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1/4" holes in 3" thick carbon steel plate
- Thread starter rcarbon
- Start date
- Replies 41
- Views 4,894
plastikdreams
Diamond
- Joined
- May 31, 2011
- Location
- upstate nj
In a CNC mill with carbide drills and through coolant maybe 2-3 minutes a hole.
Vancbiker
Diamond
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Location
- Vancouver, WA. USA
About a month with my Makita cordless......
Of course, if you are talking a CNC might be nice to get a few details about the equipment and tooling you are going to/planning to use.
Of course, if you are talking a CNC might be nice to get a few details about the equipment and tooling you are going to/planning to use.
Matt@RFR
Titanium
- Joined
- May 26, 2004
- Location
- Paradise, Ca
What kind of shit drills are you buying?! A very quick glance at this with Mitsubishi MVS drill, 300SFM, .006 IPR, starting feed slowed down to .002 IPR in order to not use a starter drill (pilot hole), 300psi through coolant, I'd be looking at 20-22 minutes for all 150 holes, and that is if tool life is more important than cycle time. 8.8 seconds per hole, worst case scenario.
I need to make about 20 different shape profiles of Exhaust manifold flanges out of 1/2" thick carbon steel sheet and about 50 pcs of each of the profile.
I plan to first make out rough profiles by joining 6 plates ( Total thickness 3") and then drilling out 1/4" holes ( appox 150 of them) just touching one another. Once this rough profile is ready by drilling ( Most inexpensive way) then I can make final cut by end mill.
What I think is that this is the most inexpensive way.
Please do let me know if it is workable.
I plan to first make out rough profiles by joining 6 plates ( Total thickness 3") and then drilling out 1/4" holes ( appox 150 of them) just touching one another. Once this rough profile is ready by drilling ( Most inexpensive way) then I can make final cut by end mill.
What I think is that this is the most inexpensive way.
Please do let me know if it is workable.
Vancbiker
Diamond
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Location
- Vancouver, WA. USA
Sub them to a laser cutting shop. That'll be way cheaper than what you are proposing.
thermite
Diamond
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2011
Sounds to me as it stacking 6 deep just makes you fight chip clearing harder and run-up the cost of tooling and QC.
1/2" material, 1/4" holes, most steels, I could knock out "in due course" with a fixture and drill-bushings on an ignorant 1940's Walker-Turner 12" bench pig, very ordinary drills, primitive lube/coolant, brush applied.
Presuming you have decent CNC, there's surely got to be a happier economic medium between manual onesies and 6 deep. "Prep time" and de-prep is on the clock, too.
AFAIK, the store-bought flanges I've bought over the years, nary a one were ever DRILLED anyway.
Punched, rather. How yah going to match THOSE costs?
I can get them cut on laser but as secondary operation of grooving etc, these have to be machined again on CNC.
If rough profile is workable with drilling, this profile will be breakable from base plate and then one by one each flange can be machined with minimum chip removal on outer surface using bolting holes created in first operation as clamping
If rough profile is workable with drilling, this profile will be breakable from base plate and then one by one each flange can be machined with minimum chip removal on outer surface using bolting holes created in first operation as clamping
Matt@RFR
Titanium
- Joined
- May 26, 2004
- Location
- Paradise, Ca
If you post a print or representative drawing of the part, run size per order and some details about your available work holding and machines, you might actually get some real help.
thermite
Diamond
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2011
I've never been inside a Walker or other major-make exhaust-parts plant, but the goods as hit the parts bins all seem to have been punched from plate or strip. Mere 1/4" holes, these sound as if they are for small gen sets, lawn care/groundskeeping, Marine/RV/ATV goods, not motorcars nor trucks. Mind "exhaust" need not be IC engine. Could be vacuum pumps or compressors for no more than what is showing.
Understood volume manufacturing techniques are not an option in fewsies, one-off, tiny batches that han't the investment in machinery or tooling for volume working.
