I just wanted to share my experience with bits so far.
I’ve been working on a sign project since I got my x-carve running. The first try I made with his sign I used a 1/8" upspiral 2-flute milling bit that I bought on Ebay. It’s a good general purpose bit overall, but as you can see from the pictures below, it left WAY LESS than acceptable results when milling thru 3/4" plywood. The photo shown below was even after some serious hand-sanding to try to get rid of the fuzzies. In the end, I just gave up.
Then I decided to look into some other bits. I ordered two varieties of additional bits. a 1/8" downspiral bit from Drillman1 (which isn’t here yet, so I’ll update this once I try it) and a 1/8" “low helix” upspiral (1/4" shank) from Yonico.
I have to say that I’m really impressed with how this bit cuts plywood. It left a nearly perfect finish that required not more than 15 minutes of light sanding (mostly for tool marks) and almost no ‘fuzzies’. You can see in the comparison picture below that there’s a night-and-day difference in the finish quality. (the larger one on the left was cut with the Yonico bit).
Other notable difference: I made the left sign using V-carve desktop, and the right sign with Easel. Same feed rates were used for both. I also made the left one a couple inches larger. I don’t believe that either of these difference have a big affect on the finish quality difference.
Here’s the sign cut with the Yonico before it was touched at all (still clamped to he x-carve). I did have to do a couple bit changes for this one, 1 for the v-carve lettering and 2 for the profile cut around the outside, as the Yonico bit only has a 1/2" cutter depth.
And finally, a picture of the sign with 1 coat of Shellac applied (needs a couple more)
