Hate to mention a competetive product, but GIBBS had a a nice explanation of inverse time feedrate on their site years ago. Basically, if you are moving 1 inch per minute feed, and you make a 1 inch move, your feedrate is 1.0, if you move, your feedrate is 2.0, and so forth. The reason it is good to use in 4th or 5th axis is that it gets rid of the issue of which feedrate you are using, degrees per minute, or inches per minute. It does create a lot of code, as you basically have a feedrate for each move.we used it successfully when making a dovetail slot on the outside of a rotary valve witha a X/A move at a fixed Z and Y position, wrapping an elipse around the body. It made a smoother cut and got rid of noticable changes in sound of the cut as it fed around the part, which was also shown by the finish. The limit like with degrees per minute, is how large a feed number you could put in. The applications people with the control, the machine, and the 4th axis head were all unable to give a definitive answer, and gave the answer, "I would keep increasing the feedrate until it alwarms." Hope this helps.

You might want to talk to your local rep fir Nakamura. As I recall, they made that switchable so that users could change them to match the program style they had for previous machines. I believe it is a paramater. some early machines had dual turrets an the upper was positive, and the lower was negative since they were on the same ball screw. Fred

register at theinvetionzone.com, it is the old Multuszone.com sites re-emergence. there is a lot of Okuma Multus related info on there. As for .LIB files, they are registered in the parameters page, and you will have to set the amount of memory to be used. When you first fire up the machine, and go to automatic, the files will register when you push any button and clear the blue pop up screen. We use them for the a lot of things like an enhanced tool change function and clearing/resetting things when the machine is restarted after the auaxilary axes have been actuated.

Todd, Is yours an Okuma Multus B300W or a tailstock equiped machine? I am in Seattle, but our local dealer is pretty well versed in these machines. We have a Multus B400W on our floor right now, and will be programming it with MasterCAM and the Okuma ADMAC softare depending on the specific part needs.

Hey Rick, I would love to get a copy of the harley case. I was thinking of something like that for the new MA400H on the floor. Fred

If it is a new machine, it should come with the P200 control, possibly with ADMAC. I have used the Albeti/KOMA, and the Eppinger heads with good sucess. They are pretty easy to program. Did you go with chucks, or collets? The Microcentric with collet pads is a nice setup on this platform. If you have the Alberti heads, I can send you a run in program to use before you start milling with them. Eppingers are supposed to be ready to run from the box.

I have been working with the Multus platform for a while. The programming is very easy to work with. the biggest problem that users seem to have is looking at it only as a lathe with milling. I know several people who are bar feeding mill jobs on the machines. It is a mental shift, but going from bar stock,(round, square, hex or extrusion) to parts catcher with mill work is something that doesn't occur to people until they see it work and do the math. One friends biggest problem was getting consistent aluminum stock so they could run lights out without having to worry about chips wrapping up on tools. But 6 hours a night of 5 axis milling on small parts changed them from thinking 40 taper mill with a pallet system to bar loader lathe, with a smaller footprint.

I would suggest looking at the OKUMA line. The iron is strong, and the support is very good with Gosiger Northwest. They also work with Cimtech, the northwest MasterCAM distributor. They are located in Sumner. The new P200 control has some very interesting features. Boeing was a beta test site and development was done to enhance it with a variety of tool load and collision avoidance features. If your are looking at high speed profiling, they have a Super Nurbs packagage that makes the parts come out looking polished and perfectly blended.