Looking to speed up some rough clearing passes by using a larger bit but I’m a little unsure how well the Dewalt can push a 3/4" bit.
Anybody have experience with larger (than 1/4") bits?
From my experience the Dewalt won’t be the limiting factor. I used a 3/4 inch but my problem was the machine wasn’t quiet stiff enough to handle the force at the depth of cut I had set . The machine vibrated like crazy eventually resulting in lost steps. You’ll just have the figure out a DOC and feed rate that will work with your machine and should be just fine.
I’ve stiffened my machine up quite a bit and I have used a 22mm bit (a bit bigger then 3/4") to level my sacrificial wasteboard with no issues.
What’s a ballpark starting point for pass depth and feed rate?
I have stiffened my X axis and have the bigger NEMA 23 motors. Heat shrink on the belts but other than that, stock machine.
How deep were you cutting per pass?
I think I did mine at about 100 IPM and I went shallow so I could take the bare minimum off in total…only 0.03" DOC. I could have cut much deeper, but not what I was going for.
I’ve used this bit successfully in the 611 to surface boards …
As @ErikJenkins and others have mentioned, it’s really a matter of the DOC and speed, take it slow.
I use a .75 spoilboard bit all the time. It’s all about speed and doc, the size of the bit is redundent
I don’t remember exactly. I’m going to guess some numbers… I had the depth per pass around .1 or .15 however my wasteboard was very uneven throughout so at points it could have been as deep as .23. Feed was probably around 60 IPM (give or take 10). It went fine for a while and eventually lost a little bit. In hindsight I think I could have turned my potentiometers up a little higher on my X/Y and probably wouldn’t have had any problems. The toolpath was also going in a climbing direction so I think that made it worse also.
I was definitely trying to be too aggressive. It was my first and only time using a 3/4 bit and honestly I was rushing which was the problem. You will definitely want to experiment before you try using on a project.
Yeah I had a similar problem with my 3/4" router bit. The traditional 50% bit diameter was way too much. I think I dropped it down to 1/8"?