Milling cutter manufacturing method

A method of manufacturing a milling cutter having a cutting head and a coaxial integral shank for mounting in a chuck or arbour of a machine tool, comprising the steps of:

• (i) grinding, in a first grinding operation, a plurality of helical flutes into the outer periphery of a cutter blank from a lead end of the blank distal from the shank towards the shank, using a peripheral area of a first grinding wheel generally of frusto-conical profile and rotatable about an axis generally transversely of the milling cutter axis, which peripheral area produces, simultaneously, the following three features:
• a leading face of a trailing tooth;
• a rear face on an adjacent preceding tooth;
• and
• a swarf removal gullet, of profile corresponding to that of the peripheral area of the first grinding wheel, having divergent sides defined between the leading face of a trailing tooth and the rear face of an adjacent preceding tooth;
• (ii) grinding, in a second grinding operation, and using a peripheral edge of a second grinding wheel of rectangular profile, and rotatable about an axis generally transversely of the milling cutter axis, a relief face which extends rearwardly from a leading end of a tooth tip, resulting in a minimum tooth wedge angle of approximately 60° measured between the leading face of a tooth to the relief face of that tooth;
• and
• (iii) grinding, in a third grinding operation, and using a peripheral edge of a third grinding wheel, a radius on the end of each flute by grinding along each flute from the lead end of each flute towards the shank of the cutter.