A friend asked me if I can make him a few hundred aluminum washers, outer diameter 1 1/4’ / inner diameter 3/4’. He has supplied the .064 thick aluminum sheet but he’s pretty sure its 3003 alloy aluminum which i know from experience doesn’t machine all that well. I thought that if i use my trusty 274z single flute endmill and employ a few of the tricks i’ve picked up on for cutting aluminum i would get decent results but i’m not having much luck. Biggest issue is both top and bottom edges are coming out pretty rough. Using offset geometry and cutting as a pocket has yielded the best results but still a little rough and took 2 hours to make a handful which just isn’t practical. Any suggestions on what I can try to improve results?
The material supplied is that required or just what he had. It might be better to get an alloy you know how to machine.
If the material is required then ask your friend to get out a file and smooth out the rough edges if this is a job with no pay.
Are you cutting dry?
If so, try a bit of WD40 - makes a huge difference. I just squirt it on by with manual spray bottle - but check out this:
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Yeah, this is a freebie job so i don’t want to spend too much time on it. I have used less then ideal aluminum in the past for a couple of really basic shapes and the results were decent, not sure what it is about the washer shape thats giving me trouble.
Thanks for the video and yes, I’m cutting dry. I try to avoid using wd40 as i find it makes things a little messy but it might be the way to go here.
I put a sheet of plastic under my aluminum to catch the WD40. A shop vac is used to clean up after. I measure the final depth before cutting.
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