Bought a new endmill.......now what do I do?

When trying to do small text, I discovered that my 1/16" endmill (Carbide’s #112) was too big. So I just bought a 1/32" (Kodiak 132449) and a 30 degree V-bit (Amana 45771-K).

In the latest version of Carbide Create, I figured out how to add a new endmill. But it doesn’t ask for any of the same information that the vendor provides. And for new tools it asks for less info than it provides for the Carbide tools (you don’t even put in the number of flutes).

This is the only real info I need for CC:

Diameter (D)
Plunge Rate (PR)
Feed Rate (FR)
Depth of Cut (DOC)
Finish Allowance (FA)
Stepover (S)

Can anyone help me find or calculate those numbers for both the 1/32" Kodiak and the Amana 30 Degree V-Bit? I’m still testing on brass.

The Winston Moy Feeds/Speeds for brass for the 1/8" (Carbide #102-Z) and 1/16" (#112-Z) endmills worked very well…can I use these to calculate the F&S for the 1/32"? And similarly, can I use the info in CC for the #501 V-Bit to use for the Amana 30 degree V-bit?

Do I need a F&S calculator? If so, does anyone know of a good free one? If I do need to use a calculator, I thought I needed to know the chipload. I thought that the manufacturer provides the chipload for their endmills and you use the chipload to calculate all the other F&S…but I couldn’t find this figure on their website.

Amana did have a .tool file that I downloaded, but I couldn’t open it. How do you open it? I thought this type of file could be imported into CC, but you can’t (or I couldn’t figure out how). Will this file have the chipload? Will it have other recommended F&S for different materials? Do manufacturers even provide recommended F&S?

All the endmills I own, I bought from Carbide…so they are all included in CC…but now that I have non-Carbide endmills, should I start keeping track of them in either a .tool file or an excel file? If so, does anyone have a sample they can share so I don’t have to re-create the wheel?

Thanks for bearing with me on all these first time user questions, but there doesn’t seem to be anywhere else to go.

a very rough rule of thumb… copy the 1/16" bit in CC, and basically half all the values for DOC / feedrate / etc

that’s conservative compared to what is needed, but these very thin bits are fragile so better to start slow and go faster over time

the V bit… you can copy bit 301 and change the angle likewise…

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You can extrapolate them by using @fenrus excellent advice to halve the chipload (and hence the feedrate) by two, as well as DOC. You may find chipload recommendations from the manufacturer, but sometimes they are not quite right for our machines and it’s better to start from proven values (e.g.Winston’s) and adapt them. Since the latest versions of CC basically integrate Winston’s recommendations, @fenrus’s advice is the fastest way for you to get working with that 1/32" endmill.
The “halving” strategy comes from the fact that endmills tend to support a MAX chipload that is correlated more or less linearly to their diameter. So the “half the diameter => half the chipload” rule of thumb, while conservative, is a good starting point for testing.

You are probably better off starting with CC recipes and adjusting them, but in case you are interested in F&S calculators and how to use them, @gmack is the calculator king around here, you can find his spreadsheet here, and you can get a short overview of how to use it as well as a dumbed-down version I made for myself, in that section of the shapeoko ebook (no reason why the principles would not apply to the Nomad).

Sometimes they do, but I would take them with a grain of salt, as it is unlikely that they had the Nomad in mind when they wrote them, and sometimes the machine matters as much as the material and endmill specs.

EDIT: I forgot to add a very useful resource for micro-machining F&S, that @WillAdams pointed me to long ago: Calibrating Feeds and Speeds When Using Carbide Microtools

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IMO, proper manufacturer’s speeds and feeds are critically important because the manufacturer should know best how to safely and effectively use their tools. In fact, I’d start there. Assuming you’re not limited by spindle speed, its best to pick the highest speed (RPM/SFM) cutter for the workpiece material (to minimize machine forces). That speed shouldn’t be exceeded to further reduce forces, but their recommended chip - loads (IPT), depth of cut (DOC), and/or width of cut (WOC) can be (and usually need to be for these types of machines).
Unfortunately Kodiak doesn’t provide DOC and WOC for their speeds and feeds (call and ask?),
But Amana does - (apparently yours is intended for wood and plastic).

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Thanks everyone for the info.

Do I adjust the stepover? Or just the feed and DOC?

I would adjust the stepover, it’s often derived from a percentage of the endmill diameter, so divide it by two also.

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