The only aluminium I could get locally at a reasonable price was 5083, which I’d imagine is quite similar. My first few projects with it were complete failures, taking super fine cuts at low rpms. Then I got some awesome tips from this thread Lets share some tool paths - 3d Aluminium machining and since then have had nothing but success!
The things I have learned:
- use adaptive toolpaths when you can, they are extremely good at removing material with a less than rigid machine
- the 0.001" (or 0.03mm) chipload is key - to get this I run a 6mm 2 Flute carbide endmill at 24000RPM, 1500mm/min feed, 1.2mm optimal load, 2mm DOC. I cut 5083 with these settings, on a completely stock SO3.
- even at 1° ramp angle it was super loud, so I run at 0.5° and it’s smooth as butter. for laughs I put in a single flute and ran the same settings and felt I could have gone harder, so upped the feedrate by 50% and had no issues
