Please mister, make me a star

[Dave G]

I know this a bit off topic but I hope you will find it of interest. I had to make some Christmas presents lately and upon completing one of them I was told that it needed a star placed on it. Here is how I went about making a 5 pointed star on the mill. First the rotary table was set on the mill and a piece of 3/4" aluminum clamped in the jaws. The part is indicated to find center.

Before starting I had to find some locations using cad. Heres a pic of the dimensions copied to paper. The star will be .75" dia and made of aluminum. I will use a .125" dia endmill for the cuts.

This pic is of the first 2 cuts in the part. One cut starts from the left and the other cut from the right. The endmill is fed into the part .03" per cut to a total depth of .09". Once these 2 cuts are made the rotary table is rotated 72 Degrees and the cuts are repeated. There will be 5 locations of the cuts, 0, 72, 144, 216, and 288 degrees. Once these cus are finished you should have the shape of the star.

 

[Dave G]

Sorry, I forgot to post the pic.

 

[Dave G]

Heres a pic of all the cuts finished.

After completing all the cuts on the mill I moved the rotary table to the horizontal position on the mill so I could drill a .038" dia hole for mounting the star.

And a pic of the finished star after parting it off in the lathe and deburring.

I hope you will find this informative and maybe it would be a good time of the year to go into the shop and make that special person or persons in your life something special. It might help justify that expensive mill and rotary table that you just bought to that special someone also. Dave

 

[lazylathe]

Nice work Dave!!!

Very informative with good pictures!

Now if only i could figure out how to get a bridgeport mill into the basement....
Somehow don't think the " Honey, i will make you a star" will fly... :big:

Andrew

 

[mu38&Bg#]

Thanks! This gives me an idea for a Christmas present for my daughter. maybe it's time to try anodizing as well.

 

[kvom]

Milling the arm facets with the rotab set horizontally would allow a larger endmill to be used. In addition, the cuts could be deeper allowing more than one to be parted off.

 

[prophub]

Thanks for sharing Dave!

I'll have to give it a try...my daughter would love one on a necklace.

Shawn

 

[nsfr1206]

Nice little tutorial. Like that finished product, be cool to have some natural and some anodized different colors.