[Joe Lavery]

Hi all,

For many years I was unable to cut aluminium on my home CNC; (Zenbot 600 x 400 with a Kress 1050 Router). I either snapped the bit or ruined the stock.

However a week ago I saw a user on YouTube with a similar setup to me, who managed to cut 5mm thick aluminium by using .1mm depth of cut and a speed of 800mm min with his router set for 8000 rpm. So i though why not give it a go, I've always cut with far more aggressive settings, with feeds and speeds much higher, (which is obviously why I kept breaking cutters.).

Anyway it worked perfectly, well nearly! The cut was clean and neither the cutter or the router were even warm. My only complaint was on close inspection the edge of the material had regular vertical lines, roughly .5mm apart, as though the cutter was juddering.
This was using a single flute 3mm carbide cutter as the speeds and feeds above. Incidentally i don't see this effect when cutting wood, even hardwood or Birch ply which machine very clean indeed.

I'm not sure whether I should slow the router speed of increase it, or slow the feed or increase it?

Any though or advice would be appreciated.

Joe. Attachment 439332