Thatās what Iād try first. Itās the lowest hanging fruit and minimal time to test. Easiest way just set your zero at the zero position you would normally use, but instead of ā0ā set it to half your final depth. e.g. if your final depth is -0.5" set your ā0ā to -0.25. If you donāt get any pull out reset zero to true zero and finish it.
Thereās other ways that will cost less actual machining time. Like doing roughing passes with the finishing tool.
Not really a good way to get there but test. How much force we can take without slipping is unknown other than less than the last cut. It will also vary from things like the helix angle (flute twist) of the tool. The tighter that is the more force is transferred into the Z and more likely to pull the tool out for any given feed, stepover, and pass depth.
The other obvious option is to get a different router and see if itās taper matches the collets better. Itās still not an ideal collet design. But, the one you have seems to be worse than average.
One old trick we used to do was:
Clean the inside of the router and outside of the collet with something that doesnāt leave behind residue.
Take a sharpie and market the entire taper section of the collet.
Put a tool in the collet and without using the nut, insert the collet into the router.
With light finger pressure pushing the collet into the router twist the collet or armature.
The idea being to put some pressure between the collet and the router but still letting the collet spin inside the router taper. It should transfer sharpie marks into the router side showing you where pinch points or other issues might be. Not perfect and doesnāt solve the underlying issue. But if thereās something like a bump in the taper you might be able to take that out. Or at the very least even though you are having issues with all the collets it might tell you which one is better. Make sure you clean the taper and outside of the collet with something that will prevent rust after this though. You donāt want just raw steel surfaces other than in the bore of the collet.
Great suggestions, ideasā¦ my sense is that some would work well for production runs, however, since mine are one-off projects, with significantly different sizes, depth of cut., etc., every one becomes experimentation? My grand plan is to upgrade to the Sienci spindle - when it becomes available. It uses ER collets and for my work, only need the 1/4ā and 1/8ā. Time will tell. Again, thank you to all for your input.
Snookered! Sienci tells me that their upgraded spindles are too heavy for the LM, hence not recommended. They have offered (thank you) to send me a replacement Mak router. No choice but to try it, and experimentā¦ Have looked at DW router - better collet, but SL dust collection boot not compatible. pwnCNC spindle looks promising, however, over $1K, and the no one supports a ācustomā setup. All advice welcome.
No, after some testing you can approximate forces with your per flute MRR and material type (e.g. for wood Janka value).
???
Am I missing something?
Admittedly, if it were me I would target something in the ER11 or ER16 at 65mm for lower weight as you wonāt really be able to make proper use of mills larger than 1/4ā anyway. Probably air cooled too as those are typically lighter and have less additional points of failure.
To that point though. Internally we try to limit forces on anything riding on v-wheels to not more than around 15-20lb and that eats a lot of it on top of momentum issues.
Good on them for this.
Thereās about a million dust boots out there. Plus you do have a CNCā¦ So, making an adapter or replacement part for the router/spindle end usually isnāt too bad.
Also ??? I wonāt post the link as itās a competitor to Sienci. But, PWN has an ER11 to wire/program yourself for under $500 or wired for a Longboard for just over $700.
Spindle for LM not available in Canada due to ācertification issuesā. They are working on finding a solution, however, are not able to provide a timeframe. This is the preferred approach.
pwn spindle kit looks very interesting, however, close to $300 to ship it up to Canada? The other factor is that this creates a situation with two different suppliers, and if something goes wrong, the finger pointing will start - I speak from painful experience on this.
@TDA John, just to help you understand where @Retiree is coming from, here are the numbers from the PWM site. In canadian dollars shipped to canada, the total for the 110v ER11 air-cooled spindle is 1213.66 Cdn. Customs will apply the federal/provincial sales tax to that. For Ontario residents, for example, that is 13%. So, landed, the total will be just under $1400 Cdn.
