feedback on Charles Davis...

[elraiis]

Hi all and to make a short story long and a long story short.. CHARLES DAVIS.. his books X2 volume 1 and 2 are they worth the price? Do they take you step by step through work? And between volume one and 2 am i gonna see the same examples and drawings or new ones. Am asking this cause i got books from InHouse solutions b4 for MC9. i got Mill and lathe and designe and solid. All last three books (lathe, designe, and solid) were more than 80% or so i find in the MILL book. The drawings in the designe book were ALL in the MILL book so practically i paid for 3 books for nothing. i don't want the same to happen again so i had to ask. Waiting for your replies as soon as possible.

are instructions well explained, clear and easy to understand? lets say on scale of 10 how would you rate the books? ah and if Charles Davis comes to this website.. plz don't take my post badly no offense is meant at all. sorry if any were taken.

peace out

[Dan@home]

I haven't used the volume 1, but the volume 2 is a very good reference manual for creating surfaces and surface tool paths (ruff & finish) also high speed.

 

Dan.

[elraiis]

i c.. thanks alot man.

[Dan Schnars]

I used his books for version 9 and they were extremely helpful... I would highly recommend them...

[Mito@DeeringBanjos]

Charles and his books are great.

 

 

[elraiis]

lol.. thanks alot guys... well.. its good to know that charles and his books are great but i can't purchase but the books. thanks all again that made me more confident somewhat but still.. is there no one who used the X2 books?

[Colin Gilchrist]

elraiis,

 

I've used the Mastercam Handbook volume 2 to teach classes for X and X MR1. They should be the same for X2. How good are you with 2D toolpaths (contour, drill, pocket)? If you know them pretty well you can probably skip Handbook volume 1 and go straight to volume #2.

 

How are they? They are pretty good at teaching you how and why you are doing something. Lots of good background info.

 

I found that they lacked enough actual tutorials for doing training, so I created some of my own projects and applied the lessons in the book to those models. It worked pretty good.

 

Now what I'd really like to see is an update on the book by Jonathan Lin. That book kicked butt for V9 training.

 

For Charles, I'd like to see him come up with some suplemental tutorial exercises for his handbooks. Maybe some training videos to go with the books too.

 

The other thing that would be really nice would be a complete tutorial that would take you through machining a complete part with multiple setups that requires some basic surface roughing and finishing. I have yet to see a tutorial that takes someone through the entire programming process including posting G-code. Of course a tutorial like that would need to come with a Machine Def, Control Def, and Post so that anyone could run it and get the same result.

 

 

Thanks,

[elraiis]

hi.. ok thanks alot this last reply it was somewhat detailed.

 

"How good are you with 2D toolpaths (contour, drill, pocket)? If you know them pretty well you can probably skip Handbook volume 1 and go straight to volume #2."

 

i won't say that am good hence there always is room for improvement. But i work as a programmar for a company stricktly limited to using lvl1 though and even that i don't know 100% am sure. hardly do 3D cuts. i mean other than wireframe swept2D and Ruled toolpaths i didn't get the chance to explore beyond that. using MC9 by the way. now if there are things in lvl 1 that i'm missing that i can't really know either but i wanna go beyond lvl one its rather boring and no challenge in it and i wanna leap to x2 hence its the newest so far. so yes if volume one is focusing on drilling pocketing and contour in 2D! i guess i'll be able to figure those out on my own IF i get used to the new version that is. am ashamed to say i wasn't able to figure out how to copy part of my drawing to a different lvl in X. lol.. frustrating ha? the function screen is not there no more.

 

so do u suggest i go with Volume 2? and skip one?

 

thaaaaaanks to you all for all the help

[Colin Gilchrist]

That would seem like a good bet for where you are at. Level 3 is really the way to go if you are planning on doing any surface machining. It is just too easy to rough and finish your part with only a couple of toolpaths, where it would take you much longer with mill level 2.

 

For copying geometry to a new level, Select the geo and Right-Click on the word "level" in the status bar at the bottom of your screen. You can also add the "Change Levels" and "Change Colors" buttons to a toolbar or your right-click menu.

 

Look in the Mastercam Reference Guide PDF file for more info on how to customize Mastercam.

 

HTH,

[elraiis]

hi again..

thanks a lottttt collin.. i won't over risk i'll order volume 2 and start from there then. I guess if i find it too hard then i'll order volume 1 afterwards. i guess this would be better than getting both and finding the info i want only in the second and not really benefetting as much as i wanted from the first. anyhow.. won't waste your time no longer i thank u again and i thank everyone else too...

peace

[Colin Gilchrist]

No worries man, those were my thoughts exactly. Why pay $100 (or whatever they cost) to get a book that you are way beyond. The Volume 2 should get you what you need. You might also want to get an X2 demo disk that you can take home and play with. Its a great way to learn Mastercam and surface machining.

 

Thanks,