I'm thinking about buying a Horizontal mill

[Thee Dragracer1951]

I'm thinking about a Horizontal mill to do a job that will be ongoing. Parts are 15" x 8" x 3" made from 4130

I'm thinking 50 taper but I am not sure on that.

Fanuc control, yada yada...this machine will see mostly steel

Suggestions?

[Rick Henrickson 65]

Look at the daewoo 500mm with geared head

Not as fast as high end ones

But it has box ways lots of tork fanuc control and all the options

Realy depends on what you want to spend $

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

Once you go horizontal, you'll never go back to vertical...

 

Take a look at Matsuura, Toyoda, Kitamura, Mori Seiki. They are not cheap but they hold their value, hold tolerance and and will beat ANY Korean or American horizontal on cycle times, longevity, and value.

 

JM2C

[Thee Dragracer1951]

I don't have to do this real soon, but it's comming. I would love to have a Matsuura, thing is though, I'd have to buy it from Selway and that just ain't gonna happen. Haden't thought of Toyoda, I may give Elisons a call and look into a Mori. I have no experience with Kitamura. But I have never heard a bad thing about them either. I'm just starting to do my homework. I think this will be a 400mm machine.

[Guest]

lets not forget okuma, as long as their quality hasnt gone down in the last 4-5 years.

worked with these in a shop that had no mercy for the machine tool in hard metals and could not break them. talk about solid.

oh you said fanuc? well okuma controls are different but very powerfull.

 

doug

[New Job]

IF you are going to be doing highspeed, you will probably want to go hsk other than that I would go cat 50if you're going to be doing a lot of steel.

 

discussion of cat50 vs hsk

 

edit:

 

do you're homework, alot of options in horizontals.

[Rick Henrickson 65]

I would not go matsuura 2 brand new ones at universal where I was before nothing but trouble / and the selway factor. But if you are going for a higher end then look at Makino, Toyoda (ellison), Mori, Kitamura (not impressed with) one thing you need to look at is torque and what sort of machining methods you are going to use. the makino with the steel spindle is amazing there is one just put in here in washington can't remember where though. If you need any help on which options come with the machines and what ones you will need please let me know I would be glad to help you out and beat up on the salesmen!

I did applications for many years and know how this works.

[kunfuzed]

How does Mazak compare these days? That's the only horizantal brand I've ever run, and mostly aluminum. I do know they have some of the best controls I've ever run. I personally stay out of the Mazatrol though... EIA all the way.

[Zoober]

Niigata for piggin, Makino for racin.

[Rick Henrickson 65]

+1 robert Niigata is another great horizontal.

the makino is an A81M it has a high torque spindle

it uses roller guide ways instead of ball bearing rollers much larger contact column is bigger also

[Thee Dragracer1951]

Man Oh Man...I got some homework to do...

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

Just for curiosities sake, what's wrong with Selway?

 

[ 03-01-2007, 07:32 PM: Message edited by: CNC Apps Guy ]

[Thee Dragracer1951]

Well...and I'm going to do this kindly, cause I'm that kind of guy. I have an SL10 Haas that I crashed. Had a 3" piece of steel come out of the chuck. Totaly my fault, didn't have the chuck pressure turned up high enough. Knocked the turret out of wack. I called Selway, they sent a guy out 8 days later. Screwed up a parts order by putting a thrust bearing in the same box as a drive motor. no packing at all...bouncing around in the box. Tech comes back and finds that and leaves. Takes 5 hours to disassemble the turret. tells me the turrett motor is bad, next tech comes and puts it together and finds the first tech had left out one of the balls in the curvic coupler. another five hours to take it back apart. more parts and after 15 days I get the machine back up and running. In the mean time I buy a new Daewoo. As it all turns out, the folks I bought the Daewoo from have taken Haas to court to be able to service Haas. You see...Washington state considers sole service organizations to be a monopoly. Mark Harris of CNC sales comes out to set up my Daewoo, two days later I startr getting servo overload errors from the Haas. I call Mark on Thanksgiving day ha dhe comes out to tear it apart. Finds an un greased Oring in the turret. Fix's it. I was getting bills from Selway within two days of my phonecall to them. they never showed up for 8 days. Know why? They had a new machine to install...

The bill came to over $8k. When Mark was there I told him my tlale of woe. Asked him what he thought and he asked if I had the old motor. Yur sez I...he tests it and lo nad behold...the motor's just fine.

I get a call from accounting at Selway wanting to know when I planned to pay my bill. I told her I'd pay that bill when Hell froze over and we'd see each other in court. So, the VP of Selway calls and I tell him the same story (Which is well documented with them) and he asks me what is fair. I told him I thought 6 hours total and a couple hours labor and I'd pay parts of course. Then I told him about the motor not being bad. Never even fazed him. Then he had the unmitigated GALL to tell me that he hoped this would not ruin a good business relationship. I told him it would be a cold day in hell when I gave them another dime. I told him that I have bought three new machines this year. And to guess who I DIDN'T buy them from.

