All the Fanucs with Renishaws (ts27r), I have setup have the "z adjustment number" in two variable places. Easiest way to find out what variables are relevant is to record macro variables, run calibration and see what changed. Its around 520 like previous poster said. Also, on your blum are you just plunging on the c/l of the disk? 

Correct the with the Blum tools are just plunged to the center for tool touch off. I would rather have a TS27R but the Blum is what was installed in it. But I at least have a Renishaw OMP-40 part probe.

When using the Renishaw tool setting macros, there is generally a #500 series variable that records the distance (in millimeters I believe) from the machine home position to the skip point on the tool probe, adjusting this number allows you to adjust the length that the touch off routine computes, sounds like its off by about .0015

 

Since the macro's are made to be able to use different variable numbers on different machines with different options it impossible to say with certainty what the exact number is.. but it's usually macro variable #520

 

If you think that's what it is and you are going to change it.. do yourself a favor .. make a small change and write your original number down before you change it!

 

 

Doh.. I am just editing this because I realized you said your using Blum laser so this wont apply..

 

Editing again to say I agree with the poster that said to lie about your tool offset length on your probe.. if you adjust your probe length it will change your results in Z when you touch off in Z

I have the low tech Blum touch off that's just a round part on the probe each tool is touched off on. I can touch my part off then touch all my tools off but they are always .0015 above the area I touched off with my probe. that being said I have a work around, I just touch my part off then touch off all tools. then before running them I add the .0015 to my Z wcs on the control under my G54 etc. then when checking my tool blends they are all within a .0002. Im trying to take the extra work out so that the night shift operator with only 6 months experience can just touch his tools off and go and not have to mdi his tools to z- zero and blend them off accordingly. Also my variables are stored in the 500's in my control I just don't have a 520 value.  thanks for the info.

I have values for the probe from variable 500 thru 517 on the renishaw side. The blum tool setter is not a laser it's just a face that the tool comes down on kind of works like a TS27R but not as nice beings it's not renishaw. I have tried messing with the length offsets page on the register for the probe but I can set it to 1 inch off or .0015 and no change so it's not grabbing its number from the length offsets. Thanks everyone for the help.

I have a renishaw OMP-60 probe and a Blum Z-nano ( Non Laser type )  tool setter. I have them calibrated and all of my tools always need to have a positive .0015 added to the respective tool length offsets page to have them blended properly. Is there a parameter on the machine control or something in the renishaw macros that I can add or subtract this .0015 difference so that when I touch my tools off they are one to one with my part pick up probe or at least a couple tenths at most. Just trying to dial them in closer than .0015 and not sure how to do it. The control is an Fanuc 18i-MB. Thanks for any helpful info anyone can provide.

change your step over to 50% to 60% of cutter diameter and also try using parallel spiral clean corners option for your roughing approach.

I use it as a way to mark what paths have been run in my list of groups of paths. It helps when the next shift comes in along with notes to let them know whats been run and what is left to do.

the only draw back with our Roders at work is the fact you cant use cutter comp or so the operator says it wont. other than that it rips through cores and cavitys at lightning fast speeds with great finishes..

is this the result of a group being created ?? I don't have solids but remember they use to group sometimes and I would have to clear the group option at bottom left of screen to get it back to normal color..HTH..

This is the tree format I see in my X8 Tool manager.

Do you see something similar?  I have selected the 'cutting tools' on the left to get the tools to the right side.

 

Andy.

I am seeing the old tool manager that I access via the toolpath tool parameters page or the tool manage from the drop down menu under the toolpaths tab in mastercam. I messed with that tool manager in X7 that you have a pic of and couldn't or didn't have the time I should say to figure it out so I stuck with what I new worked.

Rick your tool libraries should have been in tool database format for use in McamX7. 

McamX6 was the last version that supported tool-version libraries.

You might need to go back to the McamX6 tools-6 file convert that into a tool database then move it forward.

actually X7 supported it as our whole shop is using it in that format right now for we have not fully switched to using X8 shop wide. Just got installed last week and everyone is still trying to get it setup how they like and what not. but the tool manager is something everyone is complaining about so Im trying to find a cure. There is a setting in the advanced mastercam configuration in the control panel to enable the use of tool-7 extensions rather than the toolsdb. but not in X8.

yes the migration wizard was used in updating to X8 from X7. Just trying to get it to show up in tools only mode. thanks in advance.

