New parting tool holder

[black85vette]

Didn't get a lot of time in the shop this weekend. Had family stuff most of the time and enjoyed it a great deal. I started this last Wed and just finished up tonight. I bought the parting tool with a carbide indexable tip months ago pretty cheap but the holder for it was not cheap. Now that I have a running mill it seemed like time to fix that. I made the holder with two objectives:

1. Set the tool at the right height for my Atlas lathe so I did not need to shim or adjust it.
2. Give it the max amount of support as far out as possible.

You can see that this holder can sit right on the edge of the compound and is fully supported. The parting tool is about .125" thick and is supposed to work with up to 2" of it extended out. (we will see) I can work right up against the chuck. Works great. Cut some .5" and 1" steel stock with no chatter or noise. Cuts were clean and smooth. I have been wanting to do this for quite some time.

It is so nice to finally have a mill and make some of the tools I have been wanting.

 

[Deanofid]

Good looking tool post, 'Vette. Really a good accessory for your lathe, too.

What size is your Atlas? (A machine-head question, I know..)

Dean

 

[GrahamC]

Nicely done.

There is a certain joy one gets in making their own tooling. Its not being cheap or frugal but rather one of accomplishment.

I see you went with a rather thick cutoff tool 4mm. Any reason you picked that size?

I decided to go this route as well - carbide insert cutoff tool that is. I have been using an AXA size QCTP and AXA parting blade holder with a 3/32" thick HSS blade. I have never had any real problems with it except that since I did some work with titanium using this tool it has never been quite the same regardless of the number of times I have sharpened and honed it and it seems now that it requires that more often than before. Still, when sharp and honed it will make quick work of aluminum, brass or steel but there is the hassle of sharpening which does now seem to be more frequent. The blade is of Asian origin and simple marked as HSS.

I fussed over what size of insert blade to get but finally settled on the 2mm size but I will use the 2.4 size inserts. That is similar in size to what I currently use and couldn't find any reason to go any larger. Time will tell, I have not yet received the blade and inserts as they have gotten tied up in the Christmas mail. I too will be making a holder for the blade.

cheers, Graham in Ottawa Canada

 

[black85vette]

Dean; It is fitted to my Atlas 12x48

Graham; I went with this one because I wanted the stiffness to extend it out a bit longer. I have two others that are HSS. One of them is really thin, and cuts great but has to be kept pretty short. Partly I got this size just to try it out. It was cheap enough and I didn't know if I really wanted an indexable tool or not. I am thinking that the other side of this holder needs to have a place for the thin HSS cutter so I can get rid of the carrier that has to be used for it to work.

 

[ariz]

very nice work black85vette

and the choise of the 4 mm parting tool isn't that bad
you will discover that it can be useful sometime for simple turning, without change the tool, and not only for parting
and with that tickness it would not flex for sure

 

[Philjoe5]

Looks good black85vette. Another useful tool that I plan to make at some point. Is the big block of metal aluminum? Thanks for posting

Cheers,
Phil

 

[black85vette]

Is the big block of metal aluminum? Cheers, Phil

Yes. It is a 2"x2" piece of aluminum. Like many of my projects it was left over from another project and just sitting around waiting to be used.

 

[black85vette]

Follow up: I am very pleased with the outcome of this project. Not just the tool holder but the performance of the parting tool. This makes a cut much cleaner and runs so much smoother than any HSS tool I have. This could just be me, but making parting cuts in steel is never my favorite operation. Using this tool the feed rate is much higher and it actually produces some nice curly swarf without complaining / chatter. I only paid $20 for the tool and it came with 2 bits. This one cuts .125" wide. Thinking I want to go back and get the .062" tool and bit as well since it will work in the same holder. Got it at Shars.

 

[black85vette]

The other side of the tool holder looked kind of empty so I made a spot for my .5" x .062" HSS tool. Also cut the holder so that the cutter height is correct. It looks slanted in the pic but that is just the camera angle. It sits level. Works fine and is very stable.

Did I mention how much I am enjoying having a mill???