F Is for Feed Rate

Metalworking Glossary for the Letter F

See the index to the Glossaries here:

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• F.A.O. An abbreviation that stands for “finish all over” and designates the amount of additional stock needed for the forging to be at the correct dimensions once all surfaces have been machined.
• Fabrication Machine. A metal fabrication machine is one designed to bend, roll, shear, or otherwise shape metal by pressure or cutting. Fab machines are often grouped by sellers with machine tools, but they differ in that they don’t wear down a workpiece in a chipping process like a machine tool does. Press brakes, plate rolls, metal shears, fiber lasers, and ironworkers are all examples of fabrication machines, whereas lathes and mills are examples of machine tools. Metal-cutting saws, despite producing chips, are generally considered fabrication machines because they cut directly through a workpiece instead of shaping it, where drills are considered machine tools because they alter the shape of the material.
• Face Clearance. The angled relief to the rear of the cutting edge of a milling or other cutting tool that eliminates interference between the tool and the workpiece.
• Face Milling. A type of milling in which axis of the cutting tool is at 90° to the surface of the workpiece. It is most often used to create a flat surface—or “face”—on a workpiece.
• Faceplate. A faceplate is a circular metal plate that can be attached to the main spindle on a lathe to hold a workpiece in place.
• Facing. Facing is a function on a lathe or mill that removes material from the surface of a workpiece, often to slightly shorten the workpiece to its final part length.
• Fatigue. In metal, fatigue refers to a weakened condition caused through repeated stresses. Undergoing such repeated stresses will result in the appearance and propagation of cracks in the material.
• Fatigue Life. In band sawing, it refers to the estimated number of cycles a blade can go through before failing.
• Fatigue Resistance. The ability of a metal to resist weakening when exposed to repeated loads.
• Feather. A thin projection on the surface of a forging caused by metal under pressure being forced into hairline cracks in dies or the spaces between dies. Also called a fin.
• Feed. The term feed refers to the movement of a cutting tool into a workpiece.
• Feed Force. Measured in pounds, it is the pressure exerted by a saw blade against a workpiece.
• Feed Mechanism. A device that controls the advancing movement (called “feed”) of a cutting tool on a machine. It may also refer to a mechanism that feeds a secured workpiece towards a tool.
• Feed per Tooth. Abbreviated FPT, feed per tooth is a measurement used for tools with multiple cutting edges and refers to the linear distance the cutter travels during the cut of a single tooth.
• Feed Rate. The speed at which a cutter is moved into a workpiece. In a lathe turning operation, it is the distance the tool travels during a single revolution of the part.
• Feed Rod. On a lathe, the feed rod runs parallel to the leadscrew down the length of the machine and transmits power from the headstock to provide movement to the carriage and the cross-slide for turning operations.
• Feed Traverse Rate. In sawing, it is the speed the saw frame travels without cutting, measured in inches per minute.
• Feeds and Speeds. A phrase referring to the combination of feed rate and cutting speed in a machining operation. The two different velocities are often paired together because they are set in tandem with each other depending on various factors, such as the hardness of the material, the type of cut that is being made, or the surface finish that is desired.
• Feeler Gauge. A feeler gauge is a thin blade of a specific thickness used to measure the clearance (narrow gap) between two parallel flat surfaces. Several feeler gauges of different thicknesses will often be attached together in a framework resembling a pocketknife.
• Ferrous. A ferrous metal is an alloy that has iron as its major component.
• Fin. A thin projection on the surface of a forging caused by metal under pressure being forced into hairline cracks in dies or the spaces between dies. Also called a feather.
• Fine Pitch Milling Cutter. A cutter containing many inserts, recommended for applications that require a better surface finish, though it has less chip clearance than a medium or course pitch cutter. Also known as a high-density cutter.
• Finish. The term “finish” refers to the surface condition of a workpiece following being machined. In forging, “finish” refers to the forging operation where the workpiece is forged into its final shape in a finish die. 
• Five-Axis Milling Machine. A mill that has the standard X, Y, and Z linear axes, along with two rotational axes. Many 5-axis machines will allow all axes to work simultaneously to perform complex machining on a workpiece.
• Fixed-Bed Type Mill. Another name for a bed mill.
• Fixturing. A term given to the apparatus or structure that is holding your work which is often custom-made to hold your specific part.
