Lending library - Woodruff keyseat cutters

[trlvn]

I was inventorying some new-to-me milling cutters and I find I now have 3 Woodruff keyseat cutters:

Imperial:
ANSI 610, 3/16 X 1-1/4" (aka "19")
ANSI 1212, 3/8 X 1-12" (aka "G")

Metric:
6 X 9 X 22 mm

My copy of Machinery's Handbook has a 4 page table of Woodruff key sizes and that only covers "USA Standard" keys. Not metric!

It occurs to me that I will probably never need to use the cutters I have. And never have the size of keyseat cutter that I need! I wonder if we could organize an informal lending library of these? It would be cheaper to pay for mailing a cutter back and forth rather than buying a new cutter every time a different size is required.

Anybody else want to participate?

Craig in Oakville

 

[Canadium]

Interesting idea which I suppose could easily extend beyond key seat cutters. How much would it cost to ship by snail mail back and forth? In my experience Canada Post is too expensive these days for pretty much anything. In any case I don't have any key seat cutters yet so a somewhat moot point for me. I do have a drawer full of milling machine cutters that I never use because I don't yet have a milling machine.

 

[Brent H]

@trlvn and @Canadium : both you lads are pretty local for me so I have no worries if you need something- I have a bunch of woodruff cutters of various size and other things. One mission I need to complete is to get my sharpening machine running - then it is not as much an issue to even more help you guys or fix up a cutter.

I will keep you posted but I think it is a possible idea - @YotaBota and @Tom Kitta have already helped me with some cutters I needed as well as @Dabbler and I have swapped some stuff and the list goes on - LOL If I can get the sharpening dialled in I will try for some video for the lads who need some guidance and possibly be able to help out a bit with some tool sharpening/fixing for other members- so much stuff to do - LOL

 

[YYCHM]

What does a Woodruff Keyway Cutter accomplish that a vertical mill and standard endmill can't?

 

[Tom O]

I also bought a set of woodruff cutters that might get used eventually a little further down the list is more broaches followed by a hydraulic press you know the old story about “the woman who swallowed the fly!”

 

[Tom O]

Woodruff keys are the ones that are round on one side

 

[YYCHM]

Woodruff keys are the ones that are round on one side

Ahhh... got you now. You know I haven't seen one of those things on anything around here in quite some time now. What are they common on? My lathe manual only lists 2 on the entire machine.

 

[Brent H]

@YYCHM : lots are used for handles, dials, gears, alignment on couplings - depends on what the size and holding power of the key is required. If you have the right cutter it is pretty quick to put in a keyway.

 

[YotaBota]

The concept is good, sharpening is one of my concerns as most of us don't have the setup for sharpening key cutters and borrowing a dull cutter would tend to make a person grumble a bit. Second - would it be a "you break it - you replace it" understanding?

 

[trlvn]

The concept is good, sharpening is one of my concerns as most of us don't have the setup for sharpening key cutters and borrowing a dull cutter would tend to make a person grumble a bit. Second - would it be a "you break it - you replace it" understanding?

My thought was that usually a project only needs a small number of such keyseats cut. If you needed 10 more, it would make sense to buy a cutter. But if you needed less--sometimes only 1--then it is pretty painful to buy a specialized cutter. The flip side is that the cutters aren't used that much and should stay sharp.

I need to go to the post office in the near future so I'm going to ask about the most cost-effective way to ship such a cutter. I wonder if they go in a tube, for instance. Like a short piece of PVC?

OTOH, Canada Post always seems to be over $20 for a small parcel so maybe this really isn't feasible.

And yes, I think "you break it, you replace it" would be the only fair approach.

Craig

 

[trlvn]

Yeah, so Canada Post is too expensive to make this work. At the post office, the best they could do was a small flat rate box for $20 anywhere in Canada. Round trip would be $40 and a basic imported cutter goes for $25 to $40. Oh well.

Craig

 

[DPittman]

Yeah, so Canada Post is too expensive to make this work. At the post office, the best they could do was a small flat rate box for $20 anywhere in Canada. Round trip would be $40 and a basic imported cutter goes for $25 to $40. Oh well.

Craig

Well it was a good idea to start with. How about training a homing pigeon to make runs.

 

[YYCHM]

A reamer exchange might be doable? Those things will fit in a bubble envelope.

 

[historicalarms]

Woodruff keys are the ones that are round on one side

They can be used to cut conventional long flat keyways in the sides of shafting as well. i find it easier to cut absolutely centered keyways from the side than using an end mill cutter spudded in from the top...find it easier to measure dead center on a shaft laying in a couple of V-blocks .

I once needed a shaft of over 40 inches with some long ( over 10") and some short keyways but they all had to be on the exact same plane of the shaft. With the length of the shaft, at least 3 re-positioning's needed to happen on my short mill-drill table. cutting into the side of the shaft using a couple v-blocks made it an easy job.
Of course you get a sloped entrance & exit to your cuts but if that is a problem to your finished project, it is very easy to roll the shaft and use the already made cut as a line-up for a cleanup with an ordinary endmill