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Clean edges on cnc routed dibond

billsines

New Member
If your cuts are like a tuna can, I suspect there is something amiss with your machine. Not getting your settings right or using a dull bit can do that. You might even have excessive machine flex, or even machine slop due to wear of parts. I just had to replace some gear rack on one of mine last Thursday. Think about it, if you have a lot of wear somewhere, that will translate into sloppy movement, that will translate directly to your cut. Check out all your components and see if there is any slop due to wear.
 

fuzzy_cam

The Granbury Wrap & Sign Guy
We have an older ShopBot and get perfectly clean edges on ACM all the time. We use a 1/8" end mill bit, 3 ips, 16k rpm.
 

astro8

New Member
We use a bits designed to route stainless steel to cut acm/acp. Single flute upcut at 400-500-600 inches per minute, climb cut at 24000 rpm but that's on a Biesse with 50hp of vacuum. Downcut bits work well too, as long as your spoilboard is freshly surfaced.
 

Devin

New Member
We cut alot of brushed acm at my shop.

I typically run a 3/16" Belin bit. On 3mm acm I'll run 2 passes. 1st pass at 150-220 ipm cutting .111 depth. 2nd pass at 220 ipm .125" depth with a .015" width. This is at 16000 RPM. With a smooth and flat sheet of MDF spoil board for a proper vaccum.

The clean pass takes off .015" off the side and finishes the cutout of the finish piece.

With ACM, alot of time if the cut isn't clean it's because your feedrate is too slow. The material is very soft and easy to cut for a sharp bit. Don't be afraid to ramp the speed up. Also, it's important to use an accurate caliper. We use a calibrated Mitutoyo. Had trouble getting accurate readings with cheap alternatives.

Hope this helps, I've had to spend lots of time sanding down edges before I figured it out. Now they come out clean everytime.
 

jdwilliams1

New Member
Different routers will have different settings. Not all routers are created the same. We are at a router speed of 46,600 moving at 8 in/sec using a Zund 154 bit. I will caution you that there is a very good possibility those setting wont work for your Gerber. A lot of the setting are based on the actual router capabilities itself. Zund came out with a 3.6 kW router about a year after we bought ours and I know it will route faster than the one we have.
Superior Adam, you are cutting 3mm ACM at 8 inches a second with the smaller router head? Also what type of life are you getting out of the Zund 154 bit?. Are you pre printing and then cutting with registration?
 

Superior_Adam

New Member
Superior Adam, you are cutting 3mm ACM at 8 inches a second with the smaller router head? Also what type of life are you getting out of the Zund 154 bit?. Are you pre printing and then cutting with registration?
I am sure I pulled those settings right off the machine. I get a long life out of router bits on ACM as it is a pretty soft material.
 

MikePro

New Member
Belin is still my favorite brand. 33317(.125")/33475(.188")/33635(.25").
huge fan of multiple passes for clean edges, or at least a singlular roughpass halfway through the material at a ~.03"+ offset so the metal chips have an easier path to flow-out when doing your final part cuts.
 

JBurton

Signtologist
Belin is still my favorite brand. 33317(.125")
Gotta love Belin's, they never seem to dull, except for on acrylics. Though for ACM, you ought to use the 33317A, it has a 5/16" CEL, shorter OAL, and more/narrower groves on the sides, so it's just a little stiffer. I never seem to get the same mileage on a 33317A when I have to use one on ACM/Aluminum. We use it on aluminum up to .25" thick all the time. I've probably clocked a couple of miles on an aluminum bit more than a few times. More often than not they get broken when someone set up a program wrong, didn't see an inside piece get ejected, or when the depth is set wrong.
 

Vassago

New Member
Single flute bits tend to be best for aluminium and plastic - something with a nice Polish will just fly through.

Alot also depends on speeds and feeds. The issues are often that you are not going fast enough. Imagine you have a 1hp plus router.. Its not going to struggle with cutting sign material, then you look at the rpm - use that to see how much the bit is cutting per inch/mm, etc. The bits usually tell you the preferred cutting rate. Then do the math that suits your situation.. Usually it's just rpm / movement speed.

But in most cases.. Go faster and use sharp bits.. You're slicing - not grinding. You don't want to be recutting the swarf you've already cut.
 
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