Got home late. Did a quick test cut. Learned a valuable lesson. Not only do you need to flip the switch to the on position on the VFD controller before starting a job, but you also need to press the very obviously placed shiny button in the middle of the controller to activate it. Got it stopped almost immediately before any damage could be done. Reset everything and started over. It worked absolutely flawlessly. I am blown away how well this thing works straight out of the box. I thought for sure I would need to do some tweaking and adjusting to get it dialed in. Now I am at work and all I can think about is getting back to the machine to make stuff.
Which brings me to my next question, i was going to start a questions thread. Should I go start a new thread or just ask away here?
Hey thanks for moving this to a new thread! Didn’t even know ya could do that.
So, anyway, I have a materials question. And I want to preface all of my questions by saying that I am 100% new to this. I have some understanding of how it all works just from working around different industries. Just wanted to throw that out there so folks understand that you might need to explain things to me like I am a simpleton. Haha.
So I have something that I want to make, and I have a 24x24x.75 teak project panel. I know teak is very hard, and is high in oils and silica. Are there any special precautions I should take? I have been running bits at the recommended speeds and feeds assigned to them in CC, which from what I gather is pretty conservative to start with. Should I dial them back even further to work with teak?
The hardwood settings in Carbide Create are pretty conservative, and maybe on an HDM or SO5 Pro, conservative enough.
That said, in addition to the biological division of “hardwood vs. softwood” (which sometimes fails to a ludicrous degree, contrast southern yellow pine vs. poplar), there is the “Janka Hardness Scale”:
Depends on where you got the Teak? I have purchased some panel from Lowe’s about the sam size you mention and although it is Teak allot of it had sapwood when laminated together and was not that hard to mill. Always start with the default speeds and feeds until you get some time with the machine cutting a new material you’re not familiar with. You will want to use down cut bits for simple carves as you showed on you practice run. Watch you step over on softer material as it can leave fuzzy’s if it’s too large.
I have some Ipe, and it’s HARD! I have to be careful with grain direction and bit choice or chip out comes to visit.
Im using the hardwood speeds on this teak, and the machine isn’t even breaking a sweat. No squealing or chatter. No burns. Could probably push it a little harder but I am content to be conservative.
Will, thank you so much for all of the resources you’ve provided. You have been awesome. Thank you again. Also, I would like to say that V bits are amazing.
However, I have some flaws in my design that I can probably figure out how to eliminate naxt time. This is taking waaay longer than it should. It looks like it thinks there are a zillion little details but really it could probably do this in half the time. I think I need to make sure my designs are super duper clean before running them.
Made the finest dust I have ever seen. I have been using a shop vac with a 5 gallon bucket dust separator. It worked great but is annoying to deal with. I did not use Sweepy.
Any idea what the CFM should be for a dedicated dust collection system? Ive looked at a few harbor freight ones, including the big Bauer one, as seen here:
Yes, stick with the vacuum you currently have. The dust collectors you show operate best on a high air flow to remove dust vs a suction pressure value. It’s hard to get the needed ais flow thru the small attachments on the router/spindle. Im not saying it will not remove dust, but my vacuum with the 5 gallon cyclone seperator worked better than my dust collector did (what you have shown).
I finally followed the advice on the forum and got the Dewalt Stealthsonic. Best decision I ever made!
Agreed. I started with the same cyclone dust collector that all my other tools are hooked up to. When I tried the stealthsonic with a small separator I found it worked much better, was quieter and used less power than my large system. Plus, I don’t really care to leave my large one running for the length of times some of these projects take.
I have the 4" red Bauer one and the StealthSonic. I love both, but the StealthSonic rules my CNC perfectly (and SUPER quietly…to the point that I can work right next to the CNC and talk to my wife at the same time (and if you ask her, we are both deaf. So there’s that)).
But…GET THE STEALTHSONIC!!! DO IT!!!
You will be so very happy. I even have the smallest one and it works great with my Pro 5. But also get some kind of 5 gallon bucket cyclone like @Redlander and @CullenS suggested.
Well then, the stealthsonic it is. Lol. And I already have the dust separator/bucket thing. I am going to look at the dewalt now. The dust last night was so fine that I didn’t even realize it was in the air until my throat got itchy. I spent most of the run standing outside the garage door watching the machine.
Got it stopped almost immediately before any damage could be done. Reset everything and started over. It worked absolutely flawlessly. I am blown away how well this thing works straight out of the box. I thought for sure I would need to do some tweaking and adjusting to get it dialed in. Now I am at work and all I can think about is getting back to the machine to make stuff.
