Haas Super Mini Mill

Category : Haas Haas Mill News

I’ve wanted to get my hands on a new Haas machine for a while. Really wanted to see what the new control was like.

Haas Mini Mill

Stilz provided the machine and the victims for the training.

If you have read any of my articles you will know I have always had an affection for Haas machines. The first one I ever worked on being about 1994. At that time they were nothing short of ground breaking innovation.

Things like a built in airline and coolant wash-hose were not only innovative but really useful.

Coolant Hose (What Will You Do With This)

A machine that worked straight out of the box. Easy peasy tool-change. Handwheel to scroll through the program, people still get impressed by this today.

Programmable coolant nozzles, fuckin hell that was a game changer. Just move nozzle to a position and press an F key and it’s stored with the offset.

Macro at no extra cost (wow) some people wanted two grand for this (cost of a good family car in 1995)

Program restart still the best in the world, don’t get me started.

The New Machine David How Was It?

To start with on this one I didn’t like the interface but it does grow on you. You need to get used to using the touch screen. Access to some menus is a bit convoluted too.

This Haas Mini Mill has a 10k spindle and 24 tools.

Something I suddenly remembered about this model. Well you know when you get a cup of coffee and it’s in a tall tapered glass mug? You are thinking “nice big cup of coffee”. You take four big swigs n it’s gone, shit what happened. What happened is an optical illusion because the cup is tapered it’s actual capacity is that of a thimble.

It happens all the time everything comes in a great big box with loads of packaging and the actual item is minute.

Anyway try moving this machine to the end of it’s stroke in X. Fuckin hell what a disappointment I recon you can only move around about half the table. I mean great you can put a pretty big part on here. That’s great so long as you don’t want to machine it!!!

It definitely is not what you expect from the company that’s known for pragmatism. Anyway that does piss me off.

The way this machine is being used is running programs from a memory stick. At first I thought it was a bit crazy as the programs weren’t particularly big.

Anyway surprise surprise it works well. Just plug in and press load and it runs. But what about editing you ask. No problem you just do it. Same as normal.

Program restart, no problem works exactly the same as when running from memory.

VPS Haas Mini Mill

To be honest I used to avoid this like the plague but now on this Haas Mini Mill it’s actually quite useful really good graphical representation and easy to fill out boxes with plenty of explanation.

It’s gone from being pretty shit to not too bad.

Face milling, pocketing that kind of stuff, you can quickly create code n stuff in your program.

All in all a big improvement.

The Graphics

Sorry but I have to say this is incredibly disappointing. I think Haas are really missing a trick here. Experts correct me if I’m wrong but how hard would it be to put some real good program simulation graphics on this control?

I mean it’s like the fuckin 1980’s. I mean yes you can pick out typos and wildly wrong tool paths but that’s it.

At least you can speed it up and slow it down with the F3 and F4 keys which you can’t do on a Fanuc.

Haas

Coolant Level

You would think every machine would have a coolant gauge, sadly they don’t. Really useful.

Typical Haas.

I Am The Greatest (Almost)

I always recommend my trainees to watch every video I ever did and read all my articles. Worship me please I love it.

But hold on Haas Tip of The Day, fuckin awesome. This alone should be enough to make you buy a machine. This does people like me completely out of work. Haas USA keep up the good work.

Probing Haas Mini Mill

This machine has the all singing all dancing probing system. Personally if I was buying a machine this would be an absolute must.

WIPS system. Now if you even mention whips in my circle of very juvenile friends the conversation from then on is stuffed with childish CarryOnEsk comments. Never mind perhaps the guy at Haas who thought of it was genuinely naive. Enough said.

The interface for this is good, tool measurement is a doddle the actual setting of datums I think is a bit more convoluted than it used to be. Think they want you to use the touch screen.

Anyway not really grounds for complaint.

You can only set your Z offset as zero which I think is a bit shit. (Let me know if I’m wrong.). You can’t set the top of your part as Z1. to machine it off.

Haas Are Into Everything

I think Haas make their own everything now, they even sell a fan with the machine that blows off the table. I love these. Yes I know you already used one.

