CNC Coolant Basics with QualiChem

John Wiley from QualiChem discusses why coolant matters! Plus, he gives advice and tips to figure out which coolant is best for your machining needs as well as other considerations.
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[ericegan]

This gentleman is a wealth of knowledge. He really breaks it down to basic beginner level.

[Thepriest]

As a person who is getting a new Haas VF-4SS in a month I found this very informative. Thanks

[owain]

Hey John, TDS DOES NOT represent water hardness. TDS includes everything dissolved in a water, not just solids which contribute to hardness. Nor does the "TDS meter" you showed always give an accurate TDS, as it is based on using conductivity as a coarse proxy.

To accurately measure water "hardness", you want to find "Carbonate Hardness" (sometimes incorrectly called "Alkalinity"). You can use a small and cheap titration kit that gives you accuracy to 10ppm. This value is usually half that of TDS. If you are running your shop RO based on TDS, you may be getting a very low Carbonate Hardness a a result, which begins to affect the PH and them cause corrosion issues in your machine and/or parts.

My industry is commercial coffee, where water quality is critical but for a different reason!

We made a small document for our engineers who work on espresso machines to help understand it if you want a copy.

Love the vids as always.

[mjshorty]

We found out lately that coolant is a huge tool and it matters A TON in machining. We have been through many different coolants in our quest to find the best all purpose coolant - 5 in the past 2 years. Our shop of around 80 machines does a large variety of materials, from cast iron and steel to aluminum to exotics and we ended up landing on the Castrol MB50 and couldn't be happier how much better our tool life and finishes are. Great all purpose coolant.

[bostedtap]

Great mini treatise on metalworking fluids.
Thanks for sharing and stay safe all.

[LeckieInstallsLondon]

Wish you guys talked about disposing of old coolant!

[GlassImpressions]

Great video. Wish I had a dollar ever time he pushed his glasses back on his 👃

[NJTurboZ]

Great video I just ordered my first CNC for work VF2SSYT and this video was just what I needed to get up to speed on coolant. Thanks!

[abhinav]

Just keep on bringing content its great to watch your content during quarantine !!!

[danturen]

I switched to 251C Quali- chem 5 years and it is lights out better then the Sto-cool shit my First Hurco came with. A video this long and they didn't talk about the one vital must in extended coolant life. Coolant circulation and filtering. I can easily get two year out of a coolant fill. Separating out the way oil is also vital. I have 7 CNC machines and the coolant is moving in a circle 24 hours a day. Good water, correct concentration, and circulation and way separation and problems are gone.

[KuehlEngineering]

@nyc cnc That’s so awesome! Although I don’t have any CNC machines, this is still applicable for me with my manual
machines. I’m inspired by your content and have taken the leap of starting my own channel! I am currently filming the second part of the air tool rack build that features the lathe. Thanks again for keeping us sane with cool videos during this crazy time!

[mikeb]

This is excellent content. I would like to see more videos like this.

[larryblount]

No coolant story is complete without discussion of how and cost of end of life. AMA: disposal of old coolant.
Also while John's machines are all enclosed sealed, What about health and safety of machines that are open. Examples: manual lathe or mill. Or a machine like the HAAS TL.

[lpi]

Makes sense, Most hard water should use a water softer, then the cost goes down and quality goes up. very interesting

[Armedlegally]

So what is a good flood coolant for a surface grinder and a shop that gets down to freezing temps?

[zackbrown]

Used Qualichem personally at the shop i work at replaced it with blaser because our rep. Couldn't solve the smell problem with the coolant blazer did!

[DarkAeroInc]

Good stuff!!! Thank you for taking the time to put this information together. Great video.

[terry]

I have a hobby lathe and whilst there is a lube pump option, I don't have the space so what I do is mix up water soluble oil into a spray bottle and if the work needs it I squirt or light spray the work. It's a good compromise as I can't make large chips, so heat isn't a big issue, but it helps with the cutting tips.

As for water testers, go you to your local aquarium store as they will have dirt cheap water testers. I run a tropical tank and have to test for hardness as I live in a very soft water area and have to add bicarbonate of soda to bring the hardness up.

[azenginerd]

What is the coolant recommendation for the occasional use home shop? Mixing a batch for a machine sump that might sit unused for a number of weeks is problematic. Can it be sealed in a container between uses to keep it from going rancid? Interested in what others are doing.

[johnptc]

when a synthetic feels slippery it may be the ph... remember oil and lye make soap... so low ph plus skin oil is soapy as well :)