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Drilling and tapping inconel


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Can tap it, but after 4-8 holes need to throw away the tap and use a new one. Never try to go past a safe number when tapping Inconel. I always tell every customer 40% of the project total should have Tooling cost when cutting this material. Like the others have suggested Thread mill if at all possible.

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22 hours ago, Patman64 said:

I need some suggestions other options on drilling and tapping threading Inconel

Fixed. 

IMHO, unless your taps are free, and there is no other choice, just don't.  Use a marginless free cutting carbide drill such as the Kennametal GOdrill and then threadmill with a quality threadmill that is as short as possible, either solid or inserted work fine.  Don't expect to be in a hurry.  Unless you get lucky and the solid carbide taps you have happen to come with speed recommendations and geometry tailored exactly for your parts and material.  It just won't be cost effective in a production setting. 

Also, drill and threadmill life will depend greatly on the grade and heat treat of the Inconel you are cutting.  If it is 718 and is in the 50rc range, just run, run far away and don't look back, you will go through a few drills before you dial in the feeds ad speeds such that you can make a hole, but to tap it :crazy:....  you can mill that stuff all day long with ceramic (in 8 minute increments...) but holemaking the hard stuff is a different art all together.

Ron was spot on with the tool cost info.  I typically figure when using conventional carbide cutting methods in inco materials, for it to take 10x the time and 10x the tool cost of 4140 for the same parts.  In a typical job shop environment, cutting whatever you come across, other than stainless and super alloys, I typically figure a single cat 40 spindle to use roughly on average 15k in tooling per year, total spend.  Cutting Inco, depending on what you need to do for the parts you are cutting, you can expect to spend 30k or more per month on that same spindle in consumables...  Course there are lots of considerations into that number, but if you are keeping the spindle turning in Inco, expect to be turning inserts and changing tools all day long.  An optical offline presetter and spare tool assemblies are absolutely paramount to productivity.  Having a machine that you can swap tools in while it's running is also highly desirable.

Don't let any of this scare you away from the job, just know what to expect.

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On 5/27/2021 at 11:22 AM, Patman64 said:

I need some suggestions on drilling and tapping inconel using a 7/16 solid carbide drill and a 1/2_13 carbide tap! 

It single point turns pretty well if you are on a lathe, but taps just have too much surface area contact, so the temp rise when the tool gets a couple of pitches engaged is meteoric (all that damn nickel).

If on mill I support the thread mill....

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