That sure doesn't sound right. Any way to post a photo of the face mill? An R8 face mill should look something like this:
Hard to imagine one that's really R8 that would have such a short shank it couldn't reach the drawbar (bolt that holds the tool in). Also go easy with that sucker. My old X2 was really working running a 2.5" face mill on anything other than a shallow cut. Getting that bogged down and stalled would be asking to replace your plastic gears.
CNC: Making incorrect parts and breaking stuff, faster and with greater precision.