Consider HP curves of the machines. We have 3 here that swap gears. One machine at 315, another machine at 365 and yet another machine at 630. When they are in the low speeds of that range they have no nutz. Keep that consideration in mind if you know what speeds you will be running them at. Jm2c

Hey all,

WIth the tooling manufacturers always coming up with new tooling to use, I was just wondering who is using what when it comes to roughing cutters and how well they do. I was at IMTS and grabbed a few brochures from Dapra which wasn't a tool name I have ever heard of or used before. Started looking into there brochures and gave the sales guy a call. He gave me some recommendations and this thing cuts good. We knocked off about 4 hours a piece on a 3 part job. We cut 4140 PH ht/dcf material 90% of the time.

Material - 4140

Cutter - 2" Dapra toroid cutter

Speed - 1719 rpm (900sfpm)

Feed - 95 IPM (.009" fpt)

DOC - .060"

Just really starting to get time to try different things to improve here and was really happy with this cutter. After 15 years as a machinist, I still have tons of things to learn. Just wanted to share, and was hoping some of you would chime in and share what works well for you, so all of us can get different ideas on cutters that would suit all of our different applications.

Thanks

For doing solids, you click on analyze > area/ volume > solid props and then enter the density factor as the weight. This can be found in the machinery handbook. Steal is .2833, alum is around .094 I think off of the top of my head.

HTH

KMI,

Click on the link at the top that says cadcam's FTP site. When it opens, just drag your file into the MC9 folder on his site and then tell us where you put it.

Thanks guys for the help! After Julie read the thread on this forum it got her thinking differently from what she was thinking. It was something with the DNS numbers on my computer. The windows 2000 computer did get completely reformatted and is also better now too. It really had other issues that needed to be addressed anyway, so it was for the better. Again, a big thanks to you all.

Randy,

Are you saying that the rounding function WILL allow the machine to unclamp whereas a circular move will not? I have never myself, seen a machine that clamps like you are describing.

Like I stated before, I don't think Mcam will throw in a rounding function. I can't explain what I am thinking, but it just doesn't seem feasible to me.

Stupid question, just throwing out my thoughts. If the post outputs both the "X" & "Y" axis moves all the time, would that fix it? Can the machine parameters be changed to allow the clamps not to lock? (We have a union floor bar here and it holds position with the motors and ball screws. Again, I don't know your machine, just throwing ideas out). What if you were to give the control a basic rotation of say a couple of tenths, so that the control is always interpolating a straight line instead of actually cutting a straight line? Would the clamps be off and would it be safe to machine then? For that matter you could program every job straight and put in a small rotation every time. Just throwing out ideas that I can think of off the top of my head.

Iskander,

I copied the info I had so far and gave it to our tech person. She were sitting at the win 2000 computer that is/was having problems. I guess there were some other issues with that computer from the get go, so she is just about done reformatting everything and installing the needed software on it. I do believe when she was reading the response from bulliness she said something about not having DHCP, but I could be wrong. I am just passing the info I get from you fine folks to her to see what she can come up. I am way to chicken to start playing with my computer here by myself.

Bulliness,

It does allow me to go to that web page.

I'll try and be a little more specific to the best of my ability. There are somewhere between 15-20 computers on the internet here (50 total networked together), all of them work except for the 2 that I mentioned. The router, firewall, proxy questions I have no idea. The web browser is the latest internet explorer.

The only ftp I have ever been to is the one on this site. I just typed in what appears on the address bar on my computer and it didn't work. The internet security setting is at medium. I also don't know if it is a static or dynamic ip. All computers are networked here using what I have heard them call a switch (?) (the hubs are gone and these are faster?), but I can go anywhere I have permission to on the network here with absolutely no problems. I know I'm not a whole lot of help, but I'm answering the best I can.

We just went from an isdn connection to a cable connection where I work. The problem is my computer (xp pro, the only one) and one other computer (win 2000 pro) are having problems. I can go to msn's web page, but any link I click on 99% of the time does not work. I can't get to this forum or hardly any other place. All I get is the "the page cannot be displayed" error. They tried a registry cleaner on one of them, a spyware program thinking that could be the problem, and it didn't help. Our tech person has called the cable company and they didn't have a solution. Has anyone else seen this before? Any thoughts or ideas I could pass on to our tech? Any help as always is greatly appreciated. Thanks.

A heid question and I miss it.....RRRRR. They just got a cable modem at work and 2 computers can't get on the net. Mine being one of them. Funny thing is, no one knows why.

James, James, James.....Is that beanie to tight? J/K, seriously, that's all we have as far as bar mills go and I love em. There isn't anything I can't make em do (yet).

Randy,

Back to the original question...I have yet to see a heid post output the rounding function. Seems like it would be to complicated to me. Seems like just the CC's and a hard numbers that MC gives are the exact same thing except with a few more lines of code. Not sure about the tnc355 (I think that is what you mentioned in the other post).

You are doing one of two things. Either profiling an internal square by climb milling, or profiling an external square by conventional milling. Assuming you are doing an internal square, the first thing I see is that there is no cutter comp at all (RO or RL). The second thing is if you had cutter comp in the control or the computer and you modified your geometry to have that .001" would the CC in the program instead of a rounding function work? Wish I could be more help, but I need to see or get a better explanation of what you are doing. I really can't understand why the RND vs CC would have a difference.

Mike and Mayday,

I am just talking about a simple, say 3/4" - 1" drill into a piece of steel. Nothing fancy about it. Maybe I wasn't clear, but what is "preferred" or "recommended" the spindle "W" axis moving or the table "Z" axis moving and why?

