5 axis and pallet pool, who competes with Haas?

[EmGo]

I would be first to journey into the land of the unknown even with missing support documentation if there was a simple purchasing pipeline but add up all the deficiencies in the entire situation and it sounds like a real nightmare to figure out.

Dang, missed a paragraph in the middle, buried under that tcpc crap. Sorry, had to come back and restart. Btw, if that shit is supposed to be english, I'd just as soon try reading characters.

Answer is easy. Both heidenhain and siemens controls are options. Not fanuc because fanuc won't sell to china machine tool builders. So any 'application support' which is available to siemens or heidenhain users is available to people who buy a china-made 5 axis machine. And that includes the very low end, little 200 mm ones like in the photo above.

Seems like for us old farts who grew up with plain english, 'application support' could be translated as "good manuals"

If you ever want to see proper "application support" then you should get some old K&T stuff. You can actually create the entire computer down to chip level, drives, and interfaces from their documentation. In fact a friend redesigned the spindle drive from the schematics which came with a 180 I had. Sundstrand was similar. My Westinghouse came with the code listings for the executive program. I couldn't do anything with it but it was there ...

Additionally, between german schematics and chinese schematics, I'll take chinese any day. Whose brilliant idea was it to make the schematics for an entire machine one page high but fifty miles wide ? Jesus.

Everyone is saying "give us some information"

Pardon my french, but bullshit. Mhaj wants a full listing of the features of every chinese vmc available so he can freely compare; well too bad. If he wants that he can do it himself.

That's not my job in life. It's simple. Look at the photos. Those are typical designs. If the designs are interesting, then ask specific questions. Some people have, and their questions have been answered. This comment is not factual.

 

[mhajicek]

That was possibly a tactical error

I can't today, over-ran my monthly data but monday, look out. I can put up 300 or so right away, is that enough ?

Are they understandable by someone who only speaks English?

 

[EmGo]

Are they understandable by someone who only speaks English?

I think so ... the cadcam ones for sure, the "how to recover from a broken tool" ones yes, g-code mostly yeah, lots of graphics, in general I'd say yes. Not as easy as one's native language but there's lots of vietnamese guys pushing buttons in LA so can't be impossible. Tuesday I can snag a few examples. Most of them seem to take the form of a button-pusher asking a question, then the lead guy/girl going through the correct process.

Kinda funny, there's some higher-level math lessons around too - which I understand just as well in chinese as I do in english I like geometry but calculus and above, whoo boy

 

[2outof3]

I am going to sound like an old guy here but after reading this thread over a few times, I think a big thing that is missed is, the small details matter. They really matter when you are approaching parts in a five axis. I see it more with customers who buy a machine just like a Brother. Same, spec, same thing, except they are not. The details are in the 40 plus years of experience, getting seconds out of machine movements while still holding positional accuracy.

Why buy a Hermle, Grob, or Matsuura? The things you don't know. The years of little bits of knowledge that are the soul of the machine. You can have the most robust casting in the world but that is just a little bit of the puzzle. Especially when you are trying to hold tight locations from multiple positions after machining from multiple faces.

Old guy opinion.

 

[EmGo]

Why buy a Hermle, Grob, or Matsuura? The things you don't know. The years of little bits of knowledge that are the soul of the machine.

The 'soul of the machine" ? you gotta be shittin' me, now we have to put them on an altar and sacrifice goats ?

too silly. They are all designed by kids with tats and their hats on backwards in solid modellers with fea. There haven't been any little bits of knowledge in these things for forty years.

Old guy opinion.

If you insist on talking souls, to this old guy K&T had a soul, American Tool, Devlieg, Moore, Sundstrand, Ingersoll, Cincinnati, Hillyer ... Bendix, GA, Allen-Badley, G&L, KT D controls, they each had their own personalities. The ones you mention may as well be washing machines. It's 2023 now ....

 

[2outof3]

The 'soul of the machine" ? you gotta be shittin' me, now we have to put them on an altar and sacrifice goats ?

too silly. They are all designed by kids with tats and their hats on backwards in solid modellers with fea. There haven't been any little bits of knowledge in these things for forty years.


