Hi All,
Longtime lurker but first time poster, I'm in a small team of ~6 techs supporting a research facility. We have a small shop with old but good lathes, another old but decent universal mill and a Taiwanese knee mill. All major fabrication goes to a seperate production workshop or outsourced, so our shop is mostly used for quick mods, repairs or urgent fabrication work almost always 1-off parts. Half the techs are ex-machinists but like me have not worked as such for many years and usually have little cnc experience. The other half are not from a machining background but have been taught basic machining skills on the job. Some (like me) would welcome some cnc capability and are not concerned about picking it back up, others are either too set in their ways or it would be too intimidating. My impression is that we would 100% still want to have the convenience of manual machinery for the sort of work we usually do.
I'm considering doing some machinery upgrade though, and want to cover all bases and not potentially miss out on new capability for those who can take advantage of it. Hence I'm looking also at combo/hybrid/'teach' or whatever they are called machinery. Something still resembling a manual machine and with handwheels but which can be used in CNC mode also when that suits. Most discussion about things like ProtoTrak lathe/mills seems to revolve around comparisons with CNC (which they obviously lose) but I'm really interested in feedback from people who have used such machines in the context of a "manual" machine. Are they a case of 'no good at either' or do they do a passable job as a manual machine?
I'm thinking along the lines of a Trak TRL1630RX lathe https://www.southwesternindustries.com/products/lathes/trl-1630rx-toolroom-lathe
and
DPM RX3 Mill https://www.southwesternindustries.com/products/dpmrx-bed-mills/dpm-rx3-bed-mill
Any experience good or bad would be welcomed. Who else makes such machines? Makino used to make a handwheel-CNC mill but seems not to anymore, ditto Haas with a combo lathe. Is it that these type of machines are just no good for either task and are not in demand? Being as we are in Australia it's probably not so easy to get a 'test drive' and it would be a big purchase I'd hate to buy something which ends up not suitable for requirements.
Thanks in advance
B22
Longtime lurker but first time poster, I'm in a small team of ~6 techs supporting a research facility. We have a small shop with old but good lathes, another old but decent universal mill and a Taiwanese knee mill. All major fabrication goes to a seperate production workshop or outsourced, so our shop is mostly used for quick mods, repairs or urgent fabrication work almost always 1-off parts. Half the techs are ex-machinists but like me have not worked as such for many years and usually have little cnc experience. The other half are not from a machining background but have been taught basic machining skills on the job. Some (like me) would welcome some cnc capability and are not concerned about picking it back up, others are either too set in their ways or it would be too intimidating. My impression is that we would 100% still want to have the convenience of manual machinery for the sort of work we usually do.
I'm considering doing some machinery upgrade though, and want to cover all bases and not potentially miss out on new capability for those who can take advantage of it. Hence I'm looking also at combo/hybrid/'teach' or whatever they are called machinery. Something still resembling a manual machine and with handwheels but which can be used in CNC mode also when that suits. Most discussion about things like ProtoTrak lathe/mills seems to revolve around comparisons with CNC (which they obviously lose) but I'm really interested in feedback from people who have used such machines in the context of a "manual" machine. Are they a case of 'no good at either' or do they do a passable job as a manual machine?
I'm thinking along the lines of a Trak TRL1630RX lathe https://www.southwesternindustries.com/products/lathes/trl-1630rx-toolroom-lathe
and
DPM RX3 Mill https://www.southwesternindustries.com/products/dpmrx-bed-mills/dpm-rx3-bed-mill
Any experience good or bad would be welcomed. Who else makes such machines? Makino used to make a handwheel-CNC mill but seems not to anymore, ditto Haas with a combo lathe. Is it that these type of machines are just no good for either task and are not in demand? Being as we are in Australia it's probably not so easy to get a 'test drive' and it would be a big purchase I'd hate to buy something which ends up not suitable for requirements.
Thanks in advance
B22