Sandvik Group buys Mastercam

[gregormarwick]

We spent a lot of money buying featurecam only to have that go to subscription, don't want to go through that again. I want to change software because i don't want to spend heaps of money on post processors for dead software. When delcam had it posts were free. now we have to pay to have post written from scratch by our reseller, we were quoted about $3k for a live tool lathe post (so far i have been able to program everything on the controller), i imagine a post for the 5axis mill we have coming will be $10K+.
I love featurecam but it's no longer being developed so its days are numbered.

Your reseller is fleecing you for posts.

Our 5 axis millturn post was £1700 and that is a much more complex post than a typical 5ax mill. That was direct from AD, not through a reseller. Full machine simulation was included in the price after I supplied them with the model.

PM me about your live tool lathe, I may have something that will work for you.

Featurecam has about the best system for writing your own posts that exists, so you're really not at the mercy of the reseller the way you are with other systems anyway (Mastercam....)

Another very good reason not to prematurely jump ship, especially for a sidegrade like you are proposing, is that when development of FC does finally stop (it's not quite there yet actually), the final release will almost certainly be a permanent license, so you will be able to really get your moneys worth for a few years until it gets too out of date to use.

 

[EmGo]

Featurecam has about the best system for writing your own posts that exists, so you're really not at the mercy of the reseller the way you are with other systems anyway (Mastercam....)

You are never "at the mercy of your reseller" for posts. Ever. There are places who do nothing but posts, and they've been around a long long time and know what they are doing.

the final release will almost certainly be a permanent license, so you will be able to really get your moneys worth for a few years until it gets too out of date to use.

It will never be too out of date to use. I've got a 2D dos parametric drawing program from Computervision that still works fine. Software doesn't go bad.

 

[gregormarwick]

You are never "at the mercy of your reseller" for posts. Ever. There are places who do nothing but posts, and they've been around a long long time and know what they are doing.

Reseller, third party, same difference. The ability to be entirely self sufficient with posts has always been one of the top reasons for sticking with featurecam for me. I bought a post for our first 5ax because I thought it would be too much for me to deal with and I didn't want to get dragged down developing a post when we had machine repayments to make. The reality is that I have modified it so heavily at this point that it wouldn't have been much more work to do it myself from scratch, which I have done with every other post we use here.

It will never be too out of date to use. I've got a 2D dos parametric drawing program from Computervision that still works fine. Software doesn't go bad.

No, but you will eventually get left behind. Not soon, but eventually, inevitably. New technology that you can't use because your ancient software doesn't support it, files coming from customers that you can't open, etc.

 

[EmGo]

New technology that you can't use because your ancient software doesn't support it

pfffft, what a bunch of crap. "New technology" ... more like "new ways to con you into pissing away big money for nothing."

That's why they are having to go subscription, because they can't/don't offer any reason for people to buy.

 

[metalmadness]

They need to do what AD did(Fusion360) and offer a very limited Mastercam for hobbyists/graduated students where you can do basic tool pathing only in 3 axis. Make it NOT cloud based, and no need for internet, UNTIL you need to re-do the license by an internal software clock. If I was 23 and put as a button pusher somewhere and didn't want to forget programming or wanted to design something I would be on that like hot cakes.

But there is already an educational version of Mastercam that can post code for $160/year (multiaxis included)...so they are basically already doing what you suggest. You can even generate up to $1500 in annual revenue with that version. If people actually researched what Mastercam was doing they wouldn't say stupid shit about them.

"Mastercam needs to go sUbSrIpTiOn like AutoDesk"....oh wait, they already have a subscription option.

Not to mention the Home Learning Edition (HLE) of Mastercam that has been around for...15 years? That has always been free for anyone to learn with. And new in Mastercam 2022 is now Productivity+, Blade Expert, and Port Expert. What other CAM company in the world will let you mess with their most expensive modules for FREE? NONE. No one else will let you program impellers like that for free. Sure you can't post but you can learn...

 

[gregormarwick]

pfffft, what a bunch of crap. "New technology" ... more like "new ways to con you into pissing away big money for nothing."

That's why they are having to go subscription, because they can't/don't offer any reason for people to buy.

I 100% agree with you that cam software is stagnant.

That doesn't mean the rest of the industry is standing still. New things do appear every now and then that require software support. Minor things for sure, but they add up over a decade or so.

 

[Dan B]

If it were a machine like the Multus I can see that being a lot more.

I got a quote for MasterCAM for our new Okuma Multus in January 2020. They quoted me $40,900 CAD. The software itself was $29K, the rest was post, training, installation, travel expenses etc. I seem to recall a $500 charge to install the software. Too much nonsense.

