Thanks for the feedback Jonathan,

I went a bit shy on the DOC on the 8mm, after breaking the 6mm earlier and you're right it was 3 flute. I have the other mounting bracket to do tomorrow, so I'll pluck up the courage to up the feed rate, but I'm a bit wary of the sturdiness of my machine until I get that 2nd ballscrew on, so maybe a lighter DOC than 1.5mm (that and get an order in for more end mills ;-) ).

Another thing I need to figure out is an estop for the spindle/VFD and two pole that into the big red button for the control box.

For these pieces I'm not fussed about the chatter marks, they were quite light anyway, but a finishing pass will be in order for the other parts I'm making.

Solved my locking nut problem by binning the supplied M4 grub screws and chopping some M4 button head bolts to size (they had hardly any "hex" on the head and seemed to be made of silly putty). Ah yes Oldham Couplings - will go find some now.

Cheers


Chris