• Flame Hardening. A type of quench hardening in which the heat is applied directly by flame.
• Flange. A relatively thin projecting collar, ridge, rim, on ring on a part. Its purpose is to reinforce the strength of an object, and/or to serve as an area to assist with attaching the object to something else.
• Flash. The excess metal that extends out from the body of the forging as a thin plate at the seam where the dies come together. It is removed by trimming, leaving a faint “flash line” on the forging.
• Flat Die Forging. A forging worked between flat or simple contour dies by repeated strokes and manipulation of the workpiece. Also called open die forging, hand forging or smith forging.
• Flattening. In forging, flattening is a preliminary operation performed on forging stock to flatten it prior to further operations.
• Flick Grinder. A type of grinder referenced in an obscure article on Wikipedia, but no other information is available about it on the Internet, implying that it may be a machine that had a limited manufacturing run, or that the article was a prank or possibly a stunt to promote a specific product. It supposedly resembles both a surface grinder and a tool and cutter grinder, while being less accurate than either of them, but more accurate than a bench grinder.
• Floor Milling Machine. A mill with a horizontal pendant spindle mounted on a set of tracks that runs parallel to a row of rotary tables. Workpieces can be changed out while an operation is being carried out on a different table.
• Flute. A wide spiraled channel or groove along the outside of a drill bit, an end mill, or a tap. The purpose of a flute is to evacuate the swarf (chips) from a workpiece as it is cut. In an end mill, the flutes also perform the cutting, though the edges of the flutes are sometimes called teeth, to distinguish them from the channels of the flutes themselves. “Flute count” is a distinguishing feature of an end mill, as the number of flutes affects how it cuts—a higher number increases the tool’s strength, but also reduces its chip flow. One or two flutes might be used with a softer material like aluminum where the swarf needs to be removed in larger pieces, while an end mill with four flutes might be used on steel where strength is needed, and the chips can be smaller.
• Flux. Any substance used to prevent oxidation by keeping oxygen away from the surface of a hot piece of metal.
• Flywheel. A large, weighted wheel used by a mechanical press brake. It is spun to store the energy necessary to close and re-open the ram during metal bending operations.
• Fold. In forging, a fold is a forging defect caused by metal folding back on its own surface while flowing into the die cavity.
• Follower rest. A follower rest on a lathe is like a steady rest but is mounted to the carriage instead of the bed, allowing it to literally “follow” the tool bit. It provides support to the section of the workpiece where the tool bit is working to keep it centered with the axis of the spindle.
• Forge. A forge (noun) is a place where metal can be forged (verb), meaning shaped by heating and hammering. The noun forge can refer to a hearth for heating the metal, or the entire workplace where the hearth and related tools are located.
• Forgeability. The relative ability of material to deform without fracturing, rupturing, or developing flaws.
• Forging. Deforming metal physically using compressive force, often involving intense heat, to produce a desired shape. It can be done by hand using tools on an anvil or in a press using dies.
• Forging Press. A pressing machine that shapes metal into three-dimensional shapes.
• Forging Stock. Raw material used in forging. Also called a slug, a multiple or a blank.
• Forming. In metalworking, forming is a process that reshapes a piece of metal through deformation, without adding or subtracting any metal. As a lathe function, forming produces irregular profiles on a workpiece, such as convex and concave shapes.
• Foundry. A place where metal is cast.
• Four-Axis Milling Machine. A mill that adds an additional rotational movement to the standard X, Y, and Z axes.
• Four-Roll Rolling Machine. Commonly shortened to just “4-roll,” it is a plate metal roller that has a top roll and three moving bottom rolls for greater control of the material. Because of their ability to grip the plate or sheet metal at multiple points, 4-roll plate rolls are more accurate than three roll machines and are more efficient for prebending the leading and trailing edges of cylinders.
• Four-Post Press. 4-post press is another term for a column press, so named because of the four posts or columns rising from the four corners of the table that the ram is guided along. Such a press is open on each side between the post, allowing for greater accessibility to the workpiece by the operator.
• Fourth Axis. 4th axis is another term for the rotary A-axis on a mill.
• Friction Geared Shaper. A shaper that is named after its drive mechanism.
• Fulcrum. The point or support area on which a lever rests and pivots.
• Fullers. Forming tools of different shapes, often used in pairs, that can make grooves or hollows in a forging.