Polishing 304 stainless?

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Hello All.

I've got some 304 stainless I'm trying to get a nice finish on.

I'm facemilling the piece in a haas VF-2. I first tried a 2" facemill and it works 'ok' but I do get quite a few crosshatch lines.

I'm next going to go try a 3/4" indexible end mill and see what type of finish I can get. I do have a 1/2" carbide 5 flute end mill that I could also use.

How good of a surface finish do I need before I try to polish it?

How do I polish it? Should I get a brush/compound and put it in the mill?

Help!

[djr76]

The face mill will produce alot less crosshatch lines than the smaller endmills would. Are you seeking a mirror finish? Maybe the compound might work, but seems like many hrs. of polishing. Look into vibratory finishing or call a grinding house and ask them.

[keebler303]

Do you need to keep tolerances, or is it just for looks? If you don't have to keep it perfectly flat, an air sander with progressively finer sandpaper will get you there. Go down to about 320 or 600 and then switch over to polishing compound.

If you need to keep high tolerances, grinding is going to get you closest with the best accuracy.

Matt

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It's just for looks. I tried out the 2" face mill and it was dull. I'm thinking I couldn't get the chips outa the way well enough and it was recutting them/marring up the work piece.

I then tried the 3/4" indexible end mill and cranked the spindle up. It's a 3 flute cutter and I ran it at 2700 RPM with a feed of 15 IPM. Taking .37" wide cuts but only a couple thou deep. Got a very nice finish. Mirror like, and with the back and forth tool paths looks really great.

Now I've gotta figure out how to drill ~360 2.6mm holes in it. And how to engrave the entire thing...

(For anyone whos interested, I'm making crib boards for x-mas gifts) I bolted 1/8" thick pieces of stainless to 1/2" thick pieces of alum. The stainless will be the 'playing surface' I'm engraving all the lines/numbers etc that you'd find on a normal crib board.

I'm thinking it would be best to use a center drill to drill through the stainless then use the 2.6mm drill to drill out the alum. I've only got 1 drill and since I'm making 3 boards, I've got around 750 holes to drill, I don't think it'll make it..

For engraving the board I'll be using a #3 carbide center drill. No clue on how quick I can run it!