[Tonto318]

Hi everyone, I'm new to the machining world so I have a lot to learn. I bought 2005 4020 ht and this is my frist machine. I have been slowly gathering tooling. I have a few questions for some real machinist. What are your thoughts on daul contact tool holders? I have done a lot of research and some say they will work on the older machines and other say you have to have a daul contact spindle. Hopping some of you guys might be running them and get frist hand thoughts. Also Whats do you guys think about module tooling? I'm trying to be smart about this and trying not to waste to much money. any advice would be appreciated.

[rbjem]

You need to have a dual contact spindle to see any benefits.

Dual contact spindles are precison ground on the face relative to the taper (just like an hsk spindle taper). Standard cat40 spindles dont have the face grinding.

If this is your first mill (or first big boy mill maybe) don't worry about the extra rigidity in the spindle, worry more about keeping the tools sticking out as little as possible (including tool holders) and also rigidity in your part fixturing.

[Tonto318]

Thank you for the advice. I will most likely go with a standard holders. I would like to get your thoughts on end mill holders verses collets. I'm sure someday I will have plenty of both but right now just not sure what route would be better? I'm only going to buy enough holders to get me through the frist project. So I was thinking about getting end mill holders for my roughen end mills and using collets for my finishing. Or I'm thinking to far into it. You said "frist big boy" but it my frist cnc machine. I have manual stuff but business picked up and I can't keep up. I have been looking at machines for the last year. I looked at all the bench top ones looked at every brand out there. Even went so far as to pricing out parts for the top 3 machine I thought I would buy. I felt I couldn't go wrong with the fadal. I know there not the fastest or the best out there but they look simple compared to the rest to work on and the parts are way cheaper to. I was just looking around when I came across this 4020. Went to look at it and it was basically new. It only has 1100hrs on it. Hopefully that's a good thing and not a bad thing! Thank you for the advice. I'm sure there will be plenty more questions to come.

[rbjem]

For some reason i was thinking you had a desktop mill... if your working with manual machines youve already know the basics.

Fadals just work. Day in day out. plus they are stupid simple. And have great parts availability. So you didnt make a bad decision.

Dont overthink the holders.. For mill holders i dont like to use them under 3/8 but i do have a 1/4 holder i use on occasion. For collet holders, definitely capitalize on existing collets you may already have.

If youre doing a lot of different materials, you may want to at a machining calculator (check out hsmadvisor) if it saves a couple tools from breaking youre money ahead.

[Tonto318]

I have looked at the hsm advisor. Seems a lot of people run this. I did the free trial deal and i felt it was fairly straight forward. Most of the products will be alum. With some 4140 parts form time to time. I normally start with what the manufacturer wants for feeds and spend and go from there but that's with the power feed on my manual. All my manual stuff is er16 and I'm thinking I will do at least er20 for the fadal. I never had 20hp machine befor so little nervous about tooling. I guess time will tell to bad the shop won't be done for another month or so. Thanks again for the advice.

[carbidecraters]

If you can get a spindle cartridge sized right for the casting you would run into issues with the drawbar if your planning on loading the hell out of tooling. It isnt uncommon for us to bury a 3/4 endmill in aluminum in an HT model. We rarely need to hog on steel but still we can have the occasional oring in the push plate for the drawbar go bad. I have never broken a drawbar in a Fadal in 25 years. But the way they setup the drawbar release with the air plate should be resized for a DC spindle IMHO

[rbjem]

I came across this adapter last week. Its marketed to (maybe) get dual contact performance from a standard spindle and standard holders.

Installing Techniks DualDRIVE Tooling on Standard Spindles

Only downside is you need on per holder.

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

[carbidecraters]

I came across this adapter last week. Its marketed to (maybe) get dual contact performance from a standard spindle and standard holders.

Installing Techniks DualDRIVE Tooling on Standard Spindles

Only downside is you need on per holder.

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

My advice is ..dont do it.