I feel like I’m missing something obvious. I mostly work with wood making guitars. I bought the Amana 2 Pc Plastic Cutting Pack to cut Acrylic and ABS or PVC. The sheets are between 3/32" and 1/4".
I thought the 1/4" would be the workhorse and the 1/8" would be for finer detail. That’s not been true.
The 1/8" O Flute works great. It’s quiet and leaves a smooth edge.
I can’t get the 1/4" O Flute to cut anything well. Its loud enough to physically scare me with noise canceling pro ear protectors even on a .060" deep pass. Its louder than a roughing bit racing through a mahogany pocket at 150im. When I first got it, it kept kicking small plastic pieces off the spoilboard. I switched to the 1/8" and had no issue and forgot about it.
Today I just tried the 1/4" again to cutout .120" thick acrylic. It didn’t go a half inch before I could see it binding. I stopped it and reran it at only .060" depth. I had to stop again because I saw it had lost steps and the cut was off. I’ve only ever had the machine lose steps a few times from typing a feed rate too high on a hardwood pocket.
I restarted with a fresh piece of the same .120" acrylic this time with the 1/8" O Flute. It cut the material out almost silent with no issue.
In all cases the workholding was thorough blue tape and CA glue. There’s no flex or movement at all. Feedrate 50 to 70.
What’s going on here?
How can a 1/4" bit not be able to cut material that a smaller bit cuts easily?