Iām not saying that the comparison between this and a Makita, for example, is appropriate. However, the Makita sells here for $180 taxes in. Is the PWM spindle worth 7 Makita routers mounted on the Long Mill? Not for me to say. I can say that it is certainly not worth it to me.
You could also try a different router - Iāve had great experiences with the Bosch Colt line, personally.
Unfortunately with trim routers not being intended for CNC use from the get-go, their spindle/collet taper interface is (as others have mentioned) not ideal for the sort of loads that a CNC router applies.
One other thing to consider is using an endmill with a lower helix rate. The less helix on the cutter flutes the lower the pullout/pushup force will be. Straight shank flute bits are also cheaper, you just need to take a little extra care on dust extraction, and youāll likely need to reduce your feed a little as well.
Didnāt realize that you were in Canada. A more or less 50% increase to ship it changes a lot. I canāt really blame PWN though. Weāve had to fight tooth and nail to get international rates down with carriers over the years. Still isnāt great and heavy stuff is still insane. Plus brokerage if itās not āExpressā services or manually done by you.
Going to preface this as Iām trying very hard to not be negative.
This will be luck of the draw like with the Makita. The colt has a very similar issue with a small compression area. The Colt is actually what we learned this with as we LONG ago made custom collets for it. It was our experience with the colt that at least partially turned us off making Makita collets. Despite how many people have asked us to make them.
Agreed. The best weāve found was the 611ās. Very similar to ER though enough away that they are NOT interchangeable.
Yeah, I partially addressed this above. Most of the tapered ball tools are mid to high helix though.
Pedantic point but Iām assuming you mean straight flute or 0 helix. Again, not trying to be negative and assuming a 0 helix tool. However, when you have an issue with slip resistance you are potentially making this issue worse, but less detectable. The problem with a straight flute cutter is that it engages and disengages the entire fluteās cutting pass depth at once. This increases peak force on the tool for the same MRR. That in turn could let the tool slip in the collet. However, it wonāt pull or push the tool into or out of the collet much or at all. In that situation it functionally hides the issue but is causing potential massive shifts in per flute chipload.
I finally saw a pic of the DW611 collet and now understand why it is far superior to the Makita one. Too bad no one makes a better collet for the Makita.
Fascinating detail in the discussion, however, back to my issue and a resolution. Current plan (after some vacation): install new Makita router (Sienci support continues to be outstanding!) and experiment with butterfly project. Will cut exactly same program as original, with same wood and we will see if bit slips. If all OK, problem solved. If notā¦ Will KYP.
@Retiree Enjoy your vacation. FWIW, I am optimistic that the new router will be the resolution. Literally thousands of CNC users are using that router without issue. Mine has years of hours on it, with the only maintenance being some cleaning and brush replacement. I have never had the bit slip issue that you are suffering through.
Youād need the matching taper in the armature. We did actually find that some of the Makita routers HAD a longer taper section in the armature. But it was hit and miss so we didnāt pursue it.
Might be worth doing the sharpie trick from above as you have multiple collets. That way you could start with the one that has the most contact.
My focus is on doing wood carving, and need a reliable machine to do so. Just saw this: Carbide ER-11 Compact Router - Carbide 3D An ER-11 router as a direct replacement for the Makita? Yes, it is being discontinued, butā¦? Comments welcome.
Thereās a few version of them. I havenāt kept up recently so there could be more other than the usual mass rebrand ones (e.g. Genmitsu, Vevor, etc). But hereās a copy from my previous list with a few notes (Not posting links as again competitors to Sienci):
Carbide3d - Carbide ER-11 Compact Router
Kobalt - K7TR-03
Makermade - CNC Router
Nymolabs - CNC Router Spindle Motor
Openbuild - RoutER11
I believe most if not all are either on their last run or already out. Obviously the Openbuild one is as they have shut down. Carbideās I wasnāt aware of it being discontinued but makes sense. 99% sure the Kobalt one is done too.
