cnc carbide tool storage

[stan kern]

Decided to re-arrange how router bits are stored as you need quick access and you need specs,important to me is the length of end mills especially if you are maching 3D
The movement of the spindle or router can be as much as 3 in and you don't want the collet to hit.
I use a mechanical tool chest with drawers and now i hope its organized

http://youtu.be/c-LdL6HH5eY router bit storage

Very simple to do

[Bruce Page]

Nice!

Here’s my set up. I ditched the keyboard drawer in my little PC cart and made a bit drawer. I don’t have them labeled but I have all the important/special cutters set up in my software’s tool data base.

[Keith Outten]

Must be nice to be so organized. I try my best to keep router bits as accessible as possible using the black plastic organizers from HF, the ones with pockets that are designed for tool cabinet drawers. These are the same ones I use for storing my drill driver bits.
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[Shari Loveless]

Okay guys,
So now I'm motivated to organize my bit storage better. Just what I needed, another project! Thanks for the pics and ideas.
Shari

[Paul Phillips]

Nice job Stan, I didn't go as far as to put labels on mine, but I've collected so many bits I needed something to help keep them organized so this is what I came up with, I like being able to see everything at one time, I keep new bits on the bottom and move them towards the top the more use they get, at least on the more standard type bits I use. I drilled it on the CNC out of some 3/4" plywood scrap I had, I used 1"x4" pine for the frame, ran a groove in it with the table saw and used 1/8: acrylic for the sliding doors.
IMAG0445.jpg

[stan kern]

It was the end mills that got to me ,whether they are 2.5 or 3.0 or 4.0 (which is sort of obvious)
I needed to see at a glance

[Shari Loveless]

Right now I have the bits in an acrylic holder I made when I still had a laser. It holds the "most often used" bits. The rest are in a tackle type box. I color code the flat ends of my bit with various colors of a sharpie pen. I have a sheet with a dot of the same color (think like a color legend for printing). I then log the hours for the color each time I use it. Sometimes I will log the bit cut angle if I have more than one bit of that type. It just gives me an idea how many actual cutting hours are on that particular bit. When it's used up I can check the hours and know if it was short or long lived.
I'm going to try making a holder that I can write the info on as well. Problem is getting the print large enough to see without using 4x glasses! We've got lots of scrap wood so just need to experiment.

[stan kern]

you sound organized

[Mike Heidrick]

This is my NMTB30 tool holder cart for my cnc knee mill I built. All tools get a dedicated tool holder and teh heaight gets auto measured. All my specs are in the database of my CAM software (both HSMWorks, HSMXpress, and Centroid CNC) where they should be. Call tool #1 and it it loads the values for it. You can do a similar thing with mach I believe but you will still need to touch off each time as there are no holders for most routers and small spindles. Using dual plates makes the tool change and measure time very very fast.