As someone working in a company that makes a crazy amount of carbon composite parts for aerospace companies we go through a lot of endmills. Our go to types are OSG Exo-pro routers mainly for roughing. For semi-finishing and some finishing LMT-Omsrund mades some good DCC (diamond coated carbide) endmills. As for super fine finishing especially for contoured surfaces, we use diamond grit balls which have essentially no flutes but more or less grind a really nice sirface into the carbon
Love the carbon fiber inlay idea. That checkerboard pattern is going to look amazing. Forged carbon might be a cool look, too. Inspiring to see how pumped you are to master the art of carbon parts production. Stoked to see where this takes you guys! Going to pick your brain about this stuff at our next Grimsmo Gourmet Pizza luncheon 😆
If you were to create molds and lay up your own prepreg or even chopped tow, you could potentially get the inlays ready with minimal grinder cleanup or possibly water jet. You can’t call it forged carbon fiber since that names is trademarked but you can recreate the look. That stuff is great looking and since this isn’t structural, it would be of sufficient strength.
Have you checked the manuals from Sandvik? They have technical guides for CF machining. Also, don't miss out on endmills, especially for CF, they come in “weird” shapes on the flanks but you will have far fewer loose fibres on the edges.
Glad to see some carbon fiber machining! I can also vouch for Rock West composites, they are excellent! I've been trying out a lot of diamond grit end mills for roughing, profiling and some finishing. They are lasting even longer than the amorphous diamond coated carbide and are less expensive. Finding feeds and speeds is impossible but some trial and error will get you there eventually. For sharp pocket corners i still use the diamond coated fluted end mills. Keep up the good work!
Just wanted to say you and John make some of the coolest knives I’ve ever seen and I’m really appreciative that both of you share so much Information about how you guys achieve these badass tools just watched you rebuild your dads knife it was really cool god bless hope you both make a million more
@@codybroadway8496 Well dang, thanks man! All we can do is try to pay it forward. I definitely learned a lot from John as well as many others here at youtube university.
@@vcedge9466 it’s definitely a resource I’m super thankful for imagine what could have been achieved if bob loveless and the rest of his generation had RUclips to learn from.
Years ago, I thought i read that NASA figured out how to cur CF with a water jet using a consumable backer board that prevented tear out. I'm not certain, but I also seem to remember something about ceramic backer board pre-cuts, in the shape of the part to be cut, being used as they were not consumable. There were issues with this method but it did reduce the tear-out but left so finish grinding work. I'm sorry I can't be more help. Good Luck
This reminds me of when we used to cut ratchet gears from hardened sheets... lots of broken end mills and pain. Can you water jet that sheet down to blanks and machine those? Also a decal cutter or cricut to cut that Adhesive sheet. Laser might be melty on the backing. I'm excited to see what you come up with!
might I recommend looking at a thing called a cricut (ya I know it's a craft thing) for the 3m film, it's basically a drag knife so you don't have to deal with the burn marks
Check out the LMT Onsrud 66-900 series for roughing. Ive tested out probably 100 different CF endmills and those seem to be the best balance of price/performance. We have gone through litterally thousands and thousands of them. CVD and PCD work well but still dull and often i find it's not worth the price, esspecially when you facotr in the oddball crash or random edge chip that happens to 1 in 10. Diamond grit tools give really good finishes and are dirt cheap but you gotta take small woc and need really good chip flushing so they dont burn up.
Thanks for the info, good luck. Dark matter carbon fiber seems to have gotten popular over last few years, dude from lithuania makes it i think, maybe try some of that aswell to add some variation in style and color.
Extremely excited for carbon fiber! I think it would be awesome if you can get them flush with the titanium. Having the pivot sunken below the inlay looks a bit unfinished (in my opinion!). Still, that Norseman looks amazing!
Hey john and team, love the videos i have been milling carbon fiber for a few years and have found burr style endmills to be cheep and very effective for contouring carbon fiber without leaving fluff and for facing i would recommend checking out c6 tools do some awsome pcd endmills (down cut endmills are great if you are tabbing parts) also run them on the router its the right machine for the job
I've used PCD tipped tools for G10 and carbon fiber for years, and I have yet to see any wear on them. Maritool for endmills, Amana Tool for the chamfer. Have you considered epoxy for affixing the inlays? Epoxies will probably self-anneal to the resin used to bond the layers of the CF, I learned the hard way that it fuses to the resin used in G10. I was using Araldite Ultra there.
