New multiaxis linking operation

[David Colin]

I Just upgraded to X9 and I was interested in multiaxis linking operation. But i m really upset i can t use it... i m programming a Mazak Integrex 200 but its machine definition in Mastercam is Lathe basis. I have all multiaxis capabilities in Mastercam except this new multiaxis operation. Why this fonction doesn't work for lathe machines?

[jlw™]

It's available in mine, but I haven't used it.  I'm just getting used to the Lathe machine def in mcam.

[David Colin]

It s available in mine too(not greyed) but with a lathe machine definition it has no effect (Window to select operations doesn't appear). I looked for a problem in my mastercam installation, i even called my dealer and it repaired installation... then i looked on the net for that issue and i found a post on official forum (search for "multiaxis improvements") that explained this feature wasn't available with lathe and mill-turn yet. And i can't find the reason why...

[Guest]

It s available in mine too(not greyed) but with a lathe machine definition it has no effect (Window to select operations doesn't appear). I looked for a problem in my mastercam installation, i even called my dealer and it repaired installation... then i looked on the net for that issue and i found a post on official forum (search for "multiaxis improvements") that explained this feature wasn't available with lathe and mill-turn yet. And i can't find the reason why...

 

Seems you explained it to yourself right here

 

 

 i found a post on official forum (search for "multiaxis improvements") that explained this feature wasn't available with lathe and mill-turn yet

 

It's not available yet

[David Colin]

I know but I really wonder why? as there is zero difference between mill multiaxis operations on a mill machine and mill multiaxis operations on a lathe machine...

[Watcher]

I know but I really wonder why? as there is zero difference between mill multiaxis operations on a mill machine and mill multiaxis operations on a lathe machine...

 

It´s Mastercam. That´s the root cause.

 

CNC Software prefers to think that if you need to do Mill/Turn at its fullest, you have to buy the MT product, which is still in the oven. Done primarily to cover Mazak, Doosans and off-the-shelf machines.

 

Mastercam is at least 5-10 years behind their competitors in MTM. And they´re fine with that, trust me.

[Aaron Eberhard]

It´s Mastercam. That´s the root cause.

 

CNC Software prefers to think that if you need to do Mill/Turn at its fullest, you have to buy the MT product, which is still in the oven. Done primarily to cover Mazak, Doosans and off-the-shelf machines.

 

Mastercam is at least 5-10 years behind their competitors in MTM. And they´re fine with that, trust me.

 

That's a overly pessimistic view, Daniel  

 

David - Sorry to cause you grief.  The real reason was with all of the different combinations of planes, tools, and axis combos, I wasn't comfortable releasing the first go of Multiaxis Link on that platform.  I knew that anyone using a multiaxis Mill would be able to run it, and I wanted to see how it performed in the field before adding all of the safeguards necessary to keep people from hurting themselves in the Lathe environment (why can't I link a turn profile op and 3d milling op?).

 

Just a note, I don't get over here as much as I'd like but there was recently a thread on our forum about this, and I'd be happy to chat about it whenever you wanted.

 

Cheers,

[Watcher]

That's a overly pessimistic view, Daniel

 

Aaron, thank you very much for your polite positioning about my "bad" attitude. I didn´t mean to offend any particular individual at CNC, which are basically hard working people like us, trying to do their best within their options.

 

But I´ll tell you a few things that took me to where I´m now in regards MC...

 

10 years ago I was a MC fanboi. I used to be so excited and enthusiastic about MC and how much I was able to accomplish with it, that I was in a blind spot.

 

Some when 10 years ago, I managed to build a very good and solid reputation in the companies I worked for because of my technical skills. Then I joined a multinational company and a year later I was invited to participate of a benchmark process to find a CAM tool to our site in Brazil. Went to the company headquarters in Europe for a month and spent time with my peers evaluating tools such as Pro/NC, NX, CATIA, TEBIS and Mastercam. My peers where doing landing gears using Pro/NC and TEBIS, and there I was blindly defending Mastercam after each demo.

 

That biased attitude almost ruined the reputation I worked hard to earn. This is the story and the lessons I´ve learned.

