Historical Development Of CNC Milling Cutters

The development of cutting tools holds an important position in the history of human progress. As early as the 28th to 20th century BC, copper cutting tools such as brass cones and red copper cones, drills, and knives appeared in China. In the late Warring States period (3rd century BC), due to mastering carburization technology, copper cutting tools were made. At that time, drills and saws had some similarities with modern flat drills and saws.
However, the rapid development of cutting tools came in the late 18th century with the development of machines such as steam engines. In 1783, Rennes in France first produced milling cutters. In 1792, Mozley in England produced taps and dies. The earliest literature record about the invention of Fried Dough Twists drill was in 1822, but it was not produced as a commodity until 1864.
At that time, the cutting tools were made of overall high carbon tool steel, with a allowable cutting speed of about 5 meters per minute. In 1868, Mushet in England made alloy tool steel containing tungsten. In 1898, Taylor and White of the United States invented high-speed steel. In 1923, Schlester of Germany invented hard alloy.
When using alloy tool steel, the cutting speed of the tool is increased to about 8 meters per minute. When using high-speed steel, it is increased by more than twice. When using hard alloy, it is also increased by more than twice compared to using high-speed steel. The surface quality and dimensional accuracy of the workpiece processed by cutting are also greatly improved.
Due to the high prices of high-speed steel and hard alloys, cutting tools have appeared in welded and mechanically clamped structures. Between 1949 and 1950, the United States began using indexable blades on turning tools, which were soon applied to milling cutters and other cutting tools. In 1938, the German company Degussa obtained a patent for ceramic cutting tools. In 1972, General Electric Company of the United States produced polycrystalline artificial diamond and polycrystalline cubic boron nitride blades. These non-metallic tool materials can enable the tool to cut at higher speeds.
In 1969, the Sandvik Steel Plant in Sweden obtained a patent to produce titanium carbide coated hard alloy blades using chemical vapor deposition method. In 1972, Bangsha and Lagulan in the United States developed the physical vapor deposition method, which coated a hard layer of titanium carbide or titanium nitride on the surface of hard alloy or high-speed steel tools. The surface coating method combines the high strength and toughness of the matrix material with the high hardness and wear resistance of the surface layer, thereby making this composite material have better cutting performance.
Cutting tools can be divided into five categories based on the form of the workpiece's machined surface. Tools for processing various external surfaces, including turning tools, planers, milling cutters, external surface broaches, and files; Hole processing tools, including drills, reamers, boring cutters, reamers, and internal surface broaches; Thread processing tools, including taps, dies, automatic thread cutting heads, thread turning tools, and thread milling cutters; Gear processing tools, including hobs, gear shapers, shaving cutters, bevel gear processing tools, etc; Cutting tools, including serrated circular saw blades, band saws, hacksaws, cutting turning tools, saw blade milling cutters, and so on. In addition, there are also combination tools.