Looking through these comments was kind of surreal to me didn’t know vc edge had a RUclips channel and this community is such a small world and everyone is so helpful to each other it’s awesome.
Inlays look nice, but full milled carbon fibre handles would be awesome (and a nightmare to get into production probably). Something more tricky than the North Arm Skaha but not as full-on crazy as the VC Edge Interface.
I have always had good resuls using PCD tooling for cutting CF and other composite materials. but not in a hight production envoirment and also the parts are generally larger. It's funny to me how diamond tools are much more common in woodworking applications compared to metalworking.
In order to save money you can use composite board that only uses carbon fiber cloth on the outside and diolen cloth on the inside. It should also be way easier to cut.
John under the microscope you were only using very little of the flutes. If possible buy a shorter endmill barely longer than the material thickness. Maybe not available in your special coating but will be more rigid and last longer just because of the shorter length.
Use these or something like these, it will easily survive not one, but several plates like these, and they are dirt chep. They leave a somewhat rough finish, but we kind of like it. And they are dirt cheap, the ones without coating even cheaper, more than half of the price of these, and they would easily survive at least one plate. You will need rpm, you should consider carbon fibre more like grinding and not cutting, thus producing dust and not chips. Roto mills also work very well on carbon for instance, it's just more grinding than cutting in general.
If the double sided tape doesn't work out, could look into film adhesive used in composites. It's probably stronger, but it would also have to be refrigerated and then clamped and baked to cure.
micarta (canvas) inlays are more awesome....warm to the touch, grippy when wet, and durable as hell. That said, I know you'll go full Grimsmo on the carbon fiber, so I'm down for whatever...lol
Can you waterjet the inlays? Or does that not provide the finishes or tolerances you need? Even just blanking them and doing the final profile could save you a lot of carbide.
Awsome Video, i love your content :) I just saw a Bambu Lab X1C with the AMS in the background. I bought one because of the Podcast with you and John, and i absolutly love it. I would really love to see a review from you :D Would be great for the comunity, thank you :)
Can't wait to see what you end up with. I feel like nobody cares about the quality of CF they are using in the knife world. The layers are super inconsistent and when contoured/milled it makes the pattern look TERRIBLE because it's no longer flat. You are already ahead of the game from what I have seen by sourcing all different types, instead of just relying on that fake "fatcarbon" stuff 😅. If you stick to inlays only, then it's non issue. Keep up the good work, love watching your machining videos!
Found it… ruclips.net/video/-u-R3xd6KB0/видео.htmlsi=hhlXg3M0lhZZKvjk. I knew I remembered someone talking about the corncob cutters for laminated fibre products. I have small ones for cutting PCB and they work very well. .125 shaft and sub mm cutting part, you don’t have to remove a whole 1/8 to cut the parts out, the less you remove the smaller the tool wear, I think.
Can you laser cut carbon fiber? That cutting edge would never dull or break. Maybe you could make an insertable tool which could use existing cnc machines and have a fiber cable laser end? What do you think?
It's cool you can see dimples in the flute wear showing the multiple layers of the carbon
As someone working in a company that makes a crazy amount of carbon composite parts for aerospace companies we go through a lot of endmills. Our go to types are OSG Exo-pro routers mainly for roughing. For semi-finishing and some finishing LMT-Omsrund mades some good DCC (diamond coated carbide) endmills. As for super fine finishing especially for contoured surfaces, we use diamond grit balls which have essentially no flutes but more or less grind a really nice sirface into the carbon
3M VHB is my favourite way of sticking down things that need to stay stuck :)
Love the carbon fiber inlay idea. That checkerboard pattern is going to look amazing. Forged carbon might be a cool look, too. Inspiring to see how pumped you are to master the art of carbon parts production. Stoked to see where this takes you guys! Going to pick your brain about this stuff at our next Grimsmo Gourmet Pizza luncheon 😆
If you were to create molds and lay up your own prepreg or even chopped tow, you could potentially get the inlays ready with minimal grinder cleanup or possibly water jet. You can’t call it forged carbon fiber since that names is trademarked but you can recreate the look. That stuff is great looking and since this isn’t structural, it would be of sufficient strength.
Nice talk John, and thanks for sharing the knowledge!
Have you checked the manuals from Sandvik? They have technical guides for CF machining.