Iāll try to give a bit more info from what I know/remember. Most of these are straight Makita clones with the armature ground for ER11 and a standard nut/thread. I know most of them have had issues with bearings. The Makermade one is interesting from that perspective as it claims to have NSK bearing. Which if true and correctly specāed would actually be better than the Makita (from a bearing life/load perspective). The Kobalt is allegedly not a clone of the Makita but a the result of a collaboration between V1 engineering and Kobalt. It was also the only one that was actually warrantied for CNC use. From what I could tell it was a single run and never repeated though. The Nymo has a runout spec which most of the others donāt. Itās a pretty bad spec though.
Never got much good reliable data from customers on them other than the previously mentioned bearing issues and some bad runout numbers on the Openbuild version. Probably would have a support issue with most of these for various reasons.
Ordered the 3D Carbide router with ER11 collets. Cost to Canada, including shipping, etc., $98 Cdn - how can you go wrong as an insurance policy? Note: only a two prong plug, but has ETL stamp, but not UL/CSA. 3D seems to have shipping arranged to Canada at very low cost. Why is it that others charge a fortune? Waiting for shipment of replacement Mak router from Sienci. As indicated, current plan is to run same job, and see what happens. Will KYP.
@Retiree another option in case you ever need it is the Benchmark router from Home Hardware. Itās less than $100 and looks like a Makita clone. Iāve been using it on my Altmill since I still donāt have my spindle yet and it works well.
Be carful with ācheapā shipping into Canada. e.g. Donāt know if itās still an issue but last I heard Carbide3d used FedEx ground into Canada. Meaning that if you donāt specifically request personal clearing of customs you will get hit with a brokerage charge larger than shippingā¦ Sometimes by multiple times shipping.
For us, FedEx ground can be half to a third of our Express rates into Canada. But a couple customers letting us know the brokerage cost of $50+ USD on a couple packages was enough for us to kill it. Not worth the large surprise charge for those that donāt know. At a minimum you will still have taxes/fees to the State and a fee for them prepaying the taxes (depending Incoterms and carrier) .
Thatās why I usually request USPS when shipping from the states. While there may be import duties, there shouldnāt be any brokerage fees like UPS, FedEX, and the other carriers charge. At least that was the case a few years ago.
If it is a low value item, there is a good chance that it will slip through the mail system without any fees. If the value is getting anywhere near $100, chances are you will be dinged for taxes, duty if it applies plus a nominal customs clearance charge (think around $10)
Seems CBSA does have some discretion re charging GST, duties, etc., and I have no issue paying these - one of the benefits of being Canadian. My main concern is the ābrokerage feeā charged by UPS. My experience:
two separate orders from IDC Woodcraft over last 6 mo, and similar experience for both. Last one was $36 for cutter, $24 for shipping, and then UPS charged me $38 brokerage fee (all $Cdn). I definitely let IDC know what I think!
two separate orders from Carbide3D over past 6 mo and similar experience for both. Last one (the router with ER11 collets) via FedEx: $85 for router, $12 shipping, for a total of $97 delivered to my house, and no brokerage fees. They did leave me a VM indicating that taxes and duties MAY be applied, but no mention of brokerage fees. I would love to know their secret sauceā¦
my Brother (NC resident) has shipped me several items over the years via USPS. All under $100, so low value items. Last one was about $15 for shipping, but again, no brokerage fees.
Agree that USPS best option, if available. Avoid UPS!
In your second example, was that an air shipment by some chance? Depending on the service level, carriers might include brokerage ā¦. but definitely not on ground service.
I looked at IDC and came to the conclusion that even without brokerage charges, the cost was too high to order anything through them.
I happen to have the ability to clear anything from the USA myself - I ship to Blaine, Washington to a freight forwarder who brings it to the local airport (for a fee of course) and notifies me. I go to the airport, clear the shipment and Bob is your uncle ā¦.