Hey guys. I’ve got an xxl with hdz and have been sitting on it about a week now due to some faulty pieces out of the box. I seem to be ready to move on now but I’m not sure what to do. I know I need to surface my waste board which In this case is the t track kit but I am not sure how to since it’s 4 separate pieces. I’ve watched bens video and I’m not sure how to apply it to the t track. I dont want a link to seasoned machinists YouTube because it isn’t helpful for newbies at all in my opinion. I just need help surfacing. Plunge rates etc. thanks in advance. Also, I don’t have a surfacing bit and am hoping I can go get something today opposed to ordering online and waiting.
I just used a #201 (I’m cheap) and drew up a rectangle the size of the supported working area and surfaced that on my XL.
I’ve since adjusted a bit, see:
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I originally had it set to use the #201 but it said it was going to take 2 hours to surface. I’m getting discouraged
Set the depth of cut very shallow to start - say .020", and the feedrate at 100 in/min, with a stepover of .20". Plunge can be 10"/min (or higher, mdf is super soft, and doc is shallow). Once it starts, if it’s cutting ok, you can use the feedrate override, and may be able to get as high as 200"/min.
There’s a lot of area on an XXL, and you can only cut so wide with a .25" tool.
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Chris - Hang in there! I’m going to assume you’re going by the stock MDF #201 settings in CC?
A nice feature in Carbide Motion (CM) is that it will let you override set gcode set feed speeds in %10 increments up and down +/-100%. I’d start off taking like .015" depth of cut (DOC) with a feed rate of 150IPM then as you watch the operation you can dial it down or up in increments if it appears to be too aggressive jerky/unstable/non-uniform cutting noises or too slow, appears that it could go faster - give a little feedrate increase to test it out, you can always reset to your default.
That should get you better than 2hrs granted, using a larger bit (surfacing, mortise, etc…) will cut the time down more; however, you do have an XXL with a good amount of surface area to cover.
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One additional thought.
If you are referring to C3D’s T-track kit, you might consider the following alteration. If you surface it as supplied, you’ll have a pocket where the cutter can reach with a lip around the edge. If you have any thoughts of working on a project with an overall size that will be bigger than that area, the workpiece will not sit flat due to the lip.
On my XXL, I chose to remove the thinner edge strips and cut down the middle pieces to about 28” in length so the entire spoil-board would be able to be surfaced.
But if oversized pieces are not in your plans, then you can ignore this!
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