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A guy at the shop said my coolant mix was too weak and causing chatter on the aluminum parts.
I switched to a 10% concentration instead of my usual 5% and the finish is way better now, what ratio do you all run for 6061?
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kai_west3mo ago
My old shop foreman swore by 12% for all our 6061 work, said it was the sweet spot for lube and rust prevention. We had this one part, a thin-walled tube, that would always squeal and leave a terrible finish until we listened to him. It's funny how a little change makes such a big difference, kinda like what @tessap98 was saying about chips clearing better. I still run around 10-12% at home now, mostly because I'm too lazy to mix two different batches.
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tessap983mo ago
Oh man, that makes total sense. I had the exact same problem with my old machine. Ran a super weak mix for years thinking it was fine, but everything just felt grabby. Bumped it up to like 8 or 9 percent and it was a night and day difference. The finish smoothed right out and the chips cleared way better. I stick right around there now for general work.
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camerona791mo ago
Hold on, are you sure you meant 8 or 9 percent? Because coolant mix is usually based on the concentrate, not the total volume. If you're running 8-9% concentrate in water, that's actually pretty standard for general work. But if you were counting it as a part of the total mix, like 8 parts coolant to 92 parts water, that's more like 8% of the total which is actually a 7.4% concentrate. I'm only saying this because @kai_west mentioned 10-12% for 6061, and that's a pretty high concentrate mix that can get expensive and leave a residue if you're not careful. I run around 7-8% concentrate for my aluminum work and it clears chips fine without being wasteful.
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