What are the reasons for cobalt taps breakage?

2025-09-01 11:08:10

When machining threads with 5% cobalt taps, it is common for 5% cobalt taps to break. The breakage of the wire tapping is not only related to the operator's lack of experience, poor skills, improper methods, and the quality of the cobalt taps, but also closely related to the structural defects of the cobalt taps.

1. Improper operation

During the tapping process, the cobalt taps broke due to uneven force exerted by the operator's hands, causing the direction of force to change. This situation often occurs in the machining of threads with smaller diameters.

2. The aperture of the bottom hole does not match the wire tapping

For example, when processing M5 × 0.5 threads, a 4.5mm drill bit should have been used to drill the bottom hole. If the 4.2mm drill bit used for M5 is mistakenly used for processing, the smaller the hole diameter will not match the cobalt taps, and the torque will inevitably increase. If the operator continues to forcefully tap without realizing the use of the wrong drill bit at this point, the phenomenon of cobalt taps breakage is inevitable.

3. Improper selection of 5% cobalt taps

High quality Thread tap should be selected for tapping parts with excessive hardness, such as cobalt containing high-speed steel wire cones, hard Alloy taps, coated taps, etc. In addition, different cobalt taps designs are applied in different workplaces. For example, the number, size, angle, and other factors of the chip removal groove head in 5% cobalt taps have an impact on the chip removal performance.

4. Quality issues of 5% cobalt taps

The quality problems of 5% cobalt taps themselves are also one of the reasons for the breakage of 5% cobalt taps during the tapping process.

5. Inaccurate starting positioning of 5% cobalt taps

At the beginning of tapping, the starting positioning of the cobalt taps is not accurate, that is, the axis of the cobalt taps is not concentric with the center line of the bottom hole. During the tapping process, the torque is too large, which is the main reason for the breakage of the cobalt taps. The resulting phenomenon of cobalt taps breakage is more than the total number of cobalt taps breakage caused by the aforementioned factors.

6. 5% cobalt taps do not match the processed materials

This issue has received increasing attention in recent years. Previously, domestic manufacturers thought that imported goods were good and expensive, but in fact, they were suitable and good. With the continuous increase and difficulty in processing of new materials, the variety of tool materials is also constantly increasing to meet this demand. This requires selecting a suitable cobalt taps product before tapping.