Also, don't miss out on endmills, especially for CF, they come in “weird” shapes on the flanks but you will have far fewer loose fibres on the edges.
I've been building a CVD chamber in my basement and I might have to try coating some of my tooling ... thanks for the idea!
Glad to see some carbon fiber machining! I can also vouch for Rock West composites, they are excellent! I've been trying out a lot of diamond grit end mills for roughing, profiling and some finishing. They are lasting even longer than the amorphous diamond coated carbide and are less expensive. Finding feeds and speeds is impossible but some trial and error will get you there eventually. For sharp pocket corners i still use the diamond coated fluted end mills. Keep up the good work!
Just wanted to say you and John make some of the coolest knives I’ve ever seen and I’m really appreciative that both of you share so much Information about how you guys achieve these badass tools just watched you rebuild your dads knife it was really cool god bless hope you both make a million more
@@codybroadway8496 Well dang, thanks man! All we can do is try to pay it forward. I definitely learned a lot from John as well as many others here at youtube university.
@@vcedge9466 it’s definitely a resource I’m super thankful for imagine what could have been achieved if bob loveless and the rest of his generation had RUclips to learn from.
You should try PCB endmills. They are great for rough cutting carbon fiber
Years ago, I thought i read that NASA figured out how to cur CF with a water jet using a consumable backer board that prevented tear out. I'm not certain, but I also seem to remember something about ceramic backer board pre-cuts, in the shape of the part to be cut, being used as they were not consumable. There were issues with this method but it did reduce the tear-out but left so finish grinding work. I'm sorry I can't be more help. Good Luck
This reminds me of when we used to cut ratchet gears from hardened sheets... lots of broken end mills and pain. Can you water jet that sheet down to blanks and machine those? Also a decal cutter or cricut to cut that Adhesive sheet. Laser might be melty on the backing. I'm excited to see what you come up with!
Ever tried compression fluted endmills? Specially constructed to not delaminate the sheet during machining.
might I recommend looking at a thing called a cricut (ya I know it's a craft thing) for the 3m film, it's basically a drag knife so you don't have to deal with the burn marks
Check out the LMT Onsrud 66-900 series for roughing. Ive tested out probably 100 different CF endmills and those seem to be the best balance of price/performance. We have gone through litterally thousands and thousands of them.
CVD and PCD work well but still dull and often i find it's not worth the price, esspecially when you facotr in the oddball crash or random edge chip that happens to 1 in 10.
Diamond grit tools give really good finishes and are dirt cheap but you gotta take small woc and need really good chip flushing so they dont burn up.
Thanks for the info, good luck. Dark matter carbon fiber seems to have gotten popular over last few years, dude from lithuania makes it i think, maybe try some of that aswell to add some variation in style and color.
Sad enough to be excited that I took a bus that went through Stoney Creek last Wednesday! 🤓
ultratools makes great composite cutters good pricing
Extremely excited for carbon fiber! I think it would be awesome if you can get them flush with the titanium. Having the pivot sunken below the inlay looks a bit unfinished (in my opinion!). Still, that Norseman looks amazing!
Yep I like it!
Hey john and team, love the videos i have been milling carbon fiber for a few years and have found burr style endmills to be cheep and very effective for contouring carbon fiber without leaving fluff and for facing i would recommend checking out c6 tools do some awsome pcd endmills (down cut endmills are great if you are tabbing parts) also run them on the router its the right machine for the job
Also if you are drilling use a w point drill for clean holes I was getting 30,000 holes from a 3mm karnash carbide w point drill in 3mm carbon
I can’t believe a kern owner has 8dollar endmills in the building 😂
Keeping it real ❤
kevlar also a fun one
I've used PCD tipped tools for G10 and carbon fiber for years, and I have yet to see any wear on them. Maritool for endmills, Amana Tool for the chamfer.
Have you considered epoxy for affixing the inlays? Epoxies will probably self-anneal to the resin used to bond the layers of the CF, I learned the hard way that it fuses to the resin used in G10. I was using Araldite Ultra there.
Niagara Diamond coated end mills work really nice.
Looking through these comments was kind of surreal to me didn’t know vc edge had a RUclips channel and this community is such a small world and everyone is so helpful to each other it’s awesome.
Inlays look nice, but full milled carbon fibre handles would be awesome (and a nightmare to get into production probably). Something more tricky than the North Arm Skaha but not as full-on crazy as the VC Edge Interface.
