carbide depot

[don62]

looking for router bits with oal 4.5+ inches. came across Carbide Depot - has anyone dealt with them or used any of their router bit? recommendations?

[Brady Watson]

You can get "Super Extra Long" end mills (including ball end mills for 3D work) from any number of places. I get mine from Andy at www.ObergBrothers.net (http://www.ObergBrothers.net) The more you buy, the more you save.

-B

[bbrozo]

I got an end mill and ball nose, 3.5" OAL from MSC Industrial Supply and am happy with them. I used them to carve a bowl a couple of months back and had to go to a depth of 3.25" as I recall. In my opinion, you don't want a bit much longer than that since you'll start getting some deflection and the max. z depth I could get was around 3.25" and you start having to worry about other things like "will the dust shoe get in the way to reach that deep?". And, to reach deep, you may need to carve away surrounding material, etc.

I'm going to have to check out Oberg Brothers though like Brady suggests. They seem to have a really good selection.

Bill

[bbrozo]

Correction to my last post:

I just checked the bits I got from MSC and they are 5" OAL and I squeaked out 3.25" carving depth with them considering the thickness of the material I was carving (3.5") and the z height limit.

Bill

[Brady Watson]

FYI - They get a lot of their end mills and bits from Oberg Brothers...and then charge you 10% over list.

A word to the wise is sufficient...

-B