And I sure do have A TON of questions about it. How do you set TLO's, how do you align the axis on the machine ? I feel like I am starting all over again. Who's responsibility is it to help with this Haas / Mastercam Rep ? I feel like both should be involved, but it's a lot of over lapping information. As this is our shops first 5 ax system, no one knows a thing about it, is there a basic handbook or online tutorial or anything that I could look at I know this website is pretty awesome for questions answered but I also don't want to wear out my welcome. Thanks for input Jesse

you can always copy the operations then re label them g54 and g55 then change the work offset to 1 on g55 side. It looks like your using a controller that supports g54.1 and it will depend on your post to oputput g54.1 rather than g55...there are also TONS of ways to sub program this thing out, it all just depends on how you want to do it I would stay away from transform I personally dont like the way that it works when you post it, i.e. does the whole first part like you mentioned it.

it is still there its just in edit/ trim / break many pieces, select spline then you can set your tolerance for arcs, or select lines instead. http://www.mastercam.com/Support/TechTips/...ine-to-arcs.htm

cool thanks I hate the floating tapping, but we are in a medical shop and dont really see very many tapped holes, so I dont have to deal with it very much.

how do you mod the post to run at 98% of the tap pitch rather than 100%? and why would you only run 98% of the pitch to keep tension on the floating head? I got the FR to start posting the right pitch but now it's at 100% of the pitch

Yeah it it pretty much the generic haas post yes, I have looked in the post, but this machine doesnt' have rigid tapping just tap, does that make a difference

Hey guys, I need some help to get the feed rate to post correctly on the post for a haas. When I select tap it blanks out the feed rate option and posts g84 f0. how do we fix it ? Thanks in advance Jesse

I am pretty new to the whole 5ax thing too, I am interested in a(n) application like this to be solved so I can see how it happened... [ 04-29-2008, 05:54 PM: Message edited by: HEED ]

Hey ron calm down dude I appreciate your help and I was not meaning any disrespect with the WTF comment, I have been frustrated trying to get the a to reverse and the b to reverse, in the machine def. Turns out that feature is not supported yet so I had to get into the post to reverse them... YAY ! Progress ! thanks to everyone for their help so far and if anyone else has input please add ...

Thanks ron, the vectors are currently off and simulate rotary axis was on I turned it off and it helped a bunch. When I posted it, it sent a-90 where it should be a90. I tried reversing the a axis to no avail. How do you reverse the direction on the 4th other than in the machine def.? And I know it's a lot of questions and maybe a lot of explanation but why do you use the curve 5x to translate vectors ? Shouldn't mastercam put in the rotary moves to switch vectors without doing that ? Does it make the transition smoother ? *EDIT* Updated 5xblock in FTP site, take a look is that the type of 5x curve that you use to transition between vectors and do you use them every rotation ? [ 04-23-2008, 03:18 PM: Message edited by: HEED ]

Just playing with a block trying to get it to face all sides it is in FTP called 5x block when it goes to face the position b90. it doesnt backplot correctly but does post to the best of my limited knowledge correctly. Is this normal to have completely messed up backplots is that one of the reasons to run vericut ?

Totally it makes sense just like the front top bottom back that I do when I index "a" around to do work on all sides. I guess you would just use every plane except bottom then ?

ok that works for the view but do you have to change the active tplane to reflect the 33.25' or do you stay in top tplane and let the geometry (solid face , etc.) do the work ? I guess the question is would you need to create a new tplane at the funky angle or does the geo figure it out for you?

ahhhhhh..... I see now... That could pose a problem. It's so simple I should have thought of that. I guess it's like machining on the backside on a horizontal then. Ron, I pulled up your FTP file, and am I EVER confused. WTF is going on with the point toolpaths ? They dont change the tool plane are they just there for clearance ?

quote: 5. be super nice to the best guys in the shop (coffee works well). Ask them as many questions as they are willing to answer Well, that would be easy, other than there is really no one else in the shop that kows 5x (first one) quote: 4) No doubt you'd like to see what's going on while the part is cutting, but it's safer to allow your part to tilt away from you where you can't see it behind the trunion. (My boss used to ask "can't you cut that out here where we can watch?") You can get a nasty crash that way and you won't see it coming if you're watching the tool. (No, I didn't have to crash it to learn! lol) Why is it safer to tilt away from operator, I would think it would be better to tilt toward operator so you can see what is going on ? Haha, James you are one of the few guys I know of around here that I mentioned in one of the above posts about not bugging... Funny stuff that you would end up on here helping anyhow ! When you program for the indexer to go to let's say "front plane" or any other index , do you reset the t/p or not ? And if you have a(n) index at a wierd angle (33.25 for ex.) do you create a new plane at 33.25' ?

