Yup, just looked and it's there. I'll give that a try. Thanks guys!

Morning all, I've been suggested to use G12.1 for hole interpolation - which I have no idea what that is nor have ever used it... I was wondering if anyone here has and how do I go about programming that? The code in question is for the Doosan Puma and i've been using C-axis as my output since the part itself is larger than the Y axis travel range... -JD

Just found this....days after installing 2018 and spending the better part of 2 hours setting up what needed to be done. Better late than never i guess, thanks Colin! I have 10 CD's for the machines I program. 3 of the CD's use different operation defaults due to them being horizontal. Hopefully it doesn't revert anything for those 3 on the next upgrade...

Well, no, it wouldn't do what I needed it to do automatically. I think it has something to do with the way the post file is setup... I don't know if it needs to have something like "plast" or not. The funny part is, when i used "first_tool", it only posted what I needed automatically for everything else, except T35. I can get away with using mi10 option tho. Thanks for everything tho

Sorry ya had a tough day. Been busy myself as well. First chance i got today to see this.... jeez. Anyway, i'm not sure I understand what you are asking =\

I've finally had some time to try out the other half of the formula. I did do testing on the mill personally on Monday and I'm happy to say I've found what I need when T35 is called up: (T35 = 8.0" F-MILL ) N40 (ROUGH FACE - A0.) N50 G00 G91 G28 Z0. N60 T35 N70 M6 N80 S370 M03 N90 G00 G54 G90 A0. X-.88 Y-8. N100 G43 H35 Z4. M08 N110 Z.1 N120 G94 G01 Z.01 F50. N130 G41 D35 Y-3. F12. N140 Y3. N150 G40 Y8. N400 G00 Z4. N410 M09 N420 G00 G91 G28 Z0.0 M05 N430 G00 G91 G28 Y0.0 N440 M01 ( ***RETURN FACEMILL TO DEDICATED POCKET*** ) N450 P15 M06 N460 M01 So I went ahead and tried to add a boolean formula into the M01 section so the last 3 lines show up automatically when T35 is used, however the post file is setup in a way that mi10 needs to function on the next tool in order to get a custom code to post at the end of the previous toolpath. I almost got it, but instead i did this: if mi10$ = 98, n$, *sm01, "( ***RETURN FACEMILL TO DEDICATED POCKET*** )", e$, n$, "P15", "M06", e$, n$, *sm01, e$

Hah, thanks! I do have a massive list of mi10 items as part of a custom M00 line with comments so we do not have to keep typing them by hand - this way if we switch the same program to another machine, the same comment appears in the same spot. It's just a matter of getting other programmers to remember it's there and how to enable it. Coding the mi10 is the easy part - it may have to be the way to go - A little background insight into our post history: For about 18 years, we've had the same old posts until recently - 3 years ago - when CIMQUEST re-wote everything for us so the posts are fresh and new and updated. Then a year ago we switched resellers, however the new reseller we were with now no longer supports mastercam >.<, so at the moment, I cannot be 100% sure if we are back with our previous reseller. Communication with a forgetful boss is a PITA. There were some codes i've had to add and modify on my own, including the creation of 2 new machine post files ( copy + paste + modify ), which turned out to be quite successful.

Funny this topic showed up. We just tapped titanium in early August. We tapped M2.5 x .45 threads using OSG's plug tap. It is a reverse helix tap that turns right handed - worked out very well as we were going 5mm dp. We also used carbide drill as the tap drill.