If you insist on talking souls, to this old guy K&T had a soul, American Tool, Devlieg, Moore, Sundstrand, Ingersoll, Cincinnati, Hillyer ... Bendix, GA, Allen-Badley, G&L, KT D controls, they each had their own personalities. The ones you mention may as well be washing machines. It's 2023 now ....

Lot's of tribal knowledge out there making the good stuff. K&T was shit. Moore had it's place and still make a few interesting specials. Cincinatti and Ingersoll had nice machines. Says the guy who started at Acroloc.

 

[DanielG]

what the hell did Awea do here ?

Awea took a bog standard Fanuc and slapped it on a machine that needs the counterbalance cylinder rebuilt every year and will be worn out in ten years.

 

[EmGo]

Says the guy who started at Acroloc.

Acroloc ! omigawd ... I think you're mostly safe here cuz nobody with any sense bought one of those Had both cincy and k&t, would disagree with you that k&t was shit, especially control-wise, really don't care for the cincinnati controls. But coming from acroloc, you may as well be us machine tool -- who did have the best show babes Remember the Wizards of Anilam at westec ?

I agree with you that machines in the past had soul -- but not anymore. Even liebherr is just machine-inna-box now.

Awea took a bog standard Fanuc and slapped it on a machine that needs the counterbalance cylinder rebuilt every year and will be worn out in ten years.

The one we had had a fidia. It worked okay but wasn't a wonderful machine. 1 meter by 3 meters, iirc ... and it did some 'unusual' things. The fidia had some interesting capabilities but it always felt more like a hobbyist project than a reliable industrial control. C-A-D on a machine tool just felt ... wrong.

And the 'service and support' everybody is infatuated with ... spindle misbehaved, they wanted $20,000 I think to fix it ? I took it apart, got it working at least well enough for our stuff in two days. Possibly the people who rave about 'taiwan quality, not chinesium' have never owned one ? The youji vtl's are awful, shenyang pretty nice. It's possible that differences between companies has more relevance than geographical origin.

 

[2outof3]

Acroloc ! omigawd ... I think you're mostly safe here cuz nobody with any sense bought one of those Had both cincy and k&t, would disagree with you that k&t was shit, especially control-wise, really don't care for the cincinnati controls. But coming from acroloc, you may as well be us machine tool -- who did have the best show babes Remember the Wizards of Anilam at westec ?

I agree with you that machines in the past had soul -- but not anymore. Even liebherr is just machine-inna-box now.


The one we had had a fidia. It worked okay but wasn't a wonderful machine. 1 meter by 3 meters, iirc ... and it did some 'unusual' things. The fidia had some interesting capabilities but it always felt more like a hobbyist project than a reliable industrial control. C-A-D on a machine tool just felt ... wrong.

And the 'service and support' everybody is infatuated with ... spindle misbehaved, they wanted $20,000 I think to fix it ? I took it apart, got it working at least well enough for our stuff in two days. Possibly the people who rave about 'taiwan quality, not chinesium' have never owned one ? The youji vtl's are awful, shenyang pretty nice. It's possible that differences between companies has more relevance than geographical origin.

If you were doing die castings in 1980 and such, Acroloc was a winner. Same for the early Chiron's before 2000. Technology passes many builders by.

 

[mkd]

Old guy street cred thread, FTMFW

 

[boosted]

too silly. They are all designed by kids with tats and their hats on backwards in solid modellers with fea. There haven't been any little bits of knowledge in these things for forty years.

If the brands you are pushing truly believe that, then I think we just learned everything we need to know about their level of quality.

Sounds like something the SwissMak guy would say.

 

[cornerRad]

Out of curiosity, I reached out to these guys: Jingdiao JDNA-Precision for a quote since I'm in the market and they are being toted in this thread as equals to Hermle but for Haas money. I will admit, some of their IMTS videos looked impressive if the numbers are true.

