On top of these geometric features, end mills are characterised by their type, number of flutes, material (and coating). Thus, in a classical catalogue, the end mill above would be described as:

Someone on the RPF forum puts the insulation from electrical wire around the shank of their micro drill bits. The effect is some slight give in the shank where it's held in the chuck/collet and where it tends to snap, and not one has broken since he started doing it.

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I currently use PCB drills (bought off Ebay cheap) however, I find them incredibly brittle and the thread is very, very aggressive, which often means the drill bits bite and snap (especially in resin).

This article aims at explaining the basics of end mill science while answering the simple question you might have: which end mill should I use on my CNC machine?

Not at those prices I won't. 10 Euro's for one drill? I can get the microbox set I linked above for that, or a pack of 10 replacement bits.

Secondly, having more flutes on a tool creates smoother cuts, but it also leaves less space for chips to evacuate. This can be somehow overlooked if you are cutting soft materials, but not at all if you are cutting aluminium for instance. The reason is that aluminium produces very large chips compared to other materials. So when the end mill is cutting down in a hole or a slot, its flutes provide a crucial path for chips to escape. That explains why it is recommended to use 2 or 3 flutes end mills with aluminium since they have more chip clearance than with a 4-flutes one, where the chips will jam progressively, overlapping the cutting edges of your tool and making it break eventually.

Straight flutesend mills have a zero degrees helix.  They work well for materials where the lifting effect of a spiral flute might cause unwanted results, such as wood, plastics and composites. For those materials, the straight flute minimizes the fraying of the edges and provides better surface finishes than helical general purpose end mills.

What does SFM mean? This page is about the various possible meanings of the acronym, abbreviation, shorthand or slang term: SFM. ; SFM. Surface Feet per Minute.

Flutes are the deep spiral grooves that allow chip formation and evacuation. They are the part of the end mill anatomy that create those sharp cutting edges (sometimes referred to as “teeth”).

The number of flutes on your end mill is a crucial parameter that depends mostly on the material you want to cut and on the capabilities of your machine. Indeed, the number of flutes on your end mill will impact:

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It comes with a trade-off, unfortunately. The end mill will be weaker and won't sustain heavy depths of cut with high feed rates. So lower helix angle cutters are stronger, but they give a less smooth surface finish.

I got fed up breaking the cheapo drill bits but now I use Proxxon drill bits such as these Proxxon 28255 Diamond Twist Drill Bits 0.8 and 1.2 mm. Not cheap but worth it in the long run .

Surprised no one has mentioned the Tamiya bits? For small sizes I find them great as they have really accurate but short threads and sturdy shank. The cutting portion is only 4 or 5mm long so difficult to break and while I’ve gone through boxes of pcb bits (and still find them good for bits about 1mm and up ) I now have the full set of Tamiya bits from 0.2mm to 1mm. Not cheap but never had to replace any so actually good value. Also don’t have to try and dig broken pcb bits out of my models

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General-purpose end mills typically have helix angles around 30°. Increasing the helix angle will reduce the cutting forces and the amount of heat and vibration generated during the milling process. Hence, end mills with a higher helix angle tend to produce a better surface finish on the workpiece.

Another easy way to increase the performances of your end mills is to add a good coating. The most common one, TiAlN (Titanium aluminium nitride), will allow you to cut 25% faster on average without spending too much money.

As your CNC router spins the cutter clockwise, the helical direction of the flutes determines if chips are ejected towards the top or bottom of the workpiece. Upcut end mills are the most conventional ones, pullingthe chips away from the material, which is a very important feature for most milling operations on many different materials. It has a downside if you want to cut laminated materials since it leaves a poorer surface finish on the top of the workpiece. A downcut end mill has the advantage to push chips down, leaving a cleaner cut on top, but then it will also fray the bottom edge.

Secondly, it improves your MMR (Material Removal Rate) since the end mill can remove more material per unit of time when it is moving inside the material, allowing you to optimise certain operations and do the same job faster.

Each of these features has a direct influence on how the end mill will behave during a machining operation and on the cutting possibilities in terms of performance and shapes.

I've given up on buying drill sets, as like others I keep breaking the finer bits - or the carpet monster eats them. Instead I buy packets of 10 HSS bits off Amazon.

I currently use PCB drills (bought off Ebay cheap) however, I find them incredibly brittle and the thread is very, very aggressive, which often means the drill bits bite and snap (especially in resin).

