Hi Dom
We try to avoid sparking whenever possible and if we can finish mill a core/cavity we do. We try to advise our customers on part design that suits milling i.e filleted corners etc. This means we can make their tooling cheaper. Quite often part designs have features that require sparking but are unecessary to the function - so we suggest a milled alternative. CAD designers can get carried away with the functionality of their software and create unecessary features that add loads to the tooling cost.
However sometimes you can't avoid using very small cutters. We have bought a high speed spindle for our mills which gives us 40,000rpm - this helps. The other problem we have is getting small cutters that have long enough reach to finish the bottom of cavities. They are available but are expensive and easily broken.
It cetainly worth discussing the part designs with your customer and trying to come up something that satisfies their needs and is easy to mill. They usually like saving money !.
Regards
Davy  |