We are talking decent size machines, cat50 taper, no other issues at all except which axis should be moving. I got the "Why aren't you using the spindle to drill" question the other day and believe it or not, the only real reason I had was "because this is how we have always done it". I myself really don't know any reason why one way is better than the other. I was hoping all fine folks could enlighten me on the subject. HTH clarify things.

Rob,

If you go here web page and download the catalog, it's exactly as the book I have.

HTH

Some info was here web page

I also have a lyndex book that shows all the dimensions of collets that might have all the info you need.

Hey all,

When drilling on a horizontal bar mill, how many of you use the "W" axis versus using the "Z" axis? What are the pros and cons of each? A discussion came up here recently and I am just trying to get a wider viewpoint on the subject.

Thanks,

Are there more pages to the details document, or was the last word supposed to be viewed instead of view? It kinda just stops abruptly on page 2.

Thanks for the tips guys

Paul,

I owe you a few

I really appreciate your help. If I ever get a chance to meet you (and I will find you at brickyard next year if you go), the first few rounds are on me. Thanks!

I have a few questions for all you guru's out here. We had a job that recently kept breaking off a lot of taps. 3/8"-16 in sapphire 5 material I believe. We discussed threadmilling on a job when the proper time came. Well the situation came up where I don't believe it is the proper time, but was told we are going to do it on this job anyway. I am not looking to get in a pi$$ing match with the boss about this. (I already did and lost) It's 4140 ht material where as I have to threadmill 3/4"-10 x 1.50" dp and 1/2"-13 x 1.00" dp. I am limited to 2000 rpm's at the spindle (5" horizontal bar mill). We do have either a 3x or 4x cat 50 speed up head, but I am scared of losing rigidity and snapping them off. Also, the depth is longer than most standard threadmills I have seen. I was told HSS is just at the point where it isn't suited for the material. I am looking for anyone's input, tips, tricks etc. that would help me get this job done by threadmilling.

Thanks for any help guys/gals

If i did this right, we should see the job in question

Ron, care to elaborate on that, I am not sure what you are talking about or what it does, but I am always willing to learn something new. (That's why I always lurk in here).

Wes, Our tool lengths are also done internally by the control. I just forgot how I used to "teach" the tool with two rotations going on since being up in this office for the past 1-1/2 years. Out of habit we normally just go to "Z" zero and inject the value, and I forgot how to do it the old fashioned way.

Ok, here's the answer to my own question. Touch off the tool with a Z zero offset length and manually enter that number shown on the z axis. Injecting the value only works when one axis is rotated and the tool is directly at a 90 degrees orient position. It's also always a z axis inject value. Had to ask the afternoon guy when he came in. I guess I was making it more difficult than it really was. I hate brain fart Tuesday's

Hi all,

Not sure if this should be o/t or not, so if it is in the wrong area of the forum, sorry.

I just got done programming a job for a horizontal floor bar with a heidenhain tnc 430 control. It is an arbor shaft that has 4 ramps at 12.9074 degrees. Normally we would take a job like this on a horizontal and set it straight to the X axis, turn it to the ramp angle and machine the ramp faces with the spindle aimed straight at the ramp faces. Usually there is a couple of feet that is getting tucked in by the column of the horizontal. Well this job is 19 feet long so we threw it up on the floor bar and I programmed it as though we doing it how we normally do as I just described and we are using a universal head reaching over the top (like a vertical machine) and then pivoting the head at 12.9074" degrees.

We used the 3d rotation rotation on the control with values of A=+270 and C=+12.9074. When you teach the length offset of a tool on a horizontal, you normally touch off at Z zero, inject the "Z" value, recall the tool and the tool is taught properly. What is the proper way to do this with 2 axis rotated as I just described? I had to inject the Z value, recall the tool, saw that the Z was off .068", then subtract .068" from the length and manually enter that length and then recall the tool. Anyone know how to teach tools like this and clear up my mind, I would appreciate it.

We used a company called World Class something or other. I am not sure if they just implemented, work for this company or own it tri state , but they took us on a tour of it, and it was layed out very well. They are very organized which in turn gets stuff out the door. There goal is to have as little inventory with as much production as possible. The hardest part about being "lean" is to get every person on the same team, which is essentially what you are doing.

There first example of how inefficient we were was to have us "map" out where and what we went to get on a typical day. It was unbelievable how much time we spent either walking to get something or looking for something.

It is a continuous program that is always changing to improve things. Management, machinists, millwrights, material handlers (labors) all have weekly meetings to come up with ideas to improve. We have certain people in mandrel reduction meetings, job stoppage meetings etc. Not all ideas of the lean principle will apply to everyone, but there are definite ideas that will help any company.

From my point of view, the biggest factor is listening to everyone and implementing the best ideas as time and money become available. It could be something as simple as chaining a wrench to a machine so it is always there, or having a broom hanging where it should be so nobody is spending time looking for it. We are in no way a model lean shop, but a lot of there ideas have definitly made improvements. Our turn around time on a new mandrel was about 26 weeks, the goal was to get them down to 13. Last year we made 13 mandrels at one point with a 2 week delivery period between each one. And no, it wasn't pretty, lots of ot, but it got done. Lotsa crabby people, but the lean process did help a bunch.

JM2C

Thanks Bulliness, will be watching to see where this thread goes to keep learning and learning.

Bulliness,

Quick question: If the "Enable OpenGL® Drawing" is checked but grayed out what does that mean? I am trying to follow along on this one.

Thanks all for the responses. Not what I was hoping to hear though. The last program I made had 13 set ups and without being able to make an .stl and verify it from one set up to the next, it gets downright impossible to know what and where to blend surfaces I missed from a previous set up.

Thanks again,

Greg