Ive just about had it

[mayday]

What's it going to take to get Lathe fixed

fed up with the basic things never getting fixed. I dont even have to list them. anyone using it already knows the stupid problems.

Money would be well spent on a new lathe package from someone else

[horsepowered]

Same complaints here. Mill is really good despite its bugs, But Lathe has never been an even good product. Much better systems out there. I Never could understand why Mastercam has paid so little attention to the Lathe side. With every upgrade I keep hoping for a dramatic improvement only to be disappointed. Next release will be the sucky new interface and will be trumpeted as a great improvement only to disappoint the long waiting users. Prove me wrong Mastercam. Prove me wrong. We have been waiting patiently way to long!

 

[3R!< W3NG3R]

The main reason we have not purchased it yet.

[jeff]

Yeah, it's bad. Borderline useless.

[Redfire427]

+100000000000 to all of the above. Lathe has turned into a dreadful product. I feel sorry for all the folks who keep getting raped by maintainance costs year after year for the same garbage. At least we get a little for our mill maintanance. Pull up your sock CNC Software, fix the crap that has been an issue for many, many years. Take care of your customer....or someone else will.

[gcode]

We don't do any multiaxis lathe work here,

but we've got 8 VTL/millturns from 24" to 30ft

capacity and 4 slant bed CNC's running 24/6.

One guy with a seat of X4 keeps them all running.

X4 lathe multiaxis is about 5 years behind the curve, but for plane Jane turning, milling and drilling, the lathe package works very well for us.

Mastercam is loosing a lot of sales and maintenance renewals from lack of multiaxis lathe support.. hope they can plug that hole soon.

[George Hardwick]

Lathe plug and play.. yea right,want to loose a few fingers and maybe an eye!

Given up matainence,money better spent converting beer into urine.

[chris m]

Since our work is primarily turning, we still run V9.1SP2 and it works pretty well; comments like yours are the primary reason that I have never loaded an X-series Lathe product

[Randy Morton @ Clem Industrial]

The bad thing about this thread is, having personally looked into it recently, the costs for another software package are equally as high as MC and most people who would be the ones signing the payment wouldnt go for it.

 

Example being that you spend $xxxx on MC Lathe. You have it for a number of years, inc maint. Lets say after 5 years your total cost invested is $xxxx. You go to the boss and ask to drop what you have been wasting all your money in for the last 5 years cause you are fed up and its crap...what do you think his reply will be? "Uh huh. Ya sure, go away." I been here recently.

 

The obvious thing about this example is that we arent working with numbers as small as this and it makes it very hard to justify switching.

 

/sigh

 

[ 02-26-2010, 10:30 AM: Message edited by: gcode ]

[Dave.L]

Randy,

 

I am not going to mention $$$, I assume your post will be edited.

 

We are in need of the lathe seat now and I can say MC lathe will cost much less then what we are looking at, so yes, it's a tough pill to swallow.

 

However, I am scared to buy lathe and then joint in the rant.

 

With that said, we are looking at other packages.

[horsepowered]

Randy thats exactly why I have not purchased another system for lathe. I don't want to dump that much more money into buying another system when I have already paid way to much for the one I have.

 

Chris the fact that you do mostly lathe work has helped you because you have become accustomed to the unintuitive methods needed to make it work. No insult towards you intended and please don't take it that way. Those of us that do milling and Lathe-Turning have a harder time going back and forth. Milling I have dialed in and almost never have any issues. Mill-Turn I never trust and often spend a lot of time getting the program where it needs to be. I also feel that I spend way to much time creating a lathe program and I have been at this since version 3 milling and version 6 lathe.

[jeff]

I haven't messed around with X series lathe at all, but have used V9 lathe quite often, and all I can say is that it's not very user friendly.

Maybe X is better? I don't know. But V9 is dreadful to the point where if you have conversation on the control, it's 100x faster to program at the machine.

[dan m]

They made a switch here about 6 months ago for lathe software. The biggest problem with the switch is enginering likes the new software so much i havn't had a chance to use it yet.

