Tool presetter questions

[Bob W.]

I have a few questions regarding the communication between tool presetters and machine tools.  When the presetter is connected to the machine via Ethernet, how does it work when the tool offsets are sent directly to the machine?  Are these values set immediately?  Are they set to the Fanuc side or in my case the Makino side of the control?  Are they posted to the machine as a program that needs to be executed at a later time?

 

Currently I either print the offsets and manually enter them at the machine or I will post a program to a USB stick, load it into the machine and run the program to enter the offsets.  I would like to know exactly what the process is when connected to the machine via Ethernet and sending the values directly to the control.  I use the Makino side of the control exclusively for tool management in all of my machines.

[Joe788]

What presetter did you get, Bob? (Not that it matters to your question, I'm just curious).

[Bob W.]

We have a Speroni with the Magis (base version) control software.

[Guest]

We did an @$$ load of intel gathering at IMTS regarding presetters ad how you can get that data into a machine tool and here's what we came up with;

 

You've got 2 basic options as of today (not talking about DRO type presetters, I'm talking about presetters capable of some sort of output that is more than digits on a screen);

 

1. 1) Print out a sticker with the tool's data and input the data manually at the control

2. 2) Output the data to some sort of post processed file format and transmit to the control directly via Ethernet, USB stick or RS-232 thatquires the setup person/operator to run a program which then uploads the offsets (i.e. G10 for us FANUC guys out there).

 

There is no presetter presently that will automatically update a machine tool's offsets. NOBODY wants the liability.

 

HTH

[Bob W.]

 

There is no presetter presently that will automatically update a machine tool's offsets. NOBODY wants the liability.

 

Somehow RFID gets the values directly into the Makino side of the control and I'm curious how they do it.  I got quotes for RFID and its in the ballpark of $25k per machine...   Too expensive at this point but valuable technology.  I'm trying to figure out a cheaper way...  Getting the offsets into the Fanuc side of the control is easy and there are turn key systems to do so that are reasonably priced.  Getting it into the Makino side is a different matter though. 

 

What I envision is tool holder data stored permanently on the RFID chip and tool data read and written when tools are loaded.  When the tool is read into the control the holder data would be stored as an eight digit number in macro variables (60 tool magazine would use macro variables 700-759 for example) allowing deriving holder length and holder ID via macro program (12505123 = holder #125 with a 5.123" nose length, or similar) and the tool data would go into the offsets.  This would allow on-machine holder checking routines against misc reals posted from Mastercam (mr3= minimum cutter stick out) or Vericut could query the machine's current tool configuration via FOCAS or MTConnect for real time verification based on LOADED tool data.  Trying to figure out how to make it work.  I'm about 95% sure it could be done.

[GoetzInd]

 

 

There is no presetter presently that will automatically update a machine tool's offsets. NOBODY wants the liability.

A Parlec Presetter sales guy told me that they have done it before but strongly advise against it. Bunch of wimps IMO. There are a million things you could do through the TC macro to check if a value has been changed and then do a quick check on a tool probe to make sure the gage length is in a certain range off the offset loaded.

 

Mike

[Zoober]

Somehow RFID gets the values directly into the Makino side of the control and I'm curious how they do it. I got quotes for RFID and its in the ballpark of $25k per machine... Too expensive at this point but valuable technology. I'm trying to figure out a cheaper way... Getting the offsets into the Fanuc side of the control is easy and there are turn key systems to do so that are reasonably priced. Getting it into the Makino side is a different matter though.

 

What I envision is tool holder data stored permanently on the RFID chip and tool data read and written when tools are loaded. When the tool is read into the control the holder data would be stored as an eight digit number in macro variables (60 tool magazine would use macro variables 700-759 for example) allowing deriving holder length and holder ID via macro program (12505123 = holder #125 with a 5.123" nose length, or similar) and the tool data would go into the offsets. This would allow on-machine holder checking routines against misc reals posted from Mastercam (mr3= minimum cutter stick out) or Vericut could query the machine's current tool configuration via FOCAS or MTConnect for real time verification based on LOADED tool data. Trying to figure out how to make it work. I'm about 95% sure it could be done.

I think it could be done, but it would be programmatically.

Using the M56 ( if I remember correctly, I'm at home), and S and T values, you can load offset data into the Makino side. There are a number of M codes in conjunction with S and T values to load anything from tool life, load mgmt, offsets, etc into the Makino tool data side. That's how we load out life management with our programs. You can do a M233 tool data dump in MDI and view the contents of the file to parse the codes.

Getting the info into the control at the time of tool change would be a simple matter of altering the M6 macro to read the data during tool change.

[specv]

Bob, we currently output a program from our Zoller that we read at the beginning of the program to load all the offsets into the machines. The Pro 3 and pro5 controls are different programs but it works the same way in each machine. We also set our pot/tool numbers with the same program.

 

like Zoober said, use a M233 S1000 for example to create a program with everything you need, it will dump all offsets so you will have to pick which ones you want to use.