But…. does your machine have a nifty widget that just programs it for you? I think not sucker.

Haas Mini Mill

Just love it.

Do Haas do double glazing.

Even A Brush (That’s Insane)

The Thing With The Airline

There is like a little black hole in the windscreen of this Haas Mini Mill, you blast it with your airline and it cleans the screen from the inside. How cool is that?

 

Oven Ready Machining

On a Haas you get everything even a tool tightening whatsit.

And Even a Tool Tray

By the way if you buy the Super Dooper Mini Mill it comes with a mini bar, how cool is that.

Alarms What Alarms

This is another great idea. Any alarms come up in red so you can just go to it and then when you correct it, it’s no longer red.

Nice little touch

Haas Mini Mill

Fusion 360 & Haas Mini Mill

I believe the two companies are working together and it shows. My customer was using Fusion 360 and the flow was seamless. Post worked great without any tweaking to the code. My customer proved to me that my skills are outdated. Who needs to know this stupid G code shit. Just get a copy of Fusion 360 and away you go.

Bowling club, tea shops and pissing my pants here I come.

Insert Media File

Now I know they had this for a while but I haven’t used it so it’s new to me.

Stuffing pictures in the middle of your code is awesome. Think of the fun you can have. Leave a picture of your fat arse for the bloke on nights (maybe not). Anyway it’s great. Couldn’t get the video one to work (if you know how let me know). Who knows what I’ll put on that.

What a great idea. They even give you a quick way to get to the link.

Programmable Coolant Nozzles?

Haas are known for these as I mentioned earlier.

Sadly not on this one but I still liked the layout. Little tip here if you can afford through spindle coolant it’s always worth having on a new machine if you want to take advantage of modern tools. This one didn’t have it.

Conclusion Haas Mini Mill

Not bad, some improvements. In all fairness it’s hard to improve on something that is already pretty dam good. But please, please sort the fuckin graphics, it’s a big let-down.

Loads of stuff to love really enjoyed this one, in great company at Stiltz, nicest guys I ever worked with.

One quite serious point it still has that thing where it carries on after you wind the hand wheel too fast to catch up mmmm. Not on the bigger machines.

Third day they took the piss relentlessly. Everything stops for Pop-master on the radio, they loved my knowledge of the 1970’s. Being an old fart does have a few advantages.

If you need CNC Training get me in, you won’t learn much but at least you’ll get a good score on pop-master.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Citizen CNC Over-Travel

This is a quick post about over-travel on a Citizen CNC sliding head machine. The Citizen range of CNC sliding head machines are very versatile.

It’s very easy to get the axis mixed up on the Citizen CNC. Fortunately it has these easy screens that show up when you select your axis

Citizen CNC

Just use your increment button to deicide how big you want your moves to be. Once you press the manual button it will turn yellow. Now press the increment you want.

Citizen CNC

You can over travel and sometimes this machine just wont move.

It just sits there pissing itself of laughing at your expense. I know because it happened to me, searched the manuals, searched the internet. Nothing absolutely jack shit.

I was just about to tell my customer that I was a complete failure and just retire which frankly I should have done years ago.

Anyway I stumbled upon this little beast.

Citizen CNC

Press him, it’s OK I promise. Yes it’s an over travel release button. Amazing.


Hyundai Wia L 300LC CNC Lathe

Tags :

Category : Fanuc Manual Guide News

Classroom Training Click Here

Very solid nice big Hyundai Wia CNC two axis lathe with Guide i, what more could you want?

Hyundai Wia

You know like when you have been on holiday eating loads of fancy food and you get home and all you fancy is a nice simple chips n egg?

Staple diet of my childhood. Anyway that is what this machine is. It’s the chips n egg of the CNC Lathe world.

Having just worked on a Nomura sliding head that’s as complicated as a nuclear reactor (are they complicated, I don’t know?) Anyway it just seems nice to come back to some nice simple stuff.

This is a no messing sturdy beast, none of your namby pamby driven tool shit.

No Y axis, and no stupid sub spindle to mess about with. G12.1 forget it. C axis no way.

Happy days, easy training job simple two axis CNC Lathe with a Fanuc i series control. Oh and it’s got Guide i too. I’m gonna love this.