[gcode]

Dave,

If you're doing 2X lathe and simple mill/turn

Mastercam Lathe is a good value..

If you are going to be doing multiaxis.. you should look elswhere..

[Dave.L]

Tom,

 

We need it for a Mori NL1500SY.

 

Main Spindle, Live Tools, Y-Axis and Sub-spindle. (with barfeeder and parts catcher).

 

I once had an eval but never looked at it. I will request an eval again soon.

 

However, getting info on a post is like pulling teeth. I actually just emailed MC again within the last week and had not reply which is fairly normal. Something else that I cannot stand.

[crazy^millman]

quote:

---

Mill-Turn I never trust and often spend a lot of time getting the program where it needs to be.

---

Imagine that??

 

Do we want to look up some of my discussions about this?

[mayday]

quote:

---

If you're doing 2X lathe and simple mill/turn

Mastercam Lathe is a good value..

---

even with all the tool data problems, excessive useless entry moves. 15 places to set entry distances.import operation problems losing the tool

no its not

[3R!< W3NG3R]

I think Bobcad is about as good as MC lathe now. That says a lot. (I haven't used BC, but its what I heard)

[crazy^millman]

quote:

---

However, getting info on a post is like pulling teeth. I actually just emailed MC again within the last week and had not reply which is fairly normal. Something else that I cannot stand.

---

Go to In-House and you will have much better results. Also the free MPLMASTER from this web site will run that machine with some simple modifications.

 

HTH

[Dave.L]

I had a Esprit demo planed for today but it was moved to Monday due to weather.

 

I'll see how it looks Monday.

[chris m]

quote:

---

But V9 is dreadful to the point where if you have conversation on the control, it's 100x faster to program at the machine.

---

I have to disagree with that statement. Granted, I have substantial time invested in custom tools, libraries, and post editing, but I will definitely get a lathe making chips faster with V9.1SP2 MC Lathe than anybody will on a conversational control for all but the simplest geometry; the fact that I bill my iron at more than $150/hr also precludes me wasting control time on programming. For simple stuff [quick roughing, boring jaws, simple secondary ops] I can program with CimcoEdit and a calculator faster than with MC or FAPT/CAPPS/IGF/whatever. The real beauty of CAM for turning is rev changes and "same-as, except" parts; you can post out essentially proven code for a new part in a matter of moments.

 

quote:

---

Chris the fact that you do mostly lathe work has helped you because you have become accustomed to the unintuitive methods needed to make it work. No insult towards you intended and please don't take it that way.

---

I am not offended and I totally agree; there are dozens of work-arounds that my guys and I just know we have to do. This allows us to prevent MC problems before they occur and saves tons of time that would be wasted by a person less indoctrinated in the "MC way."

 

C

[Hardmill]

quote:

---

I had a Esprit demo planed for today but it was moved to Monday due to weather.

 

I'll see how it looks Monday.

---

All I got to say is you wont be disapointed.

Mill/turn rocks.

 

To cumbersome for most of your day to day mill

work, but cant beat it for your lathe.

 

Youll have a bit of a learning curve too.

Its a different beast.

 

 

quote:

---

I think Bobcad is about as good as MC lathe now. That says a lot. (I haven't used BC, but its what I heard)

---

Funny you mention that.

Theyve contacted me a few times over the years

and have even sent me a seat of mill software.

 

Theyre still try to get me to sell it for them.

 

Havent seen their lathe stuff.

 

 

PEACE

[Hardmill]

Hey Wes,

What email addy you using these days ??

 

 

PEACE

[mayday]

Check your Gmail Steve

[gary adams]

We like mc lathe, we program several different machines, all code generated by mc. Each machine has a laptop with mastercam access for fine tuning. We do chucking and bar feeding work and have very few complaints. Make sure your posts are sorted out and always set up your stock and update tool by tool. The programs are effecient with very little wasted travel.

Gary