On 3/21/2011 12:54 PM, Rich Grise wrote:
Bob La Londe wrote:

The following rant is not directed at any one individual:

Water is a no go for Metal Nibbler One or Two. So, given that I
absolutely will not use a water based or water soluble regardless of how
stupid I am and how smart you are and how superior water based coolants
are and I'm to dumb to know any better I still ain't gonna, do you have
good experience and recommendations with/for other options for milling
aluminum?

I don't have a lot of experience, but recently I got a job as the CAD
draftsman at a machine shop, and I was floored to find that there is even
such a thing as water-based coolant.

WD-40 is fine for garage door tracks, squeaky front ends, and keeping
your hand tools from rusting in the shed, but I used it once on an old,

I don't even care for it for most of those applications. It does seem
to work ok for cutting aluminum though. Knowing the anti WD crowd will
scream, I use it in the field for tapping steel sometimes too where it
impractical to use a dropper of cutting oil. Its not great, but the
pressurized cans do blow the chips out of the hole nicely. Yeah I know
an oil can would do they trick, but I've bought a bunch of pump cans
over the years and they just don't seem to keep pumping for very long.

old model 13 or so teletype, and wound up having to disassemble the whole
thing and clean the little parts in a lightweight solvent; it gums up,
and I don't know if the solvent (in the WD) is flammable, but I presume it
is.

It does seem to attract dirt when used in those type applications
doesn't it.


On that note, I'd seriously recommend against using anything volatile
around an open-brush motor that runs at such an insane speed - I can't
even imagine a motor that would be capable of 30,000 RPM without flying
apart! Or any open-brush motor at all; you don't want to cause an explosion.

Yeah, kinda why I dismissed all the mist type applications. The motor
is self fan cooling and moves an incredible amount if air. In fact I
honestly think it helps cool the cutter and work piece to some degree.
Maybe I should design a motor mount that redirects the air flow through
one of those vortex coolers. LOL.


For coolant, have you considered "liquid paraffin?" It's colorless,
odorless, and used in those little candle-like mood lights, but I
don't think the vapor would be hazardous.

No worse than any other candle or lamp fuel I imagine.


Unfortunately, the only experience I've had cutting aluminum was at much
lower speeds (like a couple of orders of magnitude) and the guy who was
coaching/teaching me used lard; Crisco would also work there, but being
more or less solid, it wouldn't be applicable for flooding.

Crisco is awesome for that last finish pass on aluminum in the lathe
with a rounded cutter to get that nicy shiny finish. I keep a tub in
the frig out in the shop for pieces I want to look pretty. My wife was
telling me that Criso is no longer animal lard though. I need to go
look at my can in the fridge.

How about non-detergent motor oil?

Basically a light weight ND oil is what I think most people used to use
ages ago for most machining. Mineral oil is a pretty common ingrediant
in cutting lubes too. I have read a ton of product labels. Whale oil
was one of the old standbys, and jojoba oil is awesome too, but
expensive to produce.


I don't really know much about stuff that's touted as "coolant," other
than that they seem kind of expensive relative to ordinary stuff that
you can find lying around.

Heck, maybe even "Mineral Spirits" or turpentine might be a possibility.

Not sure what mineral spirits is in relation to mineral oil.

I don't know if this will be any help, but I wish you well; if possible
I'd like to see videos of your new baby in operation. :-)

New? This is just further incarnations on a theme. This particular
machine is just the little Taig revamped again. I get consistent 60IPM
if I want, but for virtually zero loss of steps I can run it at 50-55.
For a little margin for error I set the max at 45, but increased the
acceleration and deceleration. Now that I got the mass of that 12 pound
spindle off of it, it really screams. A while back I put bigger motors
on it with a little more torque. Eventually I'll get rid of the 20 tpi
lead screws it came with and replace them with lower tpi screws which
will allow me to take advantage of that increased torque and up my IPM
for rapids again.