swarf management

[AMMASHOOTA]

My lathe is situated away from everything else in my garage and I have no problem dealing with the metal shavings produced during operations there.

My mill is another story. It is on the end of my work bench, and I have open storage adjacent to it. The swarf from milling tends to not collect in one place, and I am getting tired of digging shards out of my hands so frequently.

I have a lot of milling work on the horizon, and I need to figure out a way to manage the waste.

Any suggestions?

 

[JerrySharrett]

According to your mill design (vertical, horizontal, or universal-Bridgeport type) and your setup for a particular job you can sometimes rig up a shop vac with a big attachment to catch at least most of the flying chips. This can be a pain too but there ain't no easy solution.

 

[Jdh]

I made two plexiglas shields that bolt to the front and back of my kurt vise. I also bent two end pieces that I just clip onto the front shield. This essentially boxes in the vise and allows quite a bit of table travel both ways. They help when I flycut.

joe Henderson

 

[Wayne Shaw]

And if you run a coolant flow, that flies everywhere too!

 

[Dave Tooley]

Either use shields on the machine or get a roll of thin painters poly and cover everything else up.

Dave