I have a cross section of under sea cable that I need to level and smooth out for a special display project.
The cable is ~7.5” diameter and made from multiple copper cables mixed with some fiber reinforced plastic insulation/jacket. This cross section has been flooded with clear epoxy resin.
Does anyone have ideas/recommendations for bits, speeds/feeds to flatten this type of mixed material?
I have a 1.5” replaceable knife rabbet bit (2 knives DLC coated ), or a 1/2” spektra coated downcut in my tool library.
Should I get a 1/2” upcut for this or try it with one of the others?
Was thinking of cutting .3-.5mm, 2500-3000mm/min at something around 10000 rpm (cutting w router not spindle)
Since I have one, I would use my Amana RC-2263 on that. I would probably run 0.020"-0.030" DOC, 30-40ipm feed rate, and 18,000rpm. I’d start light and slow first to see how it cuts.
A 1/2" downcut will probably leave a pretty good finish too.
Since it has the epoxy, I assume you’d sand it and clearcoat it so that it looks good?
I didn’t even have a guess as how to start into that on a high speed spindle. On my mill I’d be very comfortable going into that with massivly lowe rpm and feed rates that would make people check twice to see if it was till moving, but on a high speed spindle, finding a way to keep the epoxy from melting while cutting through the metal components on a high speed spindle may prove hard to do.
If you do find something that works, please do let us know, I am very interested.
Also, if you come up with a 2-4-6-8-12in chunk of that you’d be willing to part with, let me know in a private message and we can find a $$$ that works for both of us. I’d enjoy having a piece of this to design into a future project.
