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(877) 248-1631One of the most asked questions we receive at CNC Broach Tools is in regards to broach insert life. This is a question which is nearly impossible to answer because we do not control the deciding factor of insert life, the setup. If you would like to know what other customers have achieved for broach insert life, see the testimonials at the bottom of this blog post.
Will you get the same insert life as these customer testimonials? That is dependent on your setup, which is out of our control. This is why we do not quote insert life.
We’ve also had customers call us saying that a tool which has worked great for them in the past now has tool life issues. So what could be the problem? What’s changed between this setup and the last one? Usually it is the setup itself.
There are many factors which affect tool life. One of the biggest factors, which is unknown to us, is the rigidity of your setup. Rigidity is very important and has the greatest effect on tool life. A lack of rigidity creates vibration. Vibration causes tool wear. See our blog post about rigidity here. Rigidity can change from one setup to the next and is affected by fixturing and tool mounting. Read our “Keys to Using CNC Broach Tools” blog post. These are the Tips & Tricks which we’ve compiled over the last 17 years to help you set up your machine the most rigid way possible. We always recommend the person performing the setup reads this and works with engineering to verify the proper tool mounts are available prior to setting up the machine. By tool mount we mean the method of clamping our tool holder in your machine. This could be a split sleeve, endmill holder, solid sleeve, MTA Boring Sleeve, Hydraulic holder, ER collet, etc..
Here are the top 4 factors which affect tool life:
- Rigidity of the setup
- Hardness of the material
- Material type (Inconel vs Aluminum)
- Time in the cut (length of cut * # of passes * # of slots per part)
We have many customer testimonials describing tool life in different situations. Here are some of them:
- 8620 Steel: https://cncbroachtools.com/broach-tool-insert-and-tool-life-testimonial/
- A1 Tool Steel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thcW9MUXwh4&t=28s
- 316 Stainless: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFy4s0CtBiA
- 8620 Steel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3x5aRFctks
- 304 Stainless: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KF9XvW-Oh54
- 1215 Steel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reErqhcUE7g&t=1s
- 304 Stainless: https://cncbroachtools.com/id-broach-in-304-stainless-testimonial/
- 316 Stainless: https://cncbroachtools.com/keyway-broaching-316-stainless/
- 4140 Steel: https://www.productionmachining.com/articles/the-future-of-broaching (This article is from 2007 from when our patented broach tool was sold through Razorform Tools LLC)
Also remember, our inserts have 2 cutting edges per insert. So when the client testimonial says 100 pcs per cutting edge, it means 200 pcs per insert.