 

Then the Mastercam reseller joined us, as the last one in the list of products we were evaluating. (Later I realized that my peers were so aware on my favoritism for MC that they arranged everything so the others could have a fair chance). My jaw dropped, embarrassed, when they asked for a simple thing all other guys had done well: calculate the rotational envelope – the revolved turn profile of a small part. The MC reseller started to sweat and after a few more questions I realized that my faith was kind of excessive - Mastercam were not able to compute a simple “hüllerkurve”, among several other things. (It is able to do it now - It took CNC 7 years to implement it) – From this point on I started to learn the differences between mid-end and high-end systems.

 

After that I learned other software, hopefully become very proficient with them and started to play with the big dogs, and to learn things like APT so I could make post-processors for this language. Very good times those! After a couple of years I realized that MC loosing that benchmark was the best thing for my technical career. But of course all that gratitude and admiration for MC wasn´t gone. Especially because what made me (And still do) to like it was this board and all knowledgeable and helpful people we have here. Incredible how we tie our links to people instead of tools, isn´t it? A good board like this can make miracles for a product reputation, and even sell it in advance…

 

In the meantime, I was following MC development and seeing where it was heading too. I was living the dream and working with the best MTM machinery out there, learning amazing stuff, pushing software vendors to implement very neat stuff for my employers, and often reading here the frustration of loyal people that were gaining access to modern equipment, small shop owners investing in the cutting edge technology to stay in the market, and MC not being able to follow them.

 

I once heard from a big dog at CNC, at EMO, that they knew they´re behind in MTM and that they would do something about it… a couple of years later all they did was to buy a small company in Switzerland because it was too late for them to catch up with all the progress their competitors were offering. If I acknowledge that CNC put more efforts in lathe and MT recently? Of course I do… I just think they haven´t put enough to regain their leadership…

 

After seeing some decent systems, with a much less famous reputation than MC doing turning with the Z axis pointing towards it should be, simulating things how they´re supposed to, and driving complex machines with much less workarounds, I realized CNC lost the train of innovation in MTM long ago, and took nearly a decade to look at it with the seriousness they should. Lots of efforts were put into dynamic motion stuff, and little to turning and MTM. All of sudden Mastercam was the super system for Haas VF2SS owners, and a daily battle for people with milturns featuring B axis, multi-channel and lots of other stuff. MP language and miscellaneous switches became the key to drive these beasts, not MC itself.

 

We´re seeing small European companies advancing much faster than CNC, with a fraction of their economical and workforce power. Are they complete like MC? No... But at their current speed, within 3 years they will be more comprehensive. And complete is different than comprehensive. In many ways.

 

I still respect MC and specially people around it, either from this board or from CNC. I made good friends here, mentors, people I know that work hard for every penny they make. I recognize the efficiency of CNC´s pragmatism and the pursuit of profits + whatever as the main strategy, instead of maintaining MC as the most complete solution out there + profits + whatever. It works for you guys, and I learned that good for someone is what works for someone. Just like anything, be it software or what you like to eat.

 

Mastercam, IMHO, was a killer solution when 2D was an enough answer to most problems and a decent post-processor architecture could enable you to get it done. But since those days, the world evolved quickly, small shops HAVE TO offer the latest technology in order to compete with good prices and delivery times, and metadata and 3D drives everything, from toolpath deployment to tooling / machine simulation / verification. IMHO Mastercam did not grasp this as quickly as some of its competitors. You can say you have a great 5 axis module, your simulator is brand new, your dynamic toolpaths are excellent… but when we look at the screen and see how poor MC graphics are, or how you deal with a B axis unit in a MillTurn, then it´s easy to get it.

 

You guys only move when you are forced to. That´s Ok and fine… it works for you and many people & shops.. just not for me… I still have high hopes for MC and have difficulties to accept that you guys are comfortable within these boundaries… and the reason I do I think it is because I have so much respect for CNC and for the people on this board that I struggle to accept that, all these guys, with all this potential and intelligence, have to be tied to certain limitations CNC should have eliminated a decade ago.

 

You guys knows better what is good for you and the majority of your customers… not me… But I think I owe you respect and a rationale about why I think MC is behind competition, by a great margin, in driving complex machines comprehensively. CAM is not only about toolpathing and post-processors. It´s really about how you can use an intelligent tool to bring to surface your intelligent ideas. And programming lathes and MTM machines with X pointing towards where Z should be doesn´t sound much smart too me.

