My work driving takes me everywhere. Yesterday I drove from Milwaukee to LaCrosse Wisconsin. That's about 200 miles each way. Average 68mph comes to 2 hrs (each way). So with all this driving what kind of gas mileage are we getting? I just bought a Subaru Outback with the 6cyl and got 27.35 mpg. Mixed driving I got 23 mpg. I'm pretty happy with that. My last car was a '99 Camry with a 4cly and I'm used to getting 24-30 mpg. Mike Mattera

People have had very good luck with my training CD's. It's like a teacher in a box. You can sit down with these CD's and a Demo Disk and really learn a lot. I like live classes and real human instructors, but sometimes it's hard to go to a specific location for a regular school. And some teachers only know what's in the book. I know James teaches and I would love to have an instructor like him. You have to have a passion to be a good teacher. Any way, if their interested http://www.tipsformanufacturing.com Mike Mattera

I used to live in a small town in western Illinois (almost on the Iowa boarder) and took a job in Milwaukee Wi. it was about 3 hrs each way. I took an appartment and drove up on Monday, back on Friday. Did that for about a year before we moved up here. I worked about 60hrs a week because it was more fun than going home to my 1 room studio apt. Mike Mattera

So much of the retrofit success depends on the local dealer and how good of a job they do interfacing the control to the machine. Check with all your local rebuilders. They may have other options like Anilam, Accurite, Centroid, Dynapath and there's a PC based one that I cant remember the name of right now. Ah-Ha Now I remember it's Ah-Ha (ahha.com), more of a hobbiest controller with stepper motors. Of this group I like the Dynapath Centroid best How is the machine? You can put the best control on a worn out piece of cr@p and you'll have a Cr@ppy machine with a new control. New electronics does not fix bad ways and sloppy spindles. Make sure its worth upgrading. Mike Mattera

STEP is an option. It's on the menu just like ProE and CATIA(also options) to let you know they're available. Both will ask for an access code. Mike Mattera

I think you sould contact your dealer for the details, since price is not supposed to be discussed on the forum. Mike Mattera

The tinkerer in me would like to build it myself because I know I can. Your Tivo is just a PC probably running some form of Linux. It would give me a reason to learn something about Linux. So far I've not had a reason to play with Linux. As for boxes, I could retire one of my old windows boxes and it really wouldn't cost me anything except some software and possibly a new Video card. Mike Mattera

Sounds like an old German Universal milling machine. Like a Maho. There's so many nice used machines on the market right now. Who would buy something with an Acramatic control? I wouldn't buy an old Cinncinatti with an Acramatic, let alone a retrofit. Mike Mattera

That's a lot of drilling to put all those holes in the tape (I crack myself up). You can certianly use Mastercam's communications or the Cimco software to send data to the Tape Punch. The real issue is ... a) Does your punch still work after sitting for so long. You have to set up the communications for the tape punch and that will require some documentation for the punch. Mastercam can do it. The question is, can your punch still do it. Mike Mattera

Yes it will do it. I made a video to show a customer how it works. You can download that video from the site below. http://www.tipsformanufacturing.com Go to the "Free Stuff" section and pick the video for "Point Closest to Surface". It's about 1.5 mb Mike Mattera

I like SolidWorks. But I use Mastercam for most of my 3D design. I wish I could have Mastercam's sketcher with Solidworks solid modelier. Mastercam is by far the easiest for creating wireframe. Mike Mattera

I avoid Drag. It has issues. Mike Mattera

NO. V9 is looking for MC9's. Do you want it to show .MC8's & .MC7's as well? Or ALL files? Mike Mattera

If you take the time to use the Mastercam tool/material libraries, you can really fine tune it for your liking. In the long run it makes more sense than using an external reference to determine speeds and feeds. Lars makes a good point. Create a tool for side cutting HIGH or Side cutting LOW. It seems that very few people take advantage of the variations of the surface speeds. You can also use the HSS - Carbide - TiN coated - Etc.... surface speed settings in the Material library to make some precise adjustments. User1 and User2 could be the "Other" sfpm variable you need for Bottom Cutting or Bottom Cutting w/ Carbide. Everything you need is already in Mastercam. As always, Mastercam is the 10 lb ham in the 5 lb can. Always providing the most value for your $ Mike Mattera