However it's been a week and haven't heard back from anyone, seems they are not that interested in selling me a machine and if you have to know a guy who knows a guy who needs to represent you to get a response and make sure you don't get screwed over by the builder. Then that's not a very compelling reason to buy their machine.

 

[kyleisraaddd]

I am going to sound like an old guy here but after reading this thread over a few times, I think a big thing that is missed is, the small details matter. They really matter when you are approaching parts in a five axis. I see it more with customers who buy a machine just like a Brother. Same, spec, same thing, except they are not. The details are in the 40 plus years of experience, getting seconds out of machine movements while still holding positional accuracy.

Why buy a Hermle, Grob, or Matsuura? The things you don't know. The years of little bits of knowledge that are the soul of the machine. You can have the most robust casting in the world but that is just a little bit of the puzzle. Especially when you are trying to hold tight locations from multiple positions after machining from multiple faces.

Old guy opinion.

agreed. at my shop, our owner is currently trying to purchase a pallet machine. luckily I was able to talk him into matsuura, and currently we are shopping for either an mx330 pc-10 or mam72-52v... I am very very excited.

to watch the matsuura factory tour and see those old dudes all hand scraping everything, is pretty awesome

 

[Billy_C]

agreed. at my shop, our owner is currently trying to purchase a pallet machine. luckily I was able to talk him into matsuura, and currently we are shopping for either an mx330 pc-10 or mam72-52v... I am very very excited.

to watch the matsuura factory tour and see those old dudes all hand scraping everything, is pretty awesome

Those two machines are in different leagues. If you are doing high-mix 10 pallet, the mx330 will run out of tools quick unless the limit is no longer 60 . If I had to choose MX330 PP vs UMC500 PP, I'd choose the UMC500 because I don't want to have to deal with either one but at least if it's the UMC500 I can find someone.... anyone... to have it making parts in no time and not even get involved.

edit: MX330 is 90 max now, still not enough for 10 pallets high mix but less crippling

There a tons of other, better, recommendations in this thread besides Matsuura. Best to shop around a bit.

 

[Mr.Chipeater]

edit: MX330 is 90 max now, still not enough for 10 pallets high mix but less crippling

There a tons of other, better, recommendations in this thread besides Matsuura. Best to shop around a bit.

I believe its actually 120. Just got a quote for one a couple months back.

 

[Billy_C]

The latest spec sheet on the 330 via their website is 60 standard 90 optional. I think 120 would go to a matrix system and only their higher end machines offer that. Maybe it’s some kind of retrofit from your distributor?? ask them, I’m curious now. 120 on a belt is totally reasonable so no reason why it couldn’t be done but it wasn’t an option when I last got quotes from them. The UMC500 maxes out at 70 on that giant wagon wheel setup. I don’t hate the big wheel though. From a simplicity standpoint, it makes sense. It’s still a low tool count for 10 pallets high mix. Really not an issue for most people though. People say they want to run high mix but you really have to have a tight operation to be able to keep a high mix pallet setup running like that.

I’m being hard on the MX but seems there are other options out there for better automation that are competitive in that price range. I think there are even a few threads around here discussing the MX flaws and common issues.

 

[2outof3]

90 tools is the US standard for the MX-330 PC10.

 

[Billy_C]

maybe they need to update something...

pdf downloaded from here just to make sure I'm not going crazy. Matsuura USA

MX-330 PC10

Learn more about this Matsuura Model: MX-330 PC10 in the MX Series. Technical specs, videos, and more.

www.matsuurausa.com

 

[Billy_C]

Interestingly the MAM 52 doesn't even come with a tool belt anymore. It starts at a 130 matrix. I'm not sure when that started but I've seen MAM 52s with belts. Maybe I'm going crazy on that too.

 

[mkd]

.

. If I had to choose MX330 PP vs UMC500 PP, I'd choose the UMC500 because I don't want to have to deal with either one but at least if it's the UMC500 I can find someone.... anyone... to have it making parts in no time and not even get involved.

I just threw up in my mouth, a little.