Our company has just recently upgraded to X8 update 3. we have been using tools-6,tool-7 file extensions for our tool library's up until now. now that our tool libraries have been converted to toolsdb extensions for tool database the tools no longer show up in the tool manager when I choose tools only in the display mode. If I select assemblies or both they show up but tools display only they disappear. Anyone have a solution for this or should I just save them all to a new library and start fresh. On another note the tool library mill inch that is installed by default with mastercam does not have this problem. just our custom tool libraries that we have made over the years.  thanks in advance.

Not a Haas guru but sounds like a parameter maybe that needs changed or adjusted in the machine itself ?? JM2C

go to your tool library and adjust your feed rate for each tool needed and save the tool library. you have a feed rate a plunge rate and a retract rate. This is where you tool paths are getting the 500 ipm federate from not the operation defaults.

+1 on the curve slice option.. I use it on a daily basis when I need a good boundary to drive my tool paths for outside profiling of a part.

The reason I don't tap it to the true depth in one step is due to low spindle torque. this is why I was attempting to rigid tap on this machine today. I have done it on other machines with no problem but this machine has never had rigid tapping run on it and its supposed to be one of the strong points of this machine in particular.It was a 16.0 x 2mm tap that was giving me problems in H-13 steel. I tapped them with the generic tap to Z -.875 deep using tapping oil and it had the spindle load at 65% so I left them at that and I tapped them by hand the rest of the way to depth. So during some free time today in aluminum I thought I would use rigid tap and just go back into the hole to the required depth of -1.625 in Z and thus the problem with the stripped threads with the first depth of  Z-.875. I could have thread milled them but I wanted to utilize the rigid tapping on this machine for no one prior to me running had ever attempted it nor had a reason as to why they did not attempt it. I like to know the machine I am running can do what its supposed to be capable of when and if I choose to go the route in question. Normally I just thread mill anything over 1/2 and run a tap down the hole by hand if I cant reach my intended depth with thread mill. I was just experimenting was all. If it doesn't work then so be it but just looking for any info as to why it might not work if its on my end or something with the machine. Its due for its annual maintenance in a couple months I may just wait and ask the guy doing the scheduled machine PM and pick his brain about it if I don't get it figured out sooner. thanks for the info Ron. Again just doing some experimenting so that if rigid tapping is needed I know I can do it in the future.

I recently done some experimenting with rigid tapping today and my results were not good. The hole tapped fine but upon reversal out of the hole it stripped the threads out. here is an example of my code as it is output from my tap path.

%
O0000(T)
N100 G20
N102 G0 G17 G40 G49 G80 G90
N104 T19 M6
N106 G0 G90 G54 X0.0 Y0.0
N108 G43 H19 Z2.
N110 G95
N112 M29 S1069
N114 G98 G84 Z-.5 R.1 F.05
N116 G80
N118 G94
N120 M5
N122 G91 G28 Z0.
N124 G28 X0. Y0.
N126 M30
%

I am using a collet holder that is keyed at the bottom to keep the tap from slipping in the holder itself. I can use the generic tapping with no problems but rigid tapping dose not work well for me. Is it the holder that I am using or something in the machine that needs adjusted in the rigid tapping parameters. On parameter 5211 The override (Draw) is set to 200 in my machine parameters and parameter 5213 retract is set to 2000 in the machine. The machine I am using is a Toyoda FV1050s and it does support rigid tapping. I am wanting to utilize this feature so that I can go back into the same hole but a deeper depth without cross threading the holes and once I get this figured out would like to incorporate a rigid peck tapping cycle in my custom drill cycles in my post. thanks for any help.

or you can save the file with said tools and delete the geo and tool paths then merge your new geo in to use them as well or you can leave the tool paths and utilize them with your newly merged geo. just a reversed method of above.

I have noticed since I updated to the newest X8 release that my tool path lines and surfaces edges are not smooth anymore.  Maybe this is just a coincidence but I don't think so.  I only notice this when my tool path does an arc off move.  That arc move is broken up into large angled lines.  When I create a surface, flat boundary for instance, where the surface meets my boundary the same thing is happening.  Anyone else noticing this?  Maybe my computer has a graphics problem.  Everything else looks great.

had the same problem in X6 just chalked it up to the graphics card due to our IT guy wanting to use the same card for 5 yrs straight on multiple computer builds.. but then upgraded to X7 and this issue went away. Not sure what causes it because I can open up X6 and still happens but not in X7. as for X8 our company is not ready to open that can of worms just yet lol..