I did some testing and compared codes.... you were right, it wasn't what I wanted but I did test the first code 2 ways: #pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, next_tool$, e$ if *tlngno$ = 35, [ pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, e$ ] else, pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, next_tool$, e$ #pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, next_tool$, e$ if t$ = 35, [ pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, e$ ] else, pbld, n$, "G43", *tlngno$, pfzout, scoolant, next_tool$, e$ Both work the way i need them to. I went with the bottom code. Now, hopefully the machine does not index, but if it does, there's something in the parameter that forces indexing. (T35 = 8.0" F-MILL ) N1620 (FINISH FACE - A270.) N1630 G00 G40 G80 G90 N1640 T35 N1650 M6 N1660 S370 M03 N1670 G00 G54 G90 A270. X-.88 Y-8. N1680 G43 H35 Z4. M08 N1690 Z.1 N1700 G94 G01 Z0. F50. N1710 G41 D35 Y-3. F12. N1720 Y3. N1730 G40 Y8. N1740 G00 Z4. N1990 M09 N2000 G00 G91 G28 Z0.0 M05 N2010 G00 G91 G28 Y0.0 N2020 M01 Now, I need to try and figure out how to insert a previous tool command after M01 so the machine forces T35 to return to its dedicated pocket. The issue is - a previously used tool will be sitting in the dedicated pocket while T35 is in the spindle - I think this will be much harder as it has to be a parameter thing. I have a few ideas, but not sure if they will work. There is something I need to try first at the machine. I know HAAS can tool change using the "P" code; Wonder if Doosan does the same. Its just a matter of adding a similar formula. EDIT: because tool 35 is in a dedicated pot, that pot will never change unless there is an issue with the hardware itself.

Np, but 16 machines?! jeez. Good luck! and thanks,

This was harder than i thought. I was hoping a simple formula such as if t$ = 35, stagetool = 0 would work but nope lol.... not that simple =(

I might tackle this tomorrow, will let you know. Thanks!

I've done quite a bit of post editing, but nothing as complex as what you are suggesting. The 50 taper machine is pretty solid as I believe they're a "big plus" spindle. We've had the machine for 2 years now and while there were some minor issues with the tool changer itself, drifting, and guzzling too much oil, it has been solid and stable. Still runs smooth. I've ran a 3.875 OTM drill on the Doosan mill and the load was 50-60%. Outside of the issues, machine performs remarkably well. The side loading tool mag is nice, but it can be a pain and none of the guys liked it so we had to make a step platform so we can get into the machine and load tools from the front, which is also a pain. I've used it to remove tools as needed. The tool changer issue was due to pockets being bad..... ( yes on a NEW machine ) The drifting issue we have happens when we shut the machine down all weekend then fire it up. Even after warming it up twice, G54 home positions are never the same; all axis are off anywhere between .0005-.001 each - This is still an issue. The oil guzzling was due to bad internal parts, which we just replaced. It took us 2 years to realize that filling the way oil up daily was a bad thing.

nick - as far as the machine itself there's always positives and negatives. The machine we have is gear driven so we have a lot of torque, which is a nice thing. Hardware wise, machine seems solid, software wise, I think it should be more user friendly. We have a Haas VF-6 and a horizontal Mazak.... in terms of user friendliness, the HAAS wins, but again, the HAAS is 'okay' when it comes to hardware. The mazak we have is a sweet machine; its fast, its easy to setup, and it has 10,000RPM. The controls are a lil less user friendly, but anyone who runs Mazaks won't have this issue. Plus, with a mazak you can do a great number of programming at the control. I classify the doosan as non-user friendly, somewhat of a PITA to setup - at least with what we have. Seriously, 50 tools?! The most we were able to get was 40.... We pre-stage tools on all of our machines. Our previous mazak 655-60 had pre stage tools enabled, yet with large tool and empty adjacent pockets, the tool magazine remained motionless at the large pocket, even when the next tool was called up. I liked this better vs the Doosan, because with the Doosan the magazine moves to the next tool instead of remaining where its at to save time. The Haas we have functions the same as our old mazak. Only 2 or 4 machines in the shop have random pockets.... the Doosan being one of them. All the others are dedicated... and funny you should mention that because on of the old dinosaurs actually thinks the Doosan can be switched from random to ded, and I told him no so there was an argument about it till the repair guy came in and he asked him then said "my bad, you were right". Random pockets are nice if you are only running 4 tools, you can place them side by side, which saves a tremendous amount of time if you are only doing one hole per part. Thanks all for your feedback. Looks like we're stuck with it.