 

[Mtndew]

I got a quote for MasterCAM for our new Okuma Multus in January 2020. They quoted me $40,900 CAD. The software itself was $29K, the rest was post, training, installation, travel expenses etc. I seem to recall a $500 charge to install the software. Too much nonsense.

Damn, that reseller assumed he saw a big wallet and overcharged.
$29k for the cad is about right depending on what add-ins you had quoted. The post you would definitely need. All the other crap you don't. Training I believe is free with a new purchase.
I wonder how much they were charging you for a post?

 

[Dan B]

It's not the first time I've had an overpriced quote for MasterCAM. They size up our company and figure we are big enough to afford it. We may be bigger than some other companies but we're not suckers.

 

[Mtndew]

It's not the first time I've had an overpriced quote for MasterCAM. They size up our company and figure we are big enough to afford it. We may be bigger than some other companies but we're not suckers.

I just noticed you're in Canada. Those prices don't seem that far off now.

 

[empower]

But there is already an educational version of Mastercam that can post code for $160/year (multiaxis included)...so they are basically already doing what you suggest. You can even generate up to $1500 in annual revenue with that version. If people actually researched what Mastercam was doing they wouldn't say stupid shit about them.

"Mastercam needs to go sUbSrIpTiOn like AutoDesk"....oh wait, they already have a subscription option.

Not to mention the Home Learning Edition (HLE) of Mastercam that has been around for...15 years? That has always been free for anyone to learn with. And new in Mastercam 2022 is now Productivity+, Blade Expert, and Port Expert. What other CAM company in the world will let you mess with their most expensive modules for FREE? NONE. No one else will let you program impellers like that for free. Sure you can't post but you can learn...

NX has full blown educational version for free. cant post, but you certainly can program blades, ports etc.

 

[Mickey_D]

We quit using it about 4 years ago. Once you finally got a post to work (seemed to take forever by the time you found all of the bugs and went back and forth with your reseller) the interface still sucked. I know the resellers have to make a living, but writing posts from scratch for common machines instead of just pulling a known good one from the shelf? Stupid business model.

 

[Mtndew]

We quit using it about 4 years ago. Once you finally got a post to work (seemed to take forever by the time you found all of the bugs and went back and forth with your reseller) the interface still sucked. I know the resellers have to make a living, but writing posts from scratch for common machines instead of just pulling a known good one from the shelf? Stupid business model.

Mastercam? What machine?

 

[Mickey_D]

Mastercam? What machine?

They never could get the one for our Okuma L200M to work right. Got tired of jacking with it and just use the conversational in it. The one for my 560s is pretty good after a lot of wrestling with it.

 

[metalmadness]

We quit using it about 4 years ago. Once you finally got a post to work (seemed to take forever by the time you found all of the bugs and went back and forth with your reseller) the interface still sucked. I know the resellers have to make a living, but writing posts from scratch for common machines instead of just pulling a known good one from the shelf? Stupid business model.

Why would you write a custom post when you could just buy one specific to your machine for not that much money? Or just edit the generic fanuc post so that you're not writing it from scratch

 

[hasall10fingers]

Hopefully Sandvik takes Disasterscam around the barn, puts a bullet in its pathetic head, pushes it into a deep, deep hole and buries it. That would be best for the entire CAM market as a whole. The jig is up! I can't believe Disasterscam has made it as long as it has.

 

[empower]

Hopefully Sandvik takes Disasterscam around the barn, puts a bullet in its pathetic head, pushes it into a deep, deep hole and buries it. That would be best for the entire CAM market as a whole. The jig is up! I can't believe Disasterscam has made it as long as it has.

i personally prefer 'mastercrash'

 

[Mtndew]

Hopefully Sandvik takes Disasterscam around the barn, puts a bullet in its pathetic head, pushes it into a deep, deep hole and buries it. That would be best for the entire CAM market as a whole. The jig is up! I can't believe Disasterscam has made it as long as it has.

It sounds like you aren't smart enough to figure out Mastercam, so you bash it.
That's typical for people who say it's trash.

 

[metalmadness]

I 100% agree with you that cam software is stagnant.

That doesn't mean the rest of the industry is standing still. New things do appear every now and then that require software support. Minor things for sure, but they add up over a decade or so.

this attitude is dumb. CAM software is standing still? Would you like them to just magically program your parts?

Mastercam Unified Multiaxis is huge

 

[EmGo]

Mastercam Unified Multiaxis is huge

Yeah, it's almost as capable as NCL from 1985 ...