david n
Diamond
- Joined
- Apr 13, 2007
- Location
- Pillager, MN
No. No it’s not. You get what you pay for.
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Haas UMC 500 alternatives
- Thread starter updatedsecurity
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- Replies 85
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Vancbiker
Diamond
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Location
- Vancouver, WA. USA
One thing in common is in 10-12 years it's quite likely that neither will still support the control hardware.
been stated already but a popular setup guys are moving to in a job shop is slapping a narrow 5th in the Y axis just like a rotary table all the way off to the right of the table leaves plenty of space on a vertical for some standard vise work and allow you to keep the 5th on there as well. if you have a bigger vertical might be a good cost effective route into toying with 5th axis before you take the big plunge.
I’d buy a 8’ Victor lathe if I had more space. I wouldn’t touch a Victor 5 axis no matter the price. IMO, OR can’t even make a half decent VMC. I have a friend who owns a large Victor 15’ lathe, and it’s been nothing but problems since the day it was put on the floor. Swapped two spindles in the first 6 months, down 5 out of the 6. When he wanted to send it back, the sales said it wasn’t working right because the location he placed it in had bad ‘Feng shui’.
If we’re talking Taiwanese machines Litz, Quasar, or Champmill have had pretty good reviews depending on who you ask on their 5 axis offerings. Micro dynamics which I think is owned by an American in Taiwan, have really impressed. I know a shop that has bought multiple 5 face and VMCs in the last two years and have nothing but great things to say. They were on the second floor at TIMTOS and the cuts they were taking was still impressive.
I also know guys that run only haas machines in Taiwan. I guess it all depends on what you want to do, I wouldn’t buy one. But familiarity of the control can’t be overstated. I’m happy with my various import machines but running 4 different controls now gets annoying real quick and support is often lacking. I’m OP’s case local US machine, with good support for a familiar control may just be good enough for what he wants to do.
gregormarwick
Diamond
- Joined
- Feb 7, 2007
- Location
- Aberdeen, UK
You have first or second hand experience of the OR VMCs or just hearsay? I don't have any myself but I know a shop that has a few of them in production and the guys speak quite highly of them - but their only other VMCs are Haas so...
I have two ( actually only one now, since I moved jobs and took one with me) Victor VTurn 36 lathes (15/18" chuck) and both have been super bulletproof in the 10-12 years I've ran them. The older of the two is a 1997 and I put new spindle bearings in it two years ago when the originals lost their preload. It's mechanically as good as the day it was new. I'd not hesitate to buy another.
Haas makes a great vmc. Their 5 axis machines are pretty trash overall. The reliability isn’t good somewhat due to the bad design. There’s not a lemon situation going on here, just not good machines.
My first job straight out of high school 15 years ago was an operator in a shop with 6 Victor VMC’s. They didn’t impress, the main complaints were broken taps and surface finish. The owner was a foreigner so he didn’t like the service to boot. However I wasn’t a programmer nor setting things up, just a monkey loading parts, so there may have been other factors at play. Funnily enough after I left owner swapped all the Victor VMC’s out for Haas machines and has been slightly happier. The goodway lathes, which also didn’t impress are still running to this day.
Later on I went to a government sponsored machine school for 8 months. The place I’d say had over 100 Victor machines split over multiple buildings. The 8’ lathes were work horses, the VMC’s once again failed to impress. Here I did get to program and set up the 3 axis VMC’s. Lots of downtime, poor finishes and any tool over 3xD stick out sounded terrible. But once again these machines were heavily abused and crashes were common.
Everything else is hearsay, but I do live in Taiwan and there are Victor’s on every street in the Taichung area. Common things keeps coming up the 20,26,36 lathes with 8” and 12” chucks are solid machines, the 3 axis VMC’s I’ve never heard anyone say it’s bulletproof.
Now my first machine was a used YCM Supermax, I think 2001 build, which was also heavily abused. I have no idea how to maintain it, I want to move it out to bring something modern in, but it just won’t break. When it does any local 3rd party gets it going within a day for almost no money. It’s slow but makes excellent parts with great finishes and accuracy. It is now the training machine as it’s the only ‘crashable machine’. This machine to me is a solid Taiwanese machine, which the OR Taichung’s are not. However people locally aren’t as happy with the newer generation YCM’s if compared to builds 10+ years ago either so there’s that.
