[Jyge]

I have been doing woodworking for quite sometime and somehow through 3D printing I got the idea of
building myself a CNC machine. I did a small one following some ideas from YouTube, going heavily on
3D printed parts. In the end it was a bit flimsy and too small, I figured it is not worth the bother to
try it on aluminium.

I then made my second one, went for a multiplex and chose Makita RT0700C as the spindle for it.
Now I have been doing my first trials, also on aluminium and I am going through some experiences.

I am not quite happy with the quality of the cuts and I am trying to look for cues.
I am using Freecad to construct my parts and also write out the G-Code. So far it is doing its job ok.

I am however pondering about some of the operations. When milling a simple groove it the rotation does not really matter, but when clearing a pocket for instance I come to a situation that the mill is only partially grinding the material. Classically I know from my woodworking that I should push the router against the rotating direction. I would assume that the same applies to CNC as well, but now as a default in most of the cases with freecad, I get a path that would actually do the opposite.

Does the same wisdom apply to the CNC milling as when doing the manual woodworking with a router? Should I try to follow the same rules as often as possible? For instance if I am widening a pocket in a circular path, if my router is running clockwise, I should also make the path in clockwise manner, so that I get the cutting side of the mill to run against the movement?

[Al_The_Man]

Climb or conventional milling

See
https://www.harveyperformance.com/in...of%20tolerance.

[mactec54]

I have been doing woodworking for quite sometime and somehow through 3D printing I got the idea of
building myself a CNC machine. I did a small one following some ideas from YouTube, going heavily on
3D printed parts. In the end it was a bit flimsy and too small, I figured it is not worth the bother to
try it on aluminium.

I then made my second one, went for a multiplex and chose Makita RT0700C as the spindle for it.
Now I have been doing my first trials, also on aluminium and I am going through some experiences.

I am not quite happy with the quality of the cuts and I am trying to look for cues.
I am using Freecad to construct my parts and also write out the G-Code. So far it is doing its job ok.

I am however pondering about some of the operations. When milling a simple groove it the rotation does not really matter, but when clearing a pocket for instance I come to a situation that the mill is only partially grinding the material. Classically I know from my woodworking that I should push the router against the rotating direction. I would assume that the same applies to CNC as well, but now as a default in most of the cases with freecad, I get a path that would actually do the opposite.

Does the same wisdom apply to the CNC milling as when doing the manual woodworking with a router? Should I try to follow the same rules as often as possible? For instance if I am widening a pocket in a circular path, if my router is running clockwise, I should also make the path in clockwise manner, so that I get the cutting side of the mill to run against the movement?

CNC machines and Manual machines can if there is no Backlash in the axis movement and is a ridgid machine you can climb mill or conventional mill, so, yes you can machine in both directions