[jmvar]

I am completely new to CNC milling and I am slowly learning all the terminology and procedures.

I want to mill a turner's cube out of 6061 Al with a 3/8" HSS endmill on a tormach 1100. I have modeled to cube and programmed toolpaths in HSM Express 2015. Here are my questions:

- Firstly, do you see anything glaringly wrong with either my tool tab or my pocket tab settings? I used feeds and speeds suggested over in the Tormach forum, I will try Gwizard once I get more experience under my belt.

- Is there a better methodology to machine the pockets? My thought process was to mill in several steps and use the last step as a finishing pass for the axial face.

- Is there a way to perform one last finishing pass on the radial face of each pocket in the same operation as the roughing and finishing passes for the axial face? I tried to do it in 2 separate operations but it started getting complicated, figured I would keep it simple since I am a beginner.

- Is there any issue with just using the post process feature right in HSM express and output that NC file to upload to the tormach?

Thanks in advance and I look forward to this learning process.