If you’re looking for improvements in part quality, production speed and line efficiency, standard milling machine tooling won’t cut it. You need the productivity, consistency and precision that only Advanced Cutting Tooling System Milling Cutters can provide. When you turn to our team here at Colonial Tool, you get the best milling machine tools on the market for all of your machining needs.

We build all of our milling machine tools using quality material, intelligent design and precision dimensions. Our milling machine cutters and tools allow you to work faster and reduce scrap and rework, which has a direct effect on your bottom line. Choose flexible, adjustable milling machine tools that require less set-up time and allow you to run longer to streamline your tool crib or production floor operations.

Milling cutters are cutting tools typically used in milling machine tools or machining centres to perform milling operations (and occasionally in other machine tools). They remove material by their movement within the machine (e.g., a ball nose mill) or directly from the cutter's shape (e.g., a form tool such as a hobbing cutter).

Milling cutters come in several shapes and many sizes. There is also a choice of coatings, as well as rake angle and number of cutting surfaces.

Shape: Several standard shapes of milling cutter are used in the industry today, which are explained in more detail below.

Flutes / teeth: The flutes of the milling bit are the deep helical grooves running up the cutter, while the sharp blade along the edge of the flute is known as the tooth. The tooth cuts the material, and chips of this material are pulled up the flute by the rotation of the cutter. There is almost always one tooth per flute, but some cutters have two teeth per flute. Often, the words flute and tooth are used interchangeably. Milling cutters may have from one to many teeth, with 2, 3 and 4 being most common. Typically, the more teeth a cutter has, the more rapidly it can remove material. So, a 4-tooth cutter can remove material at twice the rate of a 2-tooth cutter.

Helix angle: The flutes of a milling cutter are almost always helical. If the flutes were straight, the whole tooth would impact the material at once, causing vibration and reducing the accuracy and surface quality of the milling machine tool. Setting the flutes at an angle allows the tooth to enter the material gradually, reducing vibration. Typically, finishing cutters have a higher rake angle (tighter helix) to give a better finish.

Center cutting: Some milling cutters can drill straight down (plunge) through the material, while others cannot. This is because the teeth of some cutters do not go all the way to the centre of the end face. However, these cutters can cut downwards at an angle of 45 degrees or so.

Roughing or Finishing: Different types of cutter are available for cutting away large amounts of material, leaving a poor surface finish (roughing), or removing a smaller amount of material, but leaving a good surface finish (finishing). A roughing cutter may have serrated teeth for breaking the chips of material into smaller pieces. These teeth leave a rough surface behind. A finishing cutter may have a large number (4 or more) teeth for removing material carefully. However, the large number of flutes leaves little room for efficient swarf removal, so they are less appropriate for removing large amounts of material.

Coatings: The right milling machine tool coatings can have a great influence on the cutting process by increasing cutting speed and tool life, and improving the surface finish. Polycrystalline diamond (PCD) is an exceptionally hard coating used on cutters which must withstand high abrasive wear. A PCD coated milling machine tool may last up to 100 times longer than an uncoated tool. However the coating cannot be used at temperatures above 600 degrees C, or on ferrous metals. Tools for machining aluminium are sometimes given a coating of TiAlN. Aluminium is a relatively sticky metal, and can weld itself to the teeth of tools, causing them to appear blunt. However it tends not to stick to TiAlN, allowing the tool to be used for much longer in aluminium.

Shank: The shank is the cylindrical (non-fluted) part of the milling machine tool which is used to hold and locate it in the tool holder. A shank may be perfectly round, and held by friction, or it may have a Weldon Flat, where a set screw, also known as a grub screw, makes contact for increased torque without the tool slipping. The diameter may be different from the diameter of the cutting part of the tool, so that it can be held by a standard tool holder

As the industry moves away from standard tools and adopts Advanced Milling Solutions & Milling Cutters, you don’t want to be left behind. Equip your business with the best milling machine cutting tools available from the market leader, Colonial Tool.

You won’t find our advanced solutions at other tooling suppliers, who often stop at offering standard tooling solutions that you can find anywhere. The lower initial cost of these milling machine cutting tools is often offset by lower productivity, more frequent replacement, increased scrap and the need for costly rework steps. In the long run, you don’t save any money.

When you trust us for your milling machine tooling needs, you receive:

• Years of experience and advanced tooling knowledge

• Our modern tooling capabilities using our advanced CNC machines

• Intelligent tooling design that shortens changeover times

• Longer tooling life with fewer adjustments required

• Balanced, low-vibration milling tools for better surface finish

• Unbeatable customer service and attention to detail

On top of our impressive milling machine cutting tools, we can also repair, remanufacture, retrofit or rebuild spindles and cutting tools to extend the life of your existing milling machine tools. We understand the cost of purchasing and maintaining a full selection of milling machine cutters and tools and do what we can to help you improve the quality of your parts all while maximizing your tooling investment dollars

Our tooling specialists here at Colonial Tool are waiting to hear from you. Contact us today for more information or to get answers to your machine tooling questions. We will prepare a free quotation that provides you with the Advanced Milling Solutions & Milling Cutters your business needs for increased efficiency and a lower price per piece. You’ll quickly understand that investing in quality advanced milling tools can save you money over the long term and result in better quality machined and milled parts.

We’ve spent years meeting the needs of our customers and providing them with creative tooling solutions for all of their milling requirements. Come and discover what we can do for you and take advantage of working with an industry leader. Colonial Tool looks forward to finding the milling solutions you’re looking for, so let us know how we can help.