Hello,
I am new to the x-carve, and I wasn’t sure what kind of drill/carving bits.
I am going to be carving on hpde, wood and mdf, machinable wax, and a little bit of machinable foam.
What would be the best drill/carving bits for these materials?
Thanks
There is some good stuff here:
Any recommendations for ball nosed drill/carving bit?
is this a good set?
Bit Set for Wood and Plastic | Inventables?
My set from Inventables was a little different, but high quality. Although, I’ll be honest, I’d rather have gotten a 5 pack of 2 or 3 different bits and learned to use those really well than have a pack of 1 or 2 of each. It’s too easy to lose track of which one is what taper and which V bits were 0.1mm or 0.2mm at the end. Rather than collecting dozens of different bits, at least when you first start out, I’d recommend getting a 1 flute 1/16" and 1/8", and a 2 flute 1/16" and 1/8", and get like a 5 pack of each. Mark off on the shaft of the ones you use with a sharpie so you always know which ones are in your “working set” so you don’t end up with five half-used bits. And just really get to know what kind of DOC and feed rates work for those bits. You’ll be pretty frustrated when you buy an inventables variety pack with one 1/16" 2 flute flat end mill, design a part that needs that type of end mill, and then realize you missed a decimal place because you’re a beginner and your machine flies into HDPE at 1000 in/min., shattering your bit into ten pieces and you have no replacement.
Endmills have to be considered consumables. Buy multiples of the ones which you need.
List of recommendations here: Shapeoko CNC Router, Rigid, Accurate, Reliable, and Affordable
Can anybody recommend a good 1-1.5 inch bit for wood, hdpe, and others?
If you mean cutting length, the nicest one I’ve found is the Garr Tools one mentioned at the link: http://www.garrtool.com/tooldetaillogin.jsp?edp=41030 — note that it’s really long, and pretty much requires a precision collet, and router which has minimal runout (I got lucky w/ my Makita, it’s very close to perfectly true).
These are good places I have gotten some nice bits from