Hyundai Wia With Guide i

Seem to get loads of these lately an I’m kind of getting to like them mmm maybe not. There’s loads of good stuff mixed in with some bad shit.

Sorry I’m rambling.

Guide i Did You Know?

Well I certainly didn’t. Anyway it’s got this button called alter.

Fanuc Guide i

Always wondered what it did so today after some deep breathing exercises I plucked up the courage to press it. Put on a mask, gloves and full PPE.

Safety shoes, check.
Incontinence briefs, check.
Crash helmet, check.

Bingo I pressed it.

Guess what it did…….

Nothing, jack shit, fuck all.

Ah but wait don’t go off to some other boring stupid website with naked chicks or naked dudes. No no no.

After much deliberation me and my new bestie (James) tried every combination.

Anyway if you highlight an M code and then press the beast. Guess what it comes up with a list of all your M codes, all their meanings and you get to pick one.

Fanuc Guide i

Woopee, err, not. Well I suppose it must have a use. If you didn’t know the M code you needed I suppose it could be good.

Now I lost a good 10 minutes of my life trying to sort out what this button did and I’m not impressed.

No matter how totally bladdered my mates are at the pub tonight I wont be able to impress them with this one.

Anyway enough said, I bet someone at Fanuc got promoted after inventing this exceptional, programming aid. A close runner up to the Fanuc PROGRAM RESTART button as another contender for the “this button is fuckin useless” award 2023.

Guide i Did You Know

Honestly this one really is worth reading. When you want to call a sub-program and you are not sure what number it is this one helps.

Press  Fanuc Guide i

Then from the screen move over to subprogram.

Fanuc Guide i

This takes you into the directory and from here you can select your subprogram. It will insert this into your program complete with the M98. And if you use names for your programs then it puts it in those nice little V shaped brackets. What do you call those funny brackets by the way. Does anyone out there know?

Guide i

Names For Programs

Using names for programs is cool. When you are an old school pre-septuagenarian git like me it seems real 21st century. Saves on all those shitty four digit numbers and bracketed descriptions.

This is mine above <FACE-GUIDEI>, certainly save on typos. I recon if you get into the habit of using this it could be very useful.

Guide i

If this sub program call feature is on Trust pilot I will give it 6 out of ten or maybe 7.

So bloody shit-faced convoluted to find. I mean who the fuck would think right I’ll press this button called FIGURE I mean it’s bound to take me somewhere where I can input my sub programs straight from the folder they are in.

Enough said.

The Machine David The Machine

Oh yea, some stuff I like on this machine.

Absolute encoders, no stupid zero return. Switch it on wait a few minutes press the standby button and you are good to go.

No open and close the door shit, no rotate the turret shit no no no just switch the beast on. Lovely.

Clever that is, my tellies at home are the same, can safely say I never had to zero return any of my many 50″ tellies. One in every room by the way except for the shit-house.

No open and close the door shit, no rotate the turret shit no no no just switch the beast on. Lovely.

Gear Change

Now I knew this thing had a gearbox but I couldn’t get the thing to change gear. Well actually you don’t need to. Just select a speed in G97 and it gets the right gear. What’s all the fuss you ask? Well if you are in G96 and it’s in low gear. Imagine you are facing off a part, well it will get to 1000 revs and just stay there.

Anyway the technique is as follow

You will get low gear

G97 S500 M3
G96 S200

You will get high gear

G97 S1200 M3
G96 S200

The G97 will make the machine select the correct gear.

Hand wheel Hyundai Wia

The jog and hand wheel are the same mode just press this button.

Hyundai Wia

When an increment is selected the button will start to flash indicating that You are in hand-wheel mode.

Hyundai Wia

There is a slight delay in starting the jog mode so be patient. A couple of times I thought it wasn’t working and started playing around with other buttons.

Turret Index

Turret will only index in manual mode when the X axis is at zero return. It is probably better to use MDI as it doesn’t mind where it is. Obviously take a good look at the surroundings before pressing cycle start.