So we have a Doosan Mynx 7500... My issue with the machine is this: When calling up a large tool and then tool changing to something else.... the machine first indexes to the tool that was called up, but when the machine realizes it isn't the correct pocket, it indexes back to the pocket where the large tool is stored at then tool changes and indexes to the right tool then tool changes. I hate that, the previous Mazak we had did not do this, the HAAS we have does not do this, our machine vendor wasn't much help, So i wondered if anyone here has a fix for it? At the moment, the only thing i can think of is editing the post file somewhat so it doesn't index when "T35" is in spindle and once T35 is finished, machine tool changes to previous tool then moves onto the next tool. I don't know, maybe that's over complicating things in terms of post file... So, as a result, i've been trying to avoid using the large tool as much as I'm able to. -JD

I think i found the setting in the control definition to eliminate the need for manual breaking of circles: Within the arcs setting, theres a checkbox to allow 360 degree arcs, and that along with break at quadrants doesn't work.... it's one or the other; I unchecked all options that contain "allow 360 degree arcs" and picked break at quadrants in the drop down list. I posted a comparison between the 2 and the code seems to have posted correctly. Will keep ya'll updated when we actually machine something. -JD

I agree with Jparis regarding mastercam reseller training. My company switched resellers and I believe it was a good switch because they have people available who are willing to show us a thing or 20 about mastercam which most of us might not know and it was good. I would get in touch with your reseller to find out what they offer regarding training. Before I started working with rotary axis programming in X9, everything we did prior to X6 was typed in by hand - the axis code that is... for just simple point to point rotations. I never liked doing it till I made a mistake in manual inputting the code and that was when I decided that the old way of doing these things needed to stop. Good thing that.

Colin, are you able to elaborate a bit on the different uses between Mastercam and NX? I'm wondering if there is a special use for programming with NX? Just curious really.

Well.... Metric (shudder) tapping.... Our UK Manufacturing shop has plans for expansion and they're looking to us for a bit of help. They started with a HAAS EC-1600 and just recently bought a VF-8. Now... I have a Cimquest post file for the HAAS VF-6 here in the US and I'm very well aware the UK uses metric first then imperial second. With that being said, I've been experimenting with the generic Fanuc 3x post that the UK uses for the EC-1600... I've compared post files for tapping... seems odd the feed for the generic fanuc comes to a feed of F173.3 ( this is with G94 called ) for tapping I tried the cimquest post and it is set to G95 and a feed of F1.75 for tapping... As for Cimquest.... we've switched mastercam resellers and the current one I think has their own guys so... they pretty much said the control file is all that needs converted from inch to metric and it'll post as metric without editing anything in the post file. I'm kinda skeptical but... So with that being said... is the tapping feed rate for MM/rev correct? -JD

Everyone here has great comments. Part of my education was at RIT (Rochester institute of tech) in Rochester, NY for my machining education which took 3 years. 2 years bridgeport and manual machines then 1.5 years CNC (mostly learning the code and what they do). Of course, they trained us on Safety, then the basic setup on a bridgeport using parallels, edgefinder and making our own 1-2-3 block.... then grinding it on a surface grinder after they were sent for hardening. We also learned how to use the lathe. I believe that learning both a mill and lathe can make you go far in the CNC world since you have an understanding of both. There was a Company willing to take me in as a CO-OP for college credit, I can say the experience was interesting. It was hard, don't get me wrong. I think my biggest mistake was going back to the same company as a full-time job, but hey it was a learning experience. After I got laid off, I found a better place some 6-8 months later. This was the year after 9/11 attacks. I've been working at the 'better' company for 13+ years now (8 years as a machinist, 5 years as a programmer). As a machinist, you learn how things are coded to make machines run, the setups....good and bad... plus playing around with feeds and speeds to find the optimum point of machining. Kinda like process improvement by decreasing run times... but this is when you gain a full understanding of limitations. As a programmer, I learned directly from the mastercam X2 training tutorial handbook in a week from home. I never attended classes. I did a chapter a night and I do have to say it did give me a jump start on programming, but learning the "tricks" had to come from one of the guys with experience. After that, and once you're comfortable, expand your knowledge with new toolpaths (which might xxxx off machinists LOL), but hey if it works and impresses management, they will want keep you as long as possible. Now? I do have a lot of post processing editing experience by doing a lot of trial and error experimentation to improve out old post files as well as obtaining new ones thru cimquest, which was a huge plus. There are still times when I make mistakes programming wise, but its part of the job. At least I still go out on the floor and run the machines if theres any available - it keeps your skills sharp. Sorry for the long post! -JD

