Thankful
The HB2 heat sinks are milling just fine now. It just takes a lot of time. More time than it is worth to put them into production by milling alone. This is why prototypes cost so much. They prove the product but there are much cheaper ways to make things in quantity. That’s the challenge of home shop machining. I can make just about anything I can imagine, but not necessarily the using the most efficient and least expensive process.
Milling something from a billet of aluminum is no where as efficient as starting with a casting with most of the unnecessary metal not present. I don’t see enough of a market for these HB2 heat sinks. Heck, I haven’t even tested them yet. I do have one on the HB2 machine and sure does LOOK cool. Ha!
The mighty little Taig Micro-mill is working like a champ. It sets there running constantly for three to four hours just singing along. The little end mills and light cuts are just right for this machine. It shows fancy (expensive) screws and ball nuts are not required on small machines. The very light mist cooling keeps things cool, just a huge amount of slightly damp aluminum chips to sweep and vac away.