General Machining

General machining can include a combination of primary machining processes like milling or turning, or any number of additional secondary processes. These can be to get surface finishes such as polishing or sandblasting, for making threads, for cleaning up edges, or to achieve many other features.

Deburring

Often when parts come straight off of the mill or lathe they tend to have sharp edges and burrs. In most cases these should be removed by slightly rounding over (“breaking”) the edges to make the part safe to handle without getting cut or ensure it mates properly to another part. Depending on the part we use Swiss-cut files or Noga deburrers for this process.

Polishing

Polishing allows for up to a mirror finish, depending on the material. Parts straight from the mill or lathe typically have a general finish of 125 RMS or down to 16 RMS for critical surfaces, polishing will improve the finish to 8 RMS.

RMS denotes the surface smoothness in root mean squared variation across it in micro-inches.

Tapping

Tapping is adding an internal thread to a part, which allows for a male thread (such as a bolt or pipe fitting) to be threaded into it. We can tap thread sizes from 00-90 up to 1/2 inch in both UNF and UNC thread series, as well as common metric thread sizes.

UNC/UNF: United National Thread - Course/Fine. This is the thread system in the United States and Canada
Metric Threads: More common internationally, including automotive