I was hoping that Hyperthreading would stich up my bad surface models faster . Does any one know why Dell is having such a hard time getting computers out the door? I have not heard of anyone else with delivery problems. Mike Mattera

I was thinking of building one with a spare box. Mike Mattera

If I knew what it was I would gladly swap you. I've never seen (or eaten) a hampster egg Mike Mattera

Here Code_Breaker, See if this helps. Mike Mattera pparameter # Tool Info Values from 20004 line if prmcode = 20004, tlinfo1 = rpar(sparameter, 16) # --------- Tool information from library data (nci 20004 line)------------ tlinfo1 : 0 #slot tlinfo2 : 0 #tool type tlinfo3 : 0 #matl type tlinfo4 : 0 #corner rad type tlinfo5 : 0 #diameter tlinfo6 : 0 #corner rad tlinfo7 : 0 #threads tlinfo8 : 0 #tip angle tlinfo9 : 0 #dia off tlinfo10 : 0 #len off tlinfo11 : 0 #feed tlinfo12 : 0 #plunge tlinfo13 : 0 #retract tlinfo14 : 0 #rpm tlinfo15 : 0 #coolant tlinfo16 : 0 #n flutes fmt 1 tlinfo1 # : 0 #slot fmt 1 tlinfo2 # : 0 #tool type fmt 1 tlinfo3 # : 0 #matl type fmt 1 tlinfo4 # : 0 #corner rad type fmt 1 tlinfo5 # : 0 #diameter fmt "CORNER RAD. = " 1 tlinfo6 # : 0 #corner rad fmt 15 tlinfo7 # : 0 #threads fmt 1 tlinfo8 # : 0 #tip angle fmt 1 tlinfo9 # : 0 #dia off fmt 1 tlinfo10 # : 0 #len off fmt 1 tlinfo11 # : 0 #feed fmt 1 tlinfo12 # : 0 #plunge fmt 1 tlinfo13 # : 0 #retract fmt 1 tlinfo14 # : 0 #rpm fmt 1 tlinfo15 # : 0 #coolant fmt 1 tlinfo16 # : 0 #n flutes

What's with the 36 GB drive. Seems kind of small. Whos this from? Have you tried magicmicro.com . They've built boxes for several people on this forum. 3 days to build & 3-5 days to ship. Mike Mattera

When your in the Operation Manager, select the operation and press the letter T. With this you can turn on/off and individual operation. If you look at the icon for the tool path, you'll see it "gray out" signifing that it's not visible. Some other cool one's while your in the Op Mgr. E = Expand or contract the operations list. L = Lock the selected operation. Useful in case you need to modify the geometry, but dont want the toolpath to change. Changes the icon to a Lock. P = Turn on/off posting for the selected operation. Changes the icon to a Ghost. Mike Mattera

MSI has been good to me. I also Like ASUS. Make sure you gat an 8x AGP slot. Mike

Guess I gotta call Magicmicro now and get my commission (Yea I wish). I'm alwasys looking for a good deal and when I find them, I like to share. They're nice people with good products and fast service. Just like Dell used to be when he built PC's out of his college dorm room. Enjoy the PC. I LOVE mine. Mike Mattera

I love it when, during the demo of a customers part, the toolpath does EXACTLY what you want it to. I hate it when he says "we deceided to buy BobCam cause it cheaper", even if it wont do his parts. Mike Mattera

Love and Hate! You Cant have one without the other. I love it when I develope a process that "couldn't be done" before. Mike

I prefer to have different libraries for different tasks. Tapping Library - Ct Bored Holes Library - Metric Taps with Inch Values - Milling Library (Facing, Pockets, Pockets thru, Contours). 126 groups can take a while to load. Using libraries is one of the keys to fast ans successful toolpaths. Re-Usable machining inteligence. Mike Mattera