Which Control To Get?

[Jim ..]

Hi Guys,

I am just about to order a new vmc for our mould making Toolroom, this is going to be a 3 axis mill with a rotary table addition so will end up 4 axis. I had requested the latest

Fanuc 0iMD Control with an upgrade package for high speed surfacing ( look ahead, and bigger servos, 15k Direct drive head. ) But have been told their is a long delay getting Fanuc controls, and have been offered a Siemens 828D Control, My problem is I don't know any thing about Siemens controls are they as a good as the Fanuc I wanted? Should I wait 4 months for a Fanuc?. If you have any experience with either control, any help would be much appreciated. Thanks Jim.

[Joe788]

What brand machine?

[Joe788]

What brand machine?

[Jim ..]

What brand machine?

 

Hi,

The machine is going to be a Chevalier QP2440-L

[Jim ..]

What brand machine?

 

Hi,

The machine is going to be a Chevalier QP2440-L

[Greg Williams]

My personal preference is for Japanese controls.I would wait the 4 months

[Newbeeee™]

I'd say stick with Fanuc.

I believe siemens is the faster for block processing, but no big shakes in reality.

We have a siemens lathe, and it took quite a bit of sorting out (plc issues and parameters). Now that's not siemens fault that's the MTB of the lathe, but as they hadn't built many lathes with the siemens, we were a bit of a guinea pig. I think they call it 'in field testing'

That said, I have no regrets for the lathe. Siemens knocks the pants off fanuc for speed/user friendliness for conversational programming on the machine. But we're talking roundy roundy.

We have 3x chevalier QP VMC mills (excellent value for money machines) with all fanuc (OiMC) controls. But everything is mastercammed off line, so we wouldn't use the conversational side anyway.

HTH

[Jim ..]

I'd say stick with Fanuc.

I believe siemens is the faster for block processing, but no big shakes in reality.

We have a siemens lathe, and it took quite a bit of sorting out (plc issues and parameters). Now that's not siemens fault that's the MTB of the lathe, but as they hadn't built many lathes with the siemens, we were a bit of a guinea pig. I think they call it 'in field testing'

That said, I have no regrets for the lathe. Siemens knocks the pants off fanuc for speed/user friendliness for conversational programming on the machine. But we're talking roundy roundy.

We have 3x chevalier QP VMC mills (excellent value for money machines) with all fanuc (OiMC) controls. But everything is mastercammed off line, so we wouldn't use the conversational side anyway.

HTH

 

Thanks Newbeee,

I'm now woundering if the siemens control would be better for the 3d surfacing work you normally do in mould tools, if the block processing is faster, this is wear im trying to get a good increase in productivity in our toolroom. We also program and then send to the machine.

[Brad Lisle]

Okuma MA-650V with OSP-P200MA control with optional Super-Nurbs. Extremely fast and accurate. Surface finish with this machine setup are insane.

 

http://www.okuma.com/products/machines/vmc/ma_series/ma650v/

[Jim ..]

Okuma MA-650V with OSP-P200MA control with optional Super-Nurbs. Extremely fast and accurate. Surface finish with this machine setup are insane.

 

http://www.okuma.com/products/machines/vmc/ma_series/ma650v/

 

Thanks Brad,

But I know the price for an Okuma is outside my budget, and I also know they are really good machines, but I need to increase our capacity in a manner I can afford.

[Newbeeee™]

Jim,

If your dealer is local, go and see the machien and run a program on the siemens. If all looks ok, put on the purchase order that the machine must be capable of accurately contouring at high feed rates. This is just in case the machine cuts corners while profiling where the servo's aren't tuned properly.

Bear in mind the 828 is only just out - bugs anyone???

One other thing - the siemens hard drives only last a couple of years before needing replacing (on the assumption the machines are left on and never turned off). It may be worth checking if this has one, or can you go for a solid state version?

I believe the new OiMD is based upon the robodrill's 31i control, so is quite different from the previous OiMC version.

[YoDoug®]

The Chevalier machine is built with standard mid-grade Taiwan components, ballscrews, guides, trucks, etc. The OiMD should have no problems pushing the machine to the performance limits of the mechanicals.

 

To add to what Newbeee posted, the OiMD has nanometer interpolation abilities in 2D moves in AICC. For high speed and high tolerance 3D work the 31I Fanuc is the way to go.

 

As for actual single closed block processing speed, meaning from the time the control issues a command until the time it recieves the in position signal, Okuma and Seimens are tied at .3ms processing time being the current leaders, Fanuc is only slightly behind with the 31I alpha series.

[Jim ..]

Jim,

If your dealer is local, go and see the machien and run a program on the siemens. If all looks ok, put on the purchase order that the machine must be capable of accurately contouring at high feed rates. This is just in case the machine cuts corners while profiling where the servo's aren't tuned properly.

Bear in mind the 828 is only just out - bugs anyone???

One other thing - the siemens hard drives only last a couple of years before needing replacing (on the assumption the machines are left on and never turned off). It may be worth checking if this has one, or can you go for a solid state version?

I believe the new OiMD is based upon the robodrill's 31i control, so is quite different from the previous OiMC version.

 

Thanks Newbeeee,

My dealer has come back now with a 3 month wait on the Fanuc so that is not to long to wait, so I have gone ahead ahead with this.

 

Thanks very much for your help.

Kind regards

Jim

[Jim ..]

The Chevalier machine is built with standard mid-grade Taiwan components, ballscrews, guides, trucks, etc. The OiMD should have no problems pushing the machine to the performance limits of the mechanicals.

