr said:

So have a question maybe a few lol. I have seen in a few places that I have read about aluminum 6061, is the 6061 the strength off the material and is this the only type you can use with these machines ?
Also have an project in mind with using brass, I take it that that won't be a problem if aluminum is ok so should brass right ?
Is there a specific type off brass that you have to use ?

I do a lot of milling with brass - and I prefer it over aluminum! It's much more forgiving and cuts like butter I use an 1/8" 2 flute endmill running at 10,000 rpm on the spindle, feed is going about 1000/mm and 0.15mm depth.

Thanks for the input mark I've worked with brass when I was doing exterior cladding and love the colours. Would you use lubricant when cutting or do you just cut it dry as most oils can affect the material colour even finger prints. I've seen on one job I done somebody put there hand on a brass panel and couple weeks later there it was his hand print lol.

[markwisniowski]

Jul 13, 2017 17:04:33 GMT breslinmr said:

Thanks for the input mark I've worked with brass when I was doing exterior cladding and love the colours. Would you use lubricant when cutting or do you just cut it dry as most oils can affect the material colour even finger prints. I've seen on one job I done somebody put there hand on a brass panel and couple weeks later there it was his hand print lol.

No lubrication, but I do have a vacuum hose very close to the bit to make sure it removes MOST of the chips and that moving air being that close cools off the bit, at least I think it does since the bit is still room temp after the milling is done.

[Derek the Admin]

Feeds and speeds seems like a confusion topic, but it's not to bad once you get over that first hump of understanding.

Your feed and speed is set for the purpose of achieving a chip load that is appropriate to the material and cutting tool that you are using.

As a general rule, if your chip load is too low then the cutter is getting hotter than necessary and is possibly just burnishing the material instead of sheering a piece of it with each pass of the cutting edge. If it's too high then the cutter can't evacuate the chip from the flutes and it's prone to breaking.
I will say that you should take some of the chip load recommendations you see on the web with a grain of salt. You could say that a big chip load is going to result in a big force on the machine. Some of the published chip loads are for a cutter tailor made to an intended material with the expectation it will be run on an industrial machine. When you get ready to do some runs, feel free to post here on the forum and we will be happy to suggest some settings for you.