Thanks for the replies guys I am just writing back in between cycles here so I didn't catch them all but it seems like there is a lot of info. here I know that it's just going to take a lot of practice time and lots of long days / nights pulling hair out, then an epifany (sp?) hits. I have been doing a lot of surface paths and even getting into some kind of "advanced" 4th stuff (MCX posting rotary moves for me ) so changing planes is not a biggie. I was thinking about it last night though... is running g54/55/56 for different orientations a(n) accepted practice for 5th indexing ? I dont see much indeding other than on the B , so lets say the first program would call g54 work the top side, sub would call g55 rotate a 90' b90' run, call sub g56 forate a90' b180' etc. ? Just thinking out loud... any input is appreciated. Thanks and I will reply again later tonight with more questions when I get a minute to read the replies. Keep Em' comin!

The company that I work for is fairly decent sized (2 mil. + a month ) out of our facilty alone, plus, china, switzerland, and all over the U.S., it's just frustrating that they never want to spend any to make product better / faster / more efficently etc. The 5th Tilt/ Rotary was a HUGE leap for us. I think that in house training would be awesome, but you did bring up a massively valid point with the no interruption. I dont think that would ever happen. Maybe the best thing is to take it in small bites, and work with the local MC dealer when I need programming help. I was pretty excited when the order first went off, but as it gets closer to installation I am getting more nervous about it, but I think if I take it as an indexer, then work into full 5 it will be a lot more smooth of a transition for my brain to wrap around.

Your welcome I haven't had much luck with the slice or part line (which frustrates me because I want it to work, it's a lot easier ), sometimes it works, sometimes it kind of works and sometimes it leaves you high and dry. I like the curve intersection method a lot better. Good luck

I know it's a bad attitude to have about the training but I think I got off on the wrong foot with the whole click here do this - I wish it explained it a little better but as I pick it up I am sure that it will all start to make sense. And I can understand how they would want to simplify it so that it's just one principle at a time I took the 3ax. class at the local community college, but as the area is more geared to the 3ax and 4ax indexer, there are a few local shops running 5ax, and I know a couple 5x programmers (few and far between) but I wouldnt want my guys showing the competetion how to make our parts , So I am going to respect boundries and get some education another way. I think that the best thing would be to bring a trainer to the facility is that an acceptable practice ? That way training would / could be more specific to our needs.

Sometimes the slice does not work as well for me so I use create curve at intersection... create a flat boundry surface on a different level, swith to another level, create, curve, intersection, works like a charm...

So, our shop is getting our new 5ax tilt rotary table within the week (scheduled) so maybe by the end of summer it will finally be in ... What do I need to know about programming etc. I have the in house solutions book on 4th and 5th programming, but as well as the MCX samples they all seem to be kind of BS parts, not really real world examples and it's just like - click this do that , no explainations of what you are doing to it... As far as I know (very little) about the programming you actually draw and machine off of c/l does that mean that you set up then program ? The local MC dealer is kind of one of those "too busy to help " types, is there any good online training, how did you all learn the ropes? I am pretty sure the company would fly an instructor in, or send us to training somewhere... Thanks

I added my basic file on the FTP site in mcx2 files rotary WCS, I have learned to like it and thought others could benefit... ENJOY

Check your mail, and to all the rest of y'all I have set up some planes for my basic setup with this kind of work, it's on the FTP site, mcx2 files, rotary WCS it's not as easy as it would seem. The bottom and back planes have to be rotated to correctly post. As MCX is set up to run with a horizontal, but you cant' modify the default WCS system so you have to import the new WCS every time you work with it ( a giant pain I know ) Also, make sure the rotation is set up right in your machine def file. Mine was set up CCW instead of CW and the axis was reversed... many a tool lost their short life cause we thought we had it fixed !

Thanks Colin, I have been making new planes with solid faces, and it has been messy with new origins and etc. I like the copy an existing one, and rotating it, a lot less chance of something getting messed up! I jsut wish there was a way of altering / adding to your default list in mcx.

That's what I figured on doing, even doing some planes at 45 and etc. to get some more varation. When you create a new plane, do you use the enable origin, and select a new one, or stay on the original wcs origin as defined by the top plane ? It seems when I have tried it re-origin, it has caused havoc...