You might want to look at the Machine Definition for the rotary axis. The first thing you see is a machine tree at the lower right side. There should be something called "VMC A axis" under the "Mill table group" tree - dbl click on it and another window comes up with extra parameters... The section you might want to play around with is in the lower right side. My 4th axis is set to "Signed direction, absolute angle (0-360 deg)" You might have to play around with those settings to see what works. I could be wrong, but give it a try.

I've been doing this for milling on the OD... but I would have liked to completely avoid breaking up circles just to make it work.... unless it is the only way?

I know its at the end of the day, but I seem to have a lot of issues with Doosan and or the post itself. With that being said, we have a Doosan Puma 3100 LY.... and I figured circle interpolation would work great for all the mill work we've had to do on aluminum. So every hole we did except the center holes did machine a perfect circle. The center hole and c-bore did not for some odd reason, i'm stumped. What is happening here is: for C axis programming, before the final diameter, the spindle does a full 180 move: going from clockwise to CCW then back to clockwise - its as if it doesn't want to do a full circle on a hole from centerline. Mastercam backplot and verify are perfect, posting is a different story. I even tried a pocket toolpath for roughing and the results were the same.... I also switched from C axis to Y axis and still got the same results. I'm wondering if my issue is in the machine parameters somewhere and i'm also wondering if there are specific settings that need to be corrected in some way in order for posting to work correctly. Hoping to get some feedback because I feel i'm a lil out of my league in trying to figure this issue and yea we want to fix it somehow. -JD

What is "X+" Just wondering.

Let me first say how much of a PITA these Doosans can be.... (TOOL - 7 OFFSET - 7) (3.0"X .0625 SLIT SAW) (SLITSAW PART) N1030 G54 N1040 T0707 N1050 G19 G98 N1060 M35 N1070 M90 N1080 G0 C90. N1090 M89 N1100 G0 X10. Y-1.899 Z.8795 M08 N1110 G97 S100 M03 P12 N1120 X.2 N1130 G1 X-.0626 F10. N1140 G41 Y-.499 F1.8 N1150 Y.499 N1160 G40 Y1.899 N1170 G0 X10. N1180 M09 N1190 M90 N1200 G30 U0. V0. N1210 G30 W0. H0. N1220 M05 P12 N1230 M01 The code above is how mastercam + post processor posts for the Doosan. What happens here is the machine alarms on N1100 saying X overtravel, but we have 2.5" of travel on Y axis. However... from what i've been told by the place that sold the machine to us.... the further out in X, the less the Y axis travels. So with that knowledge, I had to manually add code to make it work: (TOOL - 7 OFFSET - 7) (3.0"X .0625 SLIT SAW) (SLITSAW PART) N1030 G54 N1040 T0707 N1050 G19 G98 N1060 M35 N1070 M90 N1080 G0 C90. N1090 M89 N1091 G0 X10. Y0. Z1.7 N1092 X.2 N1093 Y-1.899 N1100 Z.8795 M08 N1110 G97 S100 M03 P12 N1130 G1 X-.0626 F10. N1140 G41 Y-.499 F1.8 N1150 Y.499 N1160 G40 Y1.899 N1161 G0 Z1.7 N1162 Y0. N1170 G0 X10. N1180 M09 N1190 M90 N1200 G30 U0. V0. N1210 G30 W0. H0. N1220 M05 P12 N1230 M01 The above is what I had added to the program to make it work without alarming out. This might seem far fetched, but is there anything in the control definition that could be made to do this or is this a post processor thing?