Still, I do wonder if machine first, many-up, make holes, still many-up, THEN separate and tumble de-bur might not be more amenable to higher throughput/lower handling costs.
plastikdreams
Diamond
- Joined
- May 31, 2011
- Location
- upstate nj
Matt@RFR
Titanium
- Joined
- May 26, 2004
- Location
- Paradise, Ca
We're going 2.45" deep through 304 with an 8.4mm MVS drill right now. 225 SFM and .006 IPR with no drama. So what's that, 12 seconds per hole or so?8.8 seconds sounds a bit optimistic...maybe you should try it
LKeithR
Stainless
- Joined
- Sep 1, 2011
- Location
- Langley, B.C.
That was good for a little spew on the monitor.
Caught me right off guard. You're in the wrong Vancouver; otherwiseI'd offer to serve you coffee while you cleaned up...
Vancbiker
Diamond
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Location
- Vancouver, WA. USA
Hope no equipment was damaged!
Just trying to gently point out to the OP that with so little information given, he was not going to get any kind of relevant answer.
DMF_TomB
Diamond
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2008
- Location
- Rochester, NY, USA
.
at 3 ipm feed with hss drill thats 1 minute a hole if pecking figure 2 minutes a hole. long carbide drills obviously break very easily. sure shallow holes carbide feed maybe 6 to 30 ipm feed
.
BUT as some will say some steel got slag hard spots in it. hit one and break drill and if you got to get drill out and finish drilling it could take some time. often any failure corrective actions can take hours.
Mike1974
Diamond
- Joined
- Nov 5, 2014
- Location
- Tampa area
That "some" is only you.
Yes, sometimes hard spots in casting making tool jump and cause sudden tool breakage then take notes in excel so I can show everyone how it's done
DMF_TomB
Diamond
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2008
- Location
- Rochester, NY, USA
.That "some" is only you.
Yes, sometimes hard spots in casting making tool jump and cause sudden tool breakage then take notes in excel so I can show everyone how it's done
.
not talking cast iron i am talking steel
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and big difference in 2.5" stickout and 3" stickout of a carbide drill. i have seen plenty carbide drills break before. 10 to 1 length to dia ratio is general recommendation on where a long drill begins
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and even if drill breaks 1 drill per 100 holes that can be big problem if expensive part and you got to get it out. not everybody can afford to scrap a part.
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and Excel is actually a perfect way to record actual results. i have seen plenty take a extra 5 or 10 hours getting a broke drill out of one part. i record actual times including the "little" problems. at the end of the year many times data shows better to take a extra hour drilling than cause $10,000. in scrap and or take a extra 10 hours fixing the results of tool breakage.
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wouldnt surprise me in the least it take 4 minutes a hole to get 100% success rate which is often preferable to breaking any drills.
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as for bragging about drilling 304 fast. not all 304 is annealed. i have seen plenty thats work hardened and full of hard spots where you are lucky to drill one hole per drill then it needs sharpening. 304 is a perfect example where machinability can vary widely. carbon steel can be similar but usually not as bad. i have seen plenty of carbon steel got slag or hard spots in it and out 60 carbide inserts in thats 10 sets of insert changes and each time didnt last 2 seconds on a hard spot of slag. you got big slag hard spot deep in steel plate you can be stuck on one hole a long time. happen to me many a time.
That "some" is only you.
Yes, sometimes hard spots in casting making tool jump and cause sudden tool breakage then take notes in excel so I can show everyone how it's done
How do you think he gets all the over-time? Excel to the rescue. 8 hours screwing around on some spread sheet and 2 hours making chips, very slow chips.
R
metlcutr55
Cast Iron
- Joined
- Jan 6, 2007
- Location
- s w NH
im sure Tom isn't perfect. im sure im not. and im sure the rest of you are not. I doubt one of you in 200 could walk up to a very large gantry mill or horizontal boring mill and even begin to load, clamp and mill a 3 ton casting with no machined reference surfaces. could you run a portage layout machine to put start reference lines on the casting for him? and how those lines are balanced around all the casting surfs for best equalization? I didn't think so. stick that in your kurt vise.
MB-16 is one of the Machines I run. Do not presume things, just because. I'm not going to post my resume. Tom has been posting the same vomit for years.
R