 

To add to what Newbeee posted, the OiMD has nanometer interpolation abilities in 2D moves in AICC. For high speed and high tolerance 3D work the 31I Fanuc is the way to go.

 

As for actual single closed block processing speed, meaning from the time the control issues a command until the time it recieves the in position signal, Okuma and Seimens are tied at .3ms processing time being the current leaders, Fanuc is only slightly behind with the 31I alpha series.

 

Thanks YoDoug,

I have managed to get the Fanuc controler on shorter lead time and will go ahead with this.

Thanks for your knowledge.

Regards

Jim

[Newbeeee™]

No worries Jim.

You'll love the chevalier. We are routing (with G05.1) upto 7metres/min feed now, and accurately profiling at 2-3 metres/min (shape dependent). This was after a parameter tune, but the machine is more than capable.

[SKIR68]

Try to find a machinist to run that Siemens control...Its MUCH easier to find a guy for the Fanuc control! Just something to think about...

[Dan_AKA_ROY]

We have a Chevalier Falcon 3 axis VMC 2040. Its an older machine. Works like a champ. Never had any problems..

 

(FANUC Series 0-MD) - An older controller. Does what I need.

[Jim ..]

We have a Chevalier Falcon 3 axis VMC 2040. Its an older machine. Works like a champ. Never had any problems..

 

(FANUC Series 0-MD) - An older controller. Does what I need.

Thanks Dan,

The Chevalier may not be a high end machine but I've only heard good things when compairing apples with apples.

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

As for actual single closed block processing speed, meaning from the time the control issues a command until the time it recieves the in position signal, Okuma and Seimens are tied at .3ms processing time being the current leaders, Fanuc is only slightly behind with the 31I alpha series.

 

To clarify;

 

The 30i/31i are capable of .2ms processing. Where FANUC lags behind Seimens is look ahead. FANUC tops out at 1,000 blocks, whereas Seimens tops out at an impressive 5,000 IIRC.

[Newbeeee™]

To clarify;

 

The 30i/31i are capable of .2ms processing. Where FANUC lags behind Seimens is look ahead. FANUC tops out at 1,000 blocks, whereas Seimens tops out at an impressive 5,000 IIRC.

 

Blimey - 5000 blocks lookahead.

That's an inbuilt MRP system. It can see what job it's going to be machining next week

[YoDoug®]

To clarify;

 

The 30i/31i are capable of .2ms processing. Where FANUC lags behind Seimens is look ahead. FANUC tops out at 1,000 blocks, whereas Seimens tops out at an impressive 5,000 IIRC.

 

Thats news to me. Okuma uses Fanuc controls on some models and is an Fanuc authorized builder. All of the info I have puts Fanuc 31i at .4ms

 

 

 

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

To clarify;

 

The 30i/31i are capable of .2ms processing. Where FANUC lags behind Seimens is look ahead. FANUC tops out at 1,000 blocks, whereas Seimens tops out at an impressive 5,000 IIRC.

Thats news to me. Okuma uses Fanuc controls on some models and is an Fanuc authorized builder. All of the info I have puts Fanuc 31i at .4ms

I looked through my stuff and something I had from 2009 from FANUC put processing at .4ms BPT and a piece of recent NON-FANUC sales literature put it at .2ms. I will have to make a phone call to clarify now. Thanks for pointhing that out Doug.

[YoDoug®]

In all truth, .3ms to .4ms will not be noticeable to 99.99% of users. The current status of high end CNC control systems is that they are more than adequate for the mechanical abilities of the machines. Where the real power of a PC based controls like Okuma Thinc comes in to play is secondary functions that require computing power like thermal stability algorithms and graphical driven collision checking.

[MIL-TFP-41]

To clarify;

 

The 30i/31i are capable of .2ms processing. Where FANUC lags behind Seimens is look ahead. FANUC tops out at 1,000 blocks, whereas Seimens tops out at an impressive 5,000 IIRC.

 

 

There is alot more to the Seimens look ahead look ahead than a 5000 block capability. The way i had it explained to me is as follows (keep in mid these are all on Matsurra's)

 

The "Standard" IZ1 consists of a 100 block look ahead , jerk control, feed forward, better acc/dec etc

 

The "High End" IZ1/COMP has a 500 block look ahead , jerk control, etc but even more importantly this option includes COMPCAD

 

COMPCAD actually converts the standard linear blocks of your program into a Nurbs or spline type program internally on the fly, this allows the control to COMPress up to 50 linear blocks of code into 1 (spline) block of code

This means that this control may only have to process 1 block while the other guys control has to process up to 50 blocks to do the same thing

This also means the 500 block look ahead is really allot more than 500 blocks

The results are shorter cycle time, smoother motion and a better looking part, this also cuts down the number of points needed in your part program witch allows you to open up your cam tolerance a bit....So it uses even less code than a Fanuc to generate the same path.

 

Now the downside to COMPCAD comes when you are using a simultanious 5 axis toolpath with a feedrate on every line.Because it compress so many lines into one, your feedrates are out the door. I have to either turn it off in the control before running a 5ax path or use TRAORI (Siemens flavor of RTCP)

[YoDoug®]

COMPCAD actually converts the standard linear blocks of your program into a Nurbs or spline type program internally on the fly

 

 

That sounds really similar to what Okuma Super-Nurbs does. It works best with a lot of very small point to point linear moves and then it uses shape reconstruction parameters to smooth out the motion and finish.