[koenbro]

Did my first cut in 1/16" thick 6061 T6 aluminum sheet today and the material moved a lot, ruining the cut.



And it almost ruined the bit, but I could pry off the aluminum in the end:



In the second try, I bolted the sheet to the spoilboard with plastic screws, sprayed some WD40, and the cut was much cleaner (12000 rpm, 48 ipm, 1/4" two-flute square end carbide bit).



Trouble is the tabs were almost as thick as the material, so I needed to use a jigsaw to cut off the piece, then file off the tab.

How do you all manage tabs? Any examples of a workflow? I use Fusion 360. It's kind of a pain to have to remove the whole sheet, to cut the piece out, and I want to see if there an easier method to separate the piece.

Thanks.

[RicoCNCspare]

For aluminum cutting part, I have some advises:
1. For aluminum sheet or composite material sheet cutting, 12000 rpm is ok, but your feed rate is too low, it should be 100-120 ipm. Low feed rate will make the router bits too hot, then damage the bits.

2. Also single flute carbide bit is more suitable for aluminum cutting, it can remove chips more than two-flutes bits, prevent chip jam and keep the bit not too hot. You can find more information about this bit here:
http://www.cncsparetools.com/product...g-Milling.html

3. Maybe you don't need to spray WD40 by using single flute bits and increasing your feed rate.

[koenbro]

Thank you - will try your suggestions and increase feeds and just uses air instead of wd40.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[CNCMaryland]

I would recommend for parts like this to go with the painters tape/superglue combo. That way you will not need tabs.

In Fusion360 you can change the height and number of tabs, and location of tabs as well.