You're right, they are good, and also easy to change, as the base is thicker. I did something stupid and broke the 0.2mm, but 0.3mm is still going strong.

High-Speed Steel (HSS) is the least expensive of the two, it provides good wear resistance and can be used to mill many materials, such as wood, metals,...

What is an end mill actually, is it like a drill bit? It is a usual question that comes up since terminologies are often mixed up, but the answer is no. A drill bit is designed to plunge directly into the material and create holes only, while an end mill can cut laterally into the material and create slots or profiles. Besides, most end mills are designed to be centre-cutting, meaning they can plunge into the material as well and making them far more versatile than drill bits.

@Dave Swindell many thanks for the recommendation! I'd seen those at my local (Jadlam), will pick up a set next time I'm there

It's not my only guide, but value for money wise most modellers don't need expensive high precision drills to drill holes in plastic models. The microbox drills and other like them are perfectly adequate for the job.

At this point, it might seem smart to buy end mills that are as long as possible to have the flexibility to use them in more situations, right? It’s actually not the case, because the more stickout, the less rigid a tool is. If it sticks out too far and you work it too demanding, the cutting forces will make it bend, which is what is called “tool deflection.”

If you don’t care too much about performance, then choose carbide end mills that are 8mm or less in diameter. Consider HSS for larger cutters to save some money, when the tool rigidity can be compensated by its larger diameter. Besides, if you are beginning with CNC milling, don’t forget that you might make mistakes and break a few end mills before getting it right, better HSS ones as well then.

This section could deserve an entire article, so let’s keep it concise and talk about the two main materials used to make cutting tools: HSS and carbide.

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Sadly, those PCB drills are not at all suitable to hand drill as they're far too brittle. I had a set and they snapped with the least bending. I stick with regular HSS sets.

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We once wanted to drill some 0.82mm holes, and they could make them for us, but we had to take 100. Smallest I have now is 0.7 mm Smallest I have seen is 0.1 ...

I have used two sets from Trumpeter Master Tools for several years, #09954 and #09955. I have managed to break only the 0.3mm, wasn't careful enough. I don't drill resin, just polystyrene which is softer, so I don't how long lasting they would be if used to drill resin parts.

Square end mills are the most common ones and can be used for many milling applications, including slotting, profiling and plunge cutting.

Roughing end mills are used to quickly remove large amounts of material during heavy operations. Their design allows for little to no vibration but leaves a rougher finish.

Imagine you want to mill a very deep pocket inside a high part. You will need a long tool to be able to machine the bottom without colliding your spindle mandrel with the stock of the material. Hence, the length of your end mill will be determined by how deep it must penetrate into the material. The associated concept with this observation is called “stickout”. It is defined by the distance from the end of the tool holder to the tip of the end mill.

I remember talking to my dad about small drill bits. He worked in light engineering all his life and must have drilled millions of holes. Small drill bits in metal didn't last long for all sorts of reason, but largely because they were so small and relatively fragile despite whatever they were made out off. He reckoned that the really small bits in plastic suffered because plastics are relatively good insulators of heat, and so the area around the bit heats up. In some cases the plastic will soften and foul the bit, thus making it more likely to break. Also plastics may not be a consistent density. A

The diameter of your tool will have a direct incidence on the profiles you can cut. Let’s say you want to make a box and assemble it using 90° interlocking joints.

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Going on from above. A good lubricant for cutting plastic is water believe it or not. However the sort of drilling we do in plastic is more of a case that the drill bit is rotated by hand rather by machine. so heat should be minimal.

Since your tool is a cylinder with a certain radius, it won’t be possible to do it as such. Indeed, the tool will leave a circular profile in every internal corner, with a radius equal to half its diameter. The larger your end mill diameter, the bigger the radius of this circular profile. In order to overcome this problem, CNC operators use what is called “dogbones”. Dog bone corners describe the shape of a corner that is extended outside the cut area to create a perfect 90º corner.

I think I've only ever broken the two smaller sizes in my set, and like you I've bought packets of 10 so as to have spares in stock. Shesto do the sets and packs of 10 individual sizes, so you have a choice of what suits you best. Personally, I like the set in the handy storage box, and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a general purpose set of small drills, however I've only ever bought two sets, one for the home workshop and another for a travelling toolbox.

I've given up on buying drill sets, as like others I keep breaking the finer bits - or the carpet monster eats them. Instead I buy packets of 10 HSS bits off Amazon.