I have always had good resuls using PCD tooling for cutting CF and other composite materials. but not in a hight production envoirment and also the parts are generally larger.
It's funny to me how diamond tools are much more common in woodworking applications compared to metalworking.
In order to save money you can use composite board that only uses carbon fiber cloth on the outside and diolen cloth on the inside. It should also be way easier to cut.
don't think cost is a dilemma here
@@diederrr cost of cutting is. And when you can save on both then why not?
🔥Love CF!!!
John under the microscope you were only using very little of the flutes. If possible buy a shorter endmill barely longer than the material thickness. Maybe not available in your special coating but will be more rigid and last longer just because of the shorter length.
Use these or something like these, it will easily survive not one, but several plates like these, and they are dirt chep. They leave a somewhat rough finish, but we kind of like it. And they are dirt cheap, the ones without coating even cheaper, more than half of the price of these, and they would easily survive at least one plate. You will need rpm, you should consider carbon fibre more like grinding and not cutting, thus producing dust and not chips. Roto mills also work very well on carbon for instance, it's just more grinding than cutting in general.
Great video 👍Ever thought about making a press "imprint profile die" ,create a profile of the shape then cut it out.
Put the 3M sticky stuff onto the back of inlay material before you laser cut the part out = a few less man hours.
If the double sided tape doesn't work out, could look into film adhesive used in composites. It's probably stronger, but it would also have to be refrigerated and then clamped and baked to cure.
Have you considered using a laser to cut the inlays?
wouldn't waterjet solve majority of issues and rugh cutting? And then you can make inlays eyen out of stone.
I want vapour deposition diamond inlays! 😅
well, I know which norseman im going to hold out for.
micarta (canvas) inlays are more awesome....warm to the touch, grippy when wet, and durable as hell. That said, I know you'll go full Grimsmo on the carbon fiber, so I'm down for whatever...lol
Counting the days until you make a full carbon fiber scale for a Rask or Norseman, "just to see how it looks" 😉
Get good fume extraction for cutting that stuff on the laser!😊
I've been happy with the Fat Carbon from Lithuania. No voids and wild designs.
Would love to see some fancier stuff. Marbled CF, black camo CF, Fat Carbon, etc.
Can you waterjet the inlays? Or does that not provide the finishes or tolerances you need? Even just blanking them and doing the final profile could save you a lot of carbide.
Awsome Video, i love your content :)
I just saw a Bambu Lab X1C with the AMS in the background.
I bought one because of the Podcast with you and John, and i absolutly love it.
I would really love to see a review from you :D
Would be great for the comunity, thank you :)
Hey, when are you sending me my Starburst Norseman? I'm just wondering.
Can I torch my Saga pen and dip it in ferric taking out the guts and not ruin something inside
Hey thats my knife lol 😂
where is the "Arrange function" in fusion?
modify
Water jet or laser??
G'day mate. You need Forged carbon in your life.
Can't wait to see what you end up with. I feel like nobody cares about the quality of CF they are using in the knife world. The layers are super inconsistent and when contoured/milled it makes the pattern look TERRIBLE because it's no longer flat. You are already ahead of the game from what I have seen by sourcing all different types, instead of just relying on that fake "fatcarbon" stuff 😅. If you stick to inlays only, then it's non issue. Keep up the good work, love watching your machining videos!
Found it… ruclips.net/video/-u-R3xd6KB0/видео.htmlsi=hhlXg3M0lhZZKvjk. I knew I remembered someone talking about the corncob cutters for laminated fibre products. I have small ones for cutting PCB and they work very well. .125 shaft and sub mm cutting part, you don’t have to remove a whole 1/8 to cut the parts out, the less you remove the smaller the tool wear, I think.
water jet
Can you laser cut carbon fiber? That cutting edge would never dull or break.
Maybe you could make an insertable tool which could use existing cnc machines and have a fiber cable laser end?
What do you think?
LASER will tend to burn the resin before the fibre. Ooops!
Wazer waterjet
I find G10 way more abrasive than carbon fiber
Zombie Mill
⭐🙂👍
Build yourself a water jet. Use some hardened 3D printer nozzle.
🙌💪🤙🇺🇸
Who needs carbon fibre on the knife handle? It just makes no practical sense.
No one NEEDS a 1k knife. It's a functioning piece of art
They cost so much for a budget steel. Not worth the cost.
I dont buy grimsmo because they are not worth the cost. Especially with low end steel and heat treat.