 

So, That's my tale of woe. I'm over it now. But there ain't no way I'll EVER do business with Selway Machine

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

That's quite an unfortunate situation from both sides.

 

I'm really surprised that HAAS says only Haas techs can work on HAAS. It might be that only HASS people can perform Warranty work which I can see.

 

Nevertheless... not a good thing. There are different groups of techs that work on Haas machines vs. the high end Japanese machines. There's even different AE's for the Hass side of the business from what I understand.

 

quote:

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...I did applications for many years...

---

Rick, where did you work?

 

Okuma... I'd NEVER go that route unless it came with a Fanuc Control.

If you're a Fanuc house, going to Mazaks, Okuma's and sme euro machines with say Heidenheins, Siemans, etc... it's a pain, and frankly, not worth the hassle. Ask the sales guy hocking Siemans controls how long the thing takes from turning the power from the back on to cutting chips, AND how long it takes to power down. Watch him squirm.

[Thee Dragracer1951]

I thought about an Okuma as well. I used to have an H60 years ago. Great machine. I have owned enough Okumas and been around enough of them to not be bothered by the control. But the thing is, I am moving farther and farther away from the shop floor. I keep getting handed these large quote packages...

We are moving towards being a Fanuc shop. I'd like there to be some continuity with controls. Code is a lot easier.

I have not gotten to the point that I know ballpark $'s yet. I'd like to stay in the low $300k's. I don't think I can justify a high end machine. Nor, really, do I think I need one. I've been around a couple of Mazak's ..I just shake my head. Just say no to Mazatrol...

Great machines, but I don't think it's what I want in my shop. Like I said, I'd buy a Matsurra, except for who sells them. I think Toyoda is also sold by Selway. I'm going to look into a Mori and a Daewoo. I have a Daewoo lathe and am delighted with it. in fact, I was considering buying a 3016 Daewoo.

[Tim Johnson]

Take a look at Enshu A couple years ago when they were trying to break into the American market you could get the JE80S in that price range. They are starting to get popular now so I'm not sure if you still can but it would be worth a try. They make at least two horizontals for Okuma (the JE60S and JE80S) then Okuma puts their own control on them.

[YoDoug®]

I have been really impressed with OKK horizontals. They have this weird all-mechanical tool changer. It has a long chain that runs the entire length of the machine. The draw bar, door, tool arm are all driven from this chain. No electro-mechanicals to get weird, just simple reliable mechanisms.

 

We used run cast steel 24-7 with a 50 taper. The machine ran great.

[heavychevy2155]

How about an Okuma Howa, boxways, Fanuc, big plus Cat50. A place where I worked, just bought one, they reduced cycle time from 1h 40min on a Haas ec400 to 50min's on the O&H. Didn't change the program at all, and the parts looked flawless, they were alum. hand controls for custom motorcycles, and what a pain in the butt to program, not a flat surface at all. Anyway they want me to start doing some contract programming for some new products and I'll most likely setup and proveout on the new machine. I'll get back with you about my take on it. I have a O&H hl-20 lathe and man I love that thing.

[Thee Rickster ™]

My brother is a op manager at Wescast

way up here in Canada.

 

He bought 4 Makino horizontals (bigns) 2 robot

pallet changers.

 

They machine 35000 exhaust manifolds for cars

and light trucks, a week. Multi fixturing

 

He said in all his years of high volume

production, the Maikno is his mill of choice

for durability and accuracy.

 

hope that helps

 

Rick

[Zoober]

quote:

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Just for curiosities sake, what's wrong with Selway?

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James, do you know the Selways, or was that a retorical question??

 

quote:

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Rick, where did you work?

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Ya, I'm curious too. I was in the app side for 9 yrs (yes, with one of the Selway bros.... )

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

LOL @ Robert.

[Rick Henrickson 65]

John I worked for Okuma the longest, then Mazak, then a distributor for DMG, Kit, and Niigata

 

I enjoyed it very much but the traveling was way to hard on the Family

 

Dragracer Toyoda Is sold bye Ellison here

 

I have had the same issues with sellway on the matsuura cell system.

[Rick Henrickson 65]

My bad dragracer Selway does sell toyoda!

[Thee Dragracer1951]

That's what I thought...I talked to Scott from Methods MAchine a couple days ago, told him I thought a Matsuura would be my first choice but I just can't reward their (Selway's)lack of service with a $350k order. I just can't do it.

 

I think business's are built on relationships and trust.

 

But, I'm done with that now. It's in the past.

Im going to look at Kitamura's site today. I may well get down to talk to Elisons about a Mori next week, just to put some feelers out.

So, My first thought is a 50 taper machine. But, with the advent of HSM, would I be better off with a faster 40 taper? I am projecting about 80% steel on this machine but would hate to shoot myself in the foot either way. If ya know what I mean...

[Rick Henrickson 65]

It is really tough, at the end of the day cubes are what matters. (high speed technique vs. hoggin) I would think if you can get a high torque spindle (torque at low rpm) you would probably be looking at an 8000rpm spindle which would still give you some good aluminum capabilities really need to look at your work statement and see where you want to head.