Official Luthiers Forum!

While perusing the CMT router bit offerings I ran into this bit:

https://www.amazon.com/CMT-663-004-11-S ... lp_pl_dp_5

In a previous discussion I mentioned it might be nice to make a safety planer with insert cutters - this might be it! It's intended use is to smooth the spoil boards on CNC machines. The 4 sided carbide insert cutters might make sharpening a thing of the past.

How well do you think it will cut at drill press speeds? If somebody needs a router bit like this anyway, it sounds like a worthwhile $60 experiment.

There's nothing safe about that thing!

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

One downside to it is some of the "safety" feature is gone. Rigging up a shield might be a good idea. Another possibility would be to make a jig for a router base and use it in a router. That might make a higher speed surfacing tool than the average safety planer. If the jig incorporated a plunge base and dust collection so much the better - and maybe a mini vacuum table hold down runoff a shop vac.....
After cogitating on the imagineering, using it in a drill press with a simple shield might be the simpler solution.

Hutch posted while I was typing - yes adding the safety back would be a priority.

Here's the tool to use it in:

https://www.woodpeck.com/woodpeckers-slab-flattening-mill.html

Ed

I doubt a drill press will turn enough rpm to get a clean cut, This is designed for use with a planing sled....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bm9SDuWIAk0

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/

this tool is also known as a face mill
many here never used one but it will do fine on wood , This set up isn't as robust as a R* collet but It will do well on a cnc machine with a vacuum holding system. I use something like this on a R8 collet. You can flip the inserts for multiple uses. The key is in the feed and cut rate , you should not be taking more that .10 to .015 in per pass and you want to good blow off or dust collection. I can assume your using MDF as a spoil board that this will work fine but will produce a lot of fine dust.
If you are trying to do this with without a proper fixturing system I would say don't use it..
Be aware of the feed direction , and feed rate.

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

I've flattened a few slabs using a face mill with both a sled setup and a CNC. My initial thought was, "Drill press doesn't rotate as fast as the router..." But then I wondered why it shouldn't work anyway. If safety planers and the like work in a drill press, why not a face mill? Is it a mass issue? Face mills have considerably less mass than the safety planer I have from Stew-Mac.