Last edited:
EmGo
Diamond
- Joined
- Apr 14, 2018
- Location
- Over the River and Through the Woods
96 and 144" chucks are pretty honkin' big, I'd usually want to go to a vtl long before I got there .... what are you making, cranks for marine diesels ?
Hmm, I meant 8 and 12 inch chucks on the Victor machines that are often seen in the field, which are the a/s/Vturn 20,26,36 lathes.
I just realized I got the imperial ‘punctuation marks’ wrong
please my accept my condolences.
This will be a rough ride for you if you have any kind of expectations. Those are two things that Haas is particularly bad at.
When my brother's shop took delivery of a robot loading system for a VF2 (Haas installed and integrated), there were little expectations. It was an experiment of sorts to see what the deal was. Its for sale now. With the perfect parts and patients to get it setup and keep it running, it could have been ok.
Our expectations are not great. We have a couple of Haas machines and know what they can and cant do. We realize that we have to get into the 5 axis world, and thought this was not a bad way to do it. We have a handful of robot fed machine tools, so this wont be a virgin experience. We will learn on this machine, then step up to 5 axis work on our Integrexes.
alliancefab
Hot Rolled
- Joined
- Feb 24, 2009
- Location
- Massachusetts
Exactly. I was about to put another VF2 on my floor just out of curiosity I sent an RFQ to my local Doosan rep on a SVM4100. I could not believe it when the SVM came in cheaper when the machines are optioned the same. Needless to say I have a new Doosan showing up in a month.
mhajicek
Titanium
- Joined
- May 11, 2017
- Location
- Minneapolis, MN, USA
From what I can tell, there's something like 150 MTBs out there, and most of them have several different models of mill. From where I'm sitting, I can't even get an order of magnitude ballpark on price without contacting a salesman. I certainly don't have time to build a personal relationship with each one and explain my predicted needs to them. What I need is something like this, but for mills:
Let me quickly select for work envelope, spindle speed, spindle taper, ATC capacity, and maybe checkboxes for what additional features and bells and whistles I want, tell me what meets my specs and what the price is. Then I can pick out a few, or even several, promising contenders to have a longer conversation about.
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Let me quickly select for work envelope, spindle speed, spindle taper, ATC capacity, and maybe checkboxes for what additional features and bells and whistles I want, tell me what meets my specs and what the price is. Then I can pick out a few, or even several, promising contenders to have a longer conversation about.
it is a bad way to get into it though if you're expecting to hit the ground running.
it is good if you want to learn about how everything can go wrong though, so if thats what you wanna do - go for it.
Mazak has their entry level VC-Ez 16X. @ $190k
I was looking at the Brother U500 but its only positional and only 28 tools, still great machine, still might get one for replacing a small VMC later.
What do you all think of the Mazak C600, I was eyeballing this, larger machine, CAT40, 18k, lots of tools, pallet pool option.....base was $280
They have i600, their top of the line, they have 2 of them at their training centers they want to get rid of, but they have the 12k hi-torque spindles and a 2 pallet changer on them for $340k,
I was like nah.
I was looking at the Brother U500 but its only positional and only 28 tools, still great machine, still might get one for replacing a small VMC later.
What do you all think of the Mazak C600, I was eyeballing this, larger machine, CAT40, 18k, lots of tools, pallet pool option.....base was $280
They have i600, their top of the line, they have 2 of them at their training centers they want to get rid of, but they have the 12k hi-torque spindles and a 2 pallet changer on them for $340k,
I was like nah.
Houndogforever
Hot Rolled
- Joined
- Oct 20, 2015
- Location
- Boring
Mazak has their entry level VC-Ez 16X. @ $190k
Holy shit, that is entry level? I'm too damn old for this crap.
Holy shit, that is entry level? I'm too damn old for this crap.
Digital Factory
Aluminum
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2023
- Location
- Southern California
Volumetrically, maybe. As for features machined on the same plane, it'll hold a few tenths.
Regular models tend to be more accurate than SS models due to finer pitched ballscrews and less generated heat. SS is needed for full 5-axis though, as the slow speed of the regular models in the B and C rotary axes is a chokepoint.