Answering these questions will help you determine the desired tool geometry, based on your project type, the material being cut and on the desired surface finish. So let’s dive into the theory and answer those questions later with some concrete examples.

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Combine an upcut and a downcut and you have a compression cutter, where the flutes are carved one way for the bottom half of the flute length and the other way at the top.  That feature makes them a very good candidate to cut plywood, composites, and laminates. Try to use one to cut a sheet of plywood in one pass, and you should obtain cleaner edges on both sides.

Also, keep in mind that the cutting depth should never exceed the flute length of your end mill. If cutting deeper than the length of the flutes, chips won’t clear properly, heat will build up and you risk to damage your tool.

Since they can run way faster than HSS, they will increase your machine productivity a lot. They are also more durable and have a longer tool life, making them worth the investment.

Aluminum makes lots of little flakes and shavings when it's milled. I used to work at a machine shop. I hated that stuff, too! It gets everywhere!

There are as many different end mill types as there are possible cutting operations: profiling, contouring, slotting, counterboring, drilling,... Here is a short overview of the main ones.

Corner-radius end mills have slightly rounded corners that help distribute cutting forces evenly to prevent damage to the end mill and extend its life. They can create flat-bottomed grooves with slightly rounded inside corners.

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Based on those observations, I know that I need a flat-end mill type to get a nice flat surface inside the pocket. I will go for a diameter of 8mm, quite large because I don't want to waste too much time while removing all that material and because the inside corners are already designed to be rounded. I'll use a short carbide end mill as well, like 30mm long, because oak is a hardwood and I will need the rigidity to keep a high feed rate. Since the pocket is pretty shallow and chips will evacuate easily, I will choose a 3-flutes end mill with a 45° helix angle to get the best surface finish possible and spend little time hand-finishing.

Surprised no one has mentioned the Tamiya bits? For small sizes I find them great as they have really accurate but short threads and sturdy shank. The cutting portion is only 4 or 5mm long so difficult to break and while I’ve gone through boxes of pcb bits (and still find them good for bits about 1mm and up ) I now have the full set of Tamiya bits from 0.2mm to 1mm. Not cheap but never had to replace any so actually good value. Also don’t have to try and dig broken pcb bits out of my models

Coated Carbide end mills are more expensive than HSS ones, but they provide better rigidity and can be run 2 to 3 times faster than HSS. They’re also extremely heat resistant, making them suitable to mill tougher materials as well.

lot of industrial cutting and drilling uses/used cutting oils or other lubricants to ease the process, and also cool the work piece I have long since accepted that small 0.3mm/80 drill bits will not survive long.

Feed rate is indeed directly linked to the number of flutes of your end mill: if you add flutes, you will have to increase the feed rate, or decrease the rotational speed of your spindle, to keep a constant chip load. So depending on the speed capabilities of your CNC machine and of your spindle, you might have to choose an end mill with less/more flutes.

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Tapered end mills are centre-cutting tools that can be used for plunging, and are designed to machine angled slots. They are generally used in die-casts and moulds.

In short, shorter end mills are more rigid and less expensive. So save the extra-long ones for operations where they are really needed

Not at those prices I won't. 10 Euro's for one drill? I can get the microbox set I linked above for that, or a pack of 10 replacement bits.

First, it makes your tool more rigid, which will allow you to make deeper cuts while minimizing tool deflection. A lot more rigid actually, since increasing diameter by 2x will increase its rigidity by a factor of 16x.

Choosing the right end mill before turning on your CNC machine can be a pretty complex task. Many variables come into play, such as end mill length, geometry, profile type, material, while several trade-offs have to be considered: performance, cost, surface finish, tool life,...

I have been modelling for years and constantly have to keep buying new drills......only break .5 and below - all the time(at least 30 years plus).  I have tried all makes of drills, diamond, etc, you mention it, I have used/tried it......anything below .5 is going to eventually break, if it doesnt, it either goes blunt or bent........impossible to see the tips to resharpen, even purchased jewelry drills.....tried everything.  You just have to accept, those small drills have a limited shelf life........I just write off to various Jewelry  shops and buy bulk drills.....10 x .5   - 10 x .4 -   10 x .3................have many duplicates now of the sizes that do not break......being so fine, they are a welcome prize for the carpet monster......I have a special mains miniature vacu-cleaner, just to hoover the carpet about once per month.