Indexing the turret is done with these buttons. Hold in the middle one and press either of the outside ones to move turret clockwise or counter-clockwise. Press and hold for continuous rotation, Top red number is station number.

Hyundai Wia

Don’t forget when you index the turret the tool is not active, the Fanuc control will only display last tool used in MDI or in  program.

Start Spindle Hyundai Wia

As with most Fanuc controlled machines you will have to set a speed in MDI before you can start the machine manually. Once the speed is set use these buttons. Press and hold central button and your direction to start spindle manually,

Hyundai Wia

If you press forward or reverse without the central button the machine will jog the axis at the programmed speed. You can also do this with the door open. lucky you.

Hyundai Wia

Rapid does not work at all with the door open.

The jog feed potentiometer will stop all movement in rapid if set to it’s lowest position, It needs just one notch to make rapid work. A little trick, you only make this mistake once. A call to some smart arsed service engineer who says “did you try moving the dial one click?”

Zero Return

Select zero return then press direction key. One press and you don’t need to keep your finger on the button, This machine has a tailstock so keep an eye out for it when referencing the Z axis,

You can set both axis going together.

I like the door locks on this machine because they release on their own, There is no button to open and close, I like that,

A Room With a View

The viewing window is a bit small but I suppose its a good safety thing when you have a big chuck spinning at 3000 RPM.

One very concerning thing is the fact that there is no safety back kick plate on the chuck pedals, This is a 2022 machine so I would have thought it would have one.

It means you can accidentally press the pedal and open the chuck!! Holy fuckin shit.

We decided to put the pedal under the bench so you couldn’t press it by accident.

Guide i Again

Every time I use guide i I find something new that I like about it. Me and Guide i are definitely in a love hate relationship.

This time I found the two things above.

Fixed Forms

I recon with some work using Fixed forms is a good quick way of programming, Given time you could get a really good library of things.

This would make program creation very quick. Multi screen editing is also good on Guide i. You can have several programs open together and switch between them when editing.

This also means no pesky background edit where you get locked in a fuckin time warp and nothing works until you find the escape button (BG END)

Graphics Graphics Sodding Graphics

Graphics are still pretty shitty, When you alter the rotation or size of the part you lose everything and have to start again.

How annoying is that. I mean I should be used to it by now.

Come on Fanuc this is 2024 not 1981. There is no speed control on the graphics either so it’s all over in a flash.

Not sure on this one can somebody explain? Some controls have a speed control on graphics and some don’t!!

Hyundai Wia Tool Measure

Tool measurement with the tool arm uses the hand-wheel to drive tool towards the probe. Never been a great fan of this way of setting tools but I suppose it’s still better than cut and measure.

You can index the turret with the arm down so beware. Jog and rapid don’t work when the arm is down so that’s good.

No lights on the probe! What no lights on the probe, that’s annoying. When you make contact with the probe the axis just stops, There is no light so you are not sure it has stopped.

It does jump to the correct offset for you and it zeros the wear, Good because not all machines do that.

Big Chuck

It is a big 12 station turret but with a large chuck therefore adjacent tools can easily cause a problem so beware.

Take a look below the tool you are using as it approaches the chuck. Better still bring em in manually just to check before running.

I know you are never supposed to have the jaws above the chuck outside but that’s difficult with hard jaws but it’s really important to watch out for this one.

Big Fanuc Guide i Screen

All men love big TV’s, why is that? I know I do.

Anyway this machine a has a big “fuck off” screen. Big screen means more keys are visible happy days.

Means you don’t have to keep using arrow keys to find butttons.

QWERTY keyboard too, What utter luxury.

Hyundai Wia Easy to Use

All in all I liked the interface on this Hyundai Wia machine, Pretty easy to get it to do most things. Not too many frustrations. Apart from the slight delay on some buttons like the jog, I’d prefer to be able to index the turret anywhere and I don’t like using the Hand-Wheel to measure tools. A light to indicate when you are touching the probe wouldn’t go a miss either.

Tool Change Position

This Hyundai Wia has G30 P2 which you can set a position in parameter 1241 and have a second Zero Return position (G30 P2 U0 w0)

Personally I wouldn’t use it. You will need loads of different tool change positions on a machine this big. Otherwise you’ll be travelling a mile to get to small jobs.