 

Again Aaron, I don´t mean to offend anyone and I appreciate your professional attitude towards my harsh comment.

 

Daniel

[Aaron Eberhard]

Hey Daniel,

 

Sorry about the delay, I've been working hard down here in the software mines, so I haven't had been up to the surface to check up on this.  You know I have massive respect for not only your accomplishments & knowledge, but how well thought out all of your arguments are.  I don't have time to get into specifics on our MT solution vs others, nor is this the appropriate place.  I will say, though, that we have very passionate and motivated people in the right places here and, like computers, development of software never can go fast enough.  I think it's on the right trajectory.

I really just took umbrage with your statements:

 

It´s Mastercam. That´s the root cause.

Mastercam is at least 5-10 years behind their competitors in MTM. And they´re fine with that, trust me. :guitar:"

 

I think I had a pretty legitimate reason to keep it out of the lathe based machine defs for X9, namely that I want to make sure my department is putting out high quality and reliable software.  I didn't feel that I could meet that goal for Multiaxis Link in the time we had available, so we didn't release it for that duty.  I also don't feel that anyone here is specifically "fine" with being behind the competition in any arena.  We're a generally pragmatic bunch, but I don't think that being pragmatic about the reality of how difficult and long it takes to develop software is the same as being fine with it.

 

I look forward to talking about this over a beer some time

 

 

 

[David Colin]

Thank you for your answers Aaron.

Hope this multiaxis linking will be release for lathe machines soon(and won't be forgotten)

 

I understood you were not sure about this new development but i m still thinking you should have release it as it is

You are talking about turn profiling-multiaxis linking but, as 'linking' is tool cutting dependant, it s really specific to machine both operations with the same cutting tool... anyway PP already manage theses cases to change and initialize lathe/mill modes.

I never had to add a 'multiaxis linking' operation other than between mill multiaxis operations (for now: i draw a 3D spline and i m using curve5x and lines for start/end tool axis that i saved from toolpathes geometries)

[Aaron Eberhard]

Thank you for your answers Aaron.

Hope this multiaxis linking will be release for lathe machines soon(and won't be forgotten)

 

I understood you were not sure about this new development but i m still thinking you should have release it as it is

You are talking about turn profiling-multiaxis linking but, as 'linking' is tool cutting dependant, it s really specific to machine both operations with the same cutting tool... anyway PP already manage theses cases to change and initialize lathe/mill modes.

I never had to add a 'multiaxis linking' operation other than between mill multiaxis operations (for now: i draw a 3D spline and i m using curve5x and lines for start/end tool axis that i saved from toolpathes geometries)

 

You're welcome, David.

 

The lathe-based machines are definitely not forgotten, and you should see it supported quite soon, so don't worry too much about that one

 

I understand that the post will stop you from actually posting code with mill and turning tools linked together (hopefully... in most cases...), but I was just trying to illustrate some of the things that we have to look at before stamping an "OK" mark on a feature.  Even if the post won't allow it, or it's not physically possible on a machine, imagine how frustrated a user would be if Mastercam "allowed" something like that, but they couldn't post. 

 

Please let me know how you like the new features when the public beta is out for the next release.

 

Cheers,

[Watcher]

Well,

 

I think after all many of us, including me, are somehow biased and frustrated with the speed MTM is evolving in MC. This is an old story... I remember 12-13 years ago to hear about MATTS... Who doesn´t? It´s a fact that CNC lost the timing and many opportunities in this realm. But it´s also a fact that they seem to have people aware of this, and the right people looking at things like that.

 

Luckly, MC is a well known product in this market, and their right decisions and success in other fronts allowed them to get here without closing their doors. Many other shops and smaller companies could not afford to and survive making such mistake. For me, of course as a former MC fanboi, I´m sorry to see it constrained in the past decade in some areas. Most people wants to see things and stories they like to be the winners in everything. Who doesn´t want to say "my horse is the best"? I certainly do for every resource I have at my disposal.

 

But the truth is that, in many situations, things are as good and versatile as the jockeys behind them. And good guys behind Mastercam can do great stuff even when constrained compared to other solutions.

 

Aaron, keep listening to customers and making the interface between the lab and the real life. We all make mistakes. No exception to this rule. I learn this every working day.

 

Thank you!