On my Metrol height setter I just enter an X and Y value next to G332 in MDI if my tool is larger .75"

this is what I do as well but just concerns me if I have a tool with 5 indexable inserts in It am I touching off on the tallest one or the shortest one of the bunch. seems like with face mills there is always one insert that hangs out a couple thousandths more than the rest. my machine orients and locks the spindle when touching tools off so I have been breaking them down and rotating the tools so that they will touch off with the x or y offset in the same direction on every tool so as to take out the guessing game as much as possible as to which direction to offset it. this dosent work on face mills that are direct mounted to the tool body and not mounted in a collet or heat shrink holder.

Its a habit to all of the seasoned programmers to regen every operation when not creating it from scratch. The tool numbering issue happens if programs are run on the same MD, CD, & Post but just on a different machine with different tooling and numbering for finishing rather than roughing. it also does this when changing MD,CD, & Posts to be run on completely different machine. The lock feedrates option I have never seen a positive use for this in the shop I work in. Its the first thing everyone disables when setting up a new install of mastercam due to it causing problems in the past versions. I have never sent in a file to QC because when I asked about it months ago I was told by others they are experiencing it as well so I figured there would be a update released to fix this as well as any other bugs that are still in X7.

You will not see a update to X7 at this point, but I sure like know what work a rounds your whole shop has to do to get there jobs done.

Give some examples.

the main one that comes to mind that affects everyone often is that if a job is pathed for one machine with said machines tool numbering then at the last minute it is moved to a different machine with different tool numbering we cant just go into the path or the tool tab under the path itself and change the number ( used to be able to do this in X5  & X6 ) Now it will change to the number desired but will post out the original tool number it was pathed with. only work around that works is to change the tool number or reselect the tool out of the machines tool library its being run on and regening the path in order for it to post out the correct tool number in the NC code. there are problems with deleting tool out of the tool library when people try and clean out there tool library's of old tools no longer being used. only way to get around is to save all need tools into a new library then rename it back to the library name you choose.

also it seems like there was an issue with something when importing tool paths ops to use on new geo but that may have gotten addressed with the last update but the two above are just minor things unless you don't look at your code before running it then it can be major if you go to finish with a 1/8 ball endmill in the machine the paths were meant for originally but they get run on a different machine and the tool number gets changed but not updated when posted and you finish the piece with a 2 inch face mill. wouldn't be good on the operators end by any means. but IMO just minor things.

I'm used to using a Reinshaw TS27R probe to set my tool length offsets but currently running a new machine that has had to many young people trained on it when it was bought new and did not take good notes and these individuals are no longer with the company. My question is has anyone one on here any experience with this one in particular and if so how do you go about touching off large diameter face mills. it has a macro to run that touches off small diameter cutters that are less than one inch. in the macro it has a x and y value you can use to offset the center of the cutter to touch off larger cutters but it only gives you the result of one insert on an indexable cutter. I am use to the cutter spinning in revers thus getting the furthest point or highest point by touching off on all the inserts in the cutter. Is this just the way it works or is there something like a diameter offset I am missing on the input of the macro used to touch off the cutters. for example the diameter and length of the cutter in the macro so it know an approximate length to rapid to before the spindle starts rotating to get the highest point on the face mill. these not a lot of info on the web site unlike Reinshaws page..

http://www.blum-novotest.de/measuring-components/products/tactile-tool-setting/z-nano.html

thanks in advance.

I'm hoping for one last update to fix the few minor bugs that X7 still has let alone taking a chance of jumping into another mess with X8. for right now the whole shop has to use work a rounds in X7 to get things done but its hard to teach new people the right way when the right way doesn't seem to work. Love the software when its working great but simple things are getting over looked in a hurry to advance to a newer version IMO..

its been a while since I have had time to address this issue any further but I get the message in a pop up window titled " Tool Libraries Error " Tool could not be deleted. then allows me to hit ok and go on. I get this result in any random tool library, using the various methods available of deleting said tools and on any of the machines running X7 mu2. I have deleted tools before in previous versions no problem but X7 is a no go. I currently leave the unwanted tool and edit it when I add a new tool to my library since it cannot be deleted or if creating a new library I save all the needed tool and create a whole new library..any ideas on this greatly appreciated.