I set it up to use local sub routines. This means I can call program 500 in any program and it can be a unique tool change position. Read this.

My tool change position is local to this program so you can change it for every job.

Hyundai Wia

 

 


Overtravel Axis Fanuc Parameter 1300

Category : Fanuc

Messing With Parameters Can Be Fatal!!!!!

Over-travel alarm, make this a thing of the past with this parameter

You first need to go to the setting screen in MDI.and put a 1 in the parameter write box.

Today we are going to change the parameter that stops the machine generating an alarm when it gets to the end of travel.

End Of Travel Alarm  Fanuc Parameter

Now I need to start by apologising to all the lovely people at Fanuc. All the years I have moaned and moaned about the fact that when you get to the end of the machine stroke on a Fanuc control you get a stupid alarm.

Actually I have been totally wrong and I offer my sincere apologies to all who have been hurt by my nasty comments about this.

If you set parameter 1300 BIT 1 (NAL) to a 1 then you do not get an alarm when you travel to the end of the machine stroke.

Fanuc Parameter 1300
Fanuc Parameter 1300

This should make it work. If it doesn’t then maybe you should call the Samaritans.

Other Parameters You may Want to Change

3203 Clear MDI Screen

3202 Unlock Program 9000 to 9999 and 8000 to 8999 to Edit

3402 G Codes that are Active When The machine is Turned On

6005 Allows the Use of Local Subroutines (Newer Control)

6050-6059  Allows you to Call a 9000 series Program with a G Code

6080-6089 Allows you to Call a 9000 series Program with An M Code

5003 Retain Geometry when you Press Reset

3291 Wear Offset requires Key to Adjust

8134 3453 allows you to use ,R and ,C (Rads and Chamfers)

That’s it away you go.

This guy has more CNC Manuals than you can shake a stick at.

Oh just one other thing before you go off and cripple your machine forever.

Do yourself a favour take a picture of the screen before you change a parameter. If you aint got a camera then you must have a piece of paper.

Even better back everything up.

Or take a screen shot.

Thanks

If you have been affected by any of the issues in this post or need CNC Counselling then contact me.

If you want to learn to program CNC Milling Machines

Look no further Contact CNC Training Centre


Reposition Haas Machine Mid Program

Category : Haas

Reposition Haas  Mid-Program

Haas machines have the best program restart ever. (Providing you switch it on that is.)

You just move to a position in the program and press CYCLE START.

Piss easy.

Reposition Haas

But what if you want to stop a program and move the tool away to look at what you did?

Same Shit different Day

Did you ever work on a machine for years then some smart arse like me comes along and tells you something you didn’t realize it could do?

Well that happened to me the other day, except I did know but never got round to trying it. Anyway if I had said “oh I already knew that” he would have thought I was a smart arsed prick.

Needles to say I didn’t say that.

Back to Reposition Haas  Mid-Program

Well you guessed it they even thought of that.

It means you can drill a hole, move the drill away and have a good look inside and then continue with the program just like nothing ever happened.

Here We Go

First of all Press Feed Hold button.

Reposition Haas

Actually it’s not that one it’s the red one next to it, sorry but I don’t have an animated GIF for that.

Then press X, Y or Z followed by the Handle Jog button.

The control will now store the X, Y, and Z positions.

You will now see the message  “Jog Away”on the screen.

Now use your handwheel to move the tool away.

Reposition Haas

You can use other manual controls to stop spindle and coolant etc if you wish.

Do whatever you want to do.

  • Inspect the part.
  • Blow the hole out.
  • Remove your own appendix without anesthetic.

Now move the tool close to where it originally was making sure nothing is in the way for it to hit.

Now go back into memory mode.

Press Cycle Start.

Reposition Haas

The control will display the message “Jog Return”

X and Y will move back to position at 5% .

Then axis.

And bang away you go.

The program continues.

Thanks for watching and reading

If you have been affected by any of the issues in this post or need CNC Counselling then contact me.

Or call us

If you want to learn to program CNC Milling Machines

Look no further Contact CNC Training Centre

 


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