Great little Chopping Boards - aka. Practice Blanks from IKEA
£3.50 for two, can't be bad. 350x240x30

 

Being still new to all of this can anyone give me a little insight to speeds and feeds through MDF for the following tools...I've have read that moving too slow through a tooling cycle is equally as bad as moving too swiftly so if I can gain some indication about this material here it will serve me well for the future..

Here follows my endmill tooling,
6mm bit to a depth of 3mm each time
3mm bit to a depth of 1.5mm each time
2mm bit to a depth of 1mm each time
90 degree V bit to a depth of 3mm

Some of those I'll be going deeper with probably no more than 40% stepovers at about 17000 on the router

Can someone offer me an insight to the above milling of MDF so as I'm not killing my Endmill bits...
Thanks in advance
Regards
Colin

 

Wood and Genuine Leather Coasters (by a novice)
This evening I set about making a set of four coasters with leather inserts and felt pads on the base
Each coaster is 104mm square with an 80mm pocket/recess. Fairly simple affair to make. First I cut a piece of 5mm ply 300mm x 300mm
squared everything up, marked the centre and cut out the tops with the hole in. I then cut the same with the hardboard minus the hole. Sanded everything up and bonded these together with wood glue. Once dry I applied a generous coat of American Walnut wood dye to the plywood grain.
Tomorrow I plan to complete the job by fine sanding, masking off and spray coating the edges, recess, and undersides in matt black. I then need to cut the leather (for which I've made a template) and stick it down in the pocket. Finally, I will apply 4 small felt pads to the base.
Looking good thus far. Relatively quick and simple to make. If all goes well I may make a little personalised holder to complement the set.

 

I'm a mere fledgling @Alex Chambers amongst a lot of very large birds. But I always wanted to make simple perhaps saleable items to cover the odd bit here and there. So I'll be trying out a few designs in the comming weeks. At least I won't be throwing good timber off-cuts into the bin anymore lol

 

Yes, I can do that @GrayUK but as you say let's see what they look like when they are finished, (I need to be happy with them)...The finish is what will make or break the project. If things go to plan a little "Holder" could be in the offing as well.

 

This evening I have tidied up the coaster set somewhat, giving them a little coat of varnish and left to dry. Then I cut and applied the leather inserts (all glued in with spray adhesive). Tomorrow I will finalise the job with a good all round tidy up of each individual piece. Then will come the most crucial part (and things could all go pear-shaped in the blink of an eye). Putting pay to hours of work.
The plan is to mill the following, 3mm inverted coffee cup motif. Pop it in the microwave and ding the thing until its fairly hot, then turn the disk over and brand the leather insert on the coaster whilst applying pressure via a "G-Clamp" (or similar)..Embossing effect "Will it or Won't it!, Who knows ...
Wish me luck.

 

Now wouldn't that be a laugh...
No @Alex Chambers don't fret I will be using oak probably or any (non-metallic) scrap I've lying around...lol

 

Will Do...The problem will be trying to get the wood embossing block hot enough to make the impression via pressure (from the clamp).
I'll try it first on a few scrap pieces of leather on how long to ding the disk to get the best imprint. See how we go. Fingers crossed.

 

Tomorrow morning hahahahaha

 

As stated above I made the effort to complete this little job. This morning I got to milling out the little impression plate from wood and heated in the microwave (first for one minute then again for two on a different piece of scrap leather) and clamped. All did not go as planned. I got nice milling, and yes I did get an impression in the leather test piece but to me, it won't last, it really needs to be metal branded properly. So for future reference, I may subscribe into buying a dedicated branding iron with this logo emblazed upon it.

That said, I finished up the coasters as they were, adding the felt foot pads to the underside and giving the tops a light smearing of clear furniture wax to enhance the wood a little. See what ya'll think.(below)..Personally, I don't think they turned out too bad for the first attempt by a CNC novice, there are maybe a few things I would do differently (to make them truly saleable) next time around. but all in all, I'm fairly pleased with the initial concept and the end result. (if a little sad I didn't get to emboss the leather) "Ah Well", maybe next time.

 

The one major specific change that I would probably like to perform next time is to square pocket the underside of the ply top piece a little wider than the hole, so as the leather can be cut square and sandwiched between the two wood segments rather than having to cut circles out of the material (this can be quite tough). This would have the effect of giving the leather insert a much nicer cleaner edge.
Regards
C

 

Thanks buddy!
For sure @Alex Chambers, I'm still taking the easy way out in that I'm using the centre of my workpiece as the datum point (work/start position) it would be a whole lot easier for me to use the front left corner from now on. As I'm mostly cutting small pieces presently I find myself just using the same lines that I've drawn on the spoiler board as the squaring off points. An "L" shaped ruler fence would be a nice addition.
Regards
C

 

Nice one @Rick 2.0
I must have missed that...Wetting the leather of course..It may work I'll give it a go with my woody version of the acrylic stamp see what gives, but to be honest I don't honestly think that there is any creditable longlasting imprint that can outweigh proper metal branding, but we'll see.
Many thanks
Regards
C

 

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I want to make something like this little trolley

 

Coast to Coast Slideshow

 

Its all in the presentation @Alex Chambers

 

@Rick 2.0
Looking forward to tomorrow, maybe