Soap mold making

[cnc_works]

I have a request to make a 3" X 3" soap mold from the attached file.

I'm going to use machinists wax and I want pretty fine work. I seem to remember reading that for fine resolution something like a 30deg engravers bit with .005 flat works good. Anybody have any further guidelines on stepover, feeds, speeds...a better choice of bits?

By the way, Grant Bailey has been mentioned recently a couple of times as a 3D artist...to toot his horn a little, this is just part of a larger crest he created for me.

Donn

22574.jpg

[Brady Watson]

Donn,
Grant should be able to make tooling suggestions for you, but I'll tell you what I would use. I would start by roughing out with a 1/8" end mill, then use a 1/16" ball end mill, and a 1/32" ball end mill for the finer parts. If you have ArtCAM, you can do what they call 'Rest Machining' where you only machine the areas that the larger tool missed. Your stepovers should be in the 5 to 7% range to give a good finish. You will want to make sure that your CNC is properly tuned and 'tightly adjusted' for files of this size. Worn Z-axis pinions will cause surface irregularities. As with ANYTHING you cut on a CNC, there is ALWAYS going to be some hand finishing, especially when you are creating a mold master.

-B