Can somebody please confirm that the roughing stepover distance field for pocket remachining toolpath is the same as RDOC?

Yes, we're talking about a round part in a chuck on a vertical mill.

Anybody have a ballpark price for an SMW HG-F 160, 315 or 400?

I'm looking at buying chucks for a VMC setup. I have pricing for Schunk, Bison and Rohm chucks. The technology and the features provided with each are different but I think all could do the job. I'm looking for thoughts regarding the accuracy and longevity of each to decide if the price difference is justified. Schunk pricing is roughly double that of the others.

Thanks in advance for your help.

I updated the driver via the Solidworks website.

Simulation frame rate remains unchanged.

Any other suggestions?

You can go with the Solidworks Certified

I have the following driver options when downloading from nvidia.

Quadro ODE graphics driver

Quadro performance driver

Quadro partner certified driver

AutoCAD performance driver

3ds Max performance driver

Mosaic utility

Mercury transmit plugin

Which should I pick?

I'm working through the mill level 1 training tutorial and having trouble.

My computer bogs down so badly during simulations that it's more like watching a collection of still photos rather than a video. If I run in backplot mode with only wireframe then the animation works ok. As soon as I switch to verify and run in shaded mode the simulation becomes useless.

I need help identifying the problem. Is this hardware or software and how do I fix it?

Computer specs are:

HP EliteBook 8770w

Core i7-3740QM

8 GB Ram

Windows 7 64 bit

Nvidia Quadro K3000M graphics card

Thanks in advance.

Hi all,

I'm working with various tool holding suppliers and having difficulty understanding the options.

The Schunk rep is suggesting hydraulic tool holders with sleeves and claims this to be the least runout holder in the price range I can afford.

The Iscar rep is promoting various holders: spring collets, side screw and some mechanical pin roller lock.

My product requires the drilling of a large number small holes. For this operation minimal runout is important to maximize tool life and minimize breakage. Other operations include facing, contouring, pocketing and thread milling.

Can somebody please point me in the right direction for tool holding for these operations?

Thanks

How does Hyundai fit into the mix with Doosan?

Joe,

You've got it right. The part is contoured around the perimeter and machined on the other two sides.

What is an A51?

Same customer?

Yes

...sounds like this guy is just getting into business and this will be his first equipment purchase to support this one job...

You're spot on Bob. Except this one job has 3 other jobs following it. And the contract is for 7 years.

Thanks for the input guys. I've gone over the numbers in great detail and the margins are good. Millman makes a good point: 2000 pieces will be unattainable. The part I described above is the worst case. It's difficult to say specifically what the demand will be (long cycle time parts or short) since this is a family of parts and the customers order mix will vary every week. I had one of the equipment vendors run a simulation of run times. They concluded that the run time of my parts ranged from 26 minutes to 5.5 hours. I'm betting reality is more like 1-8 hours. Rerunning the business case with 1000 parts still makes this a viable project assuming the average part requires 4 hours. My financial situation prevents me from adding any additional equipment (or more sophisticated/more expensive equipment) until the cash flow from this job kicks in. Of course that's dependent on how much I need to spend on work holding and tooling. I should probably also note that production rates are planned to ramp up over the first two years.

Where do Schunk, Iscar and Sanvik tool holders fall in the hierarchy of quality?

Bob,

I'm aiming to produce about 2000 parts in a year. Material is mold steel. About 1/2 the material is removed during machining.

Does anybody know the difference between spindle bearing diameters for a Haas VF-4 and DMN-500?

Doug,

The parts are roughly 19" x 19" x 2". I don't have a picture at the moment. All six sides need to be machined. All the drilling will be done from the same side.

Dj,

The tightest tolerance that I need to maintain is a 0.005 window.

WAT,

I like the sounds of a one button recovery... Do tool changers jam often? If I'm using X7 to write the programs will my direct involvement with the control be limited to inputting tools and loading programs?

Thanks for all the input so far.

Hi all.

I'm new to CNC machines and about to buy my first mill.

I've acquired a contract to produce components and am now building the capability. I know that sounds backwards but the opportunity came from the relationship with the client, not the existing capability. That aside, I could use some advise choosing and configuration the mill.

The application is predominantly drilling with some face milling, pocket milling, thread cutting and a little bit of hard milling (RC60). The parts are to be manufactured from square bar tool steel.

I've already got the ball rolling with a variety of equipment vendors and narrowed my options to the following:

Doosan DMN-500

Haas VF-4

Fryer V-40

I bought a copy of X7 mill level 1 to ensure I get as much out the mill as I can.

The mill is intended to be run lights-out and will be configured with the following:

Through spindle coolant

Probe package

Automatic tool changer

Undoubtedly I've overlooked an important parameter and I have a pretty steep learning curve. My apologies in advance. At the moment, I'm endeavouring to weigh the value of the following to determine which mill to purchase.

20 hp versus 30 hp

BT-40 versus CAT-40 spindle

Big plus spindle versus standard

Mist collection

Comparative rigidity and durability of the noted machines

Comparative strength of service network in SW ON.

10,000 rpm versus 12,000 rpm (excluding effects on cycle time)

Thanks in advance for your help. I look forward to your comments.