Multicam 3000 Nightmare

[angelocmp]

My company puchased a Multicam 3000 with a Hyperthem Plasma HPR auto-gas torch system 7 months ago. It has never been 100% from day one. Among the many problems is with the torch head. We are cutting vinyl covered stainess, and have had ongoing issues with the torch head diving into the metal after the first couple of inches of cutting. The only way to avoid this is to enable ATHC (against the recommendation of Multicam). With ATCH enabled, however, the cut voltage runs between 10-15 volts too high causing short consumable lifespan, and poor quality cuts.

Has anyone experienced this issue with Multicam or any other Plasma system? Any valuable suggestions would be deeply appreciated.

[cut more]

Hello,
Not sure if this will help but,
Are you connecting a good ground to the material or just laying the sheet on the table and cutting? Maybe your grounding to the material is causing you trouble.
Just a thought.
Cutmore

[One of Many]

I had the same thought, only due to static on the sheet. The plastic coating can hold one heck of a charge besides the aforementioned" insulating it from ground". You ought to see the lightening bolts come off the discharge rod while that stuff is being applied to sheet metal. Sometimes it sounds like a 22 shell going off!

DC

[angelocmp]

The groud has been checked to, and at the table. Interesting, though, the comment about the vinyl static. We get metal from several suppliers. I would have to imagine that sheet metal from different manufacturers wold have different static levels? That would explain why it seems to occur more at times than others(?).

[OLD_Newbie]

I would try increasing the feed rate or it could be a ground issue.Also check spi board and you can always call tech support for adjusting sensitivity using the keypad. Sounds like you may be cutting thin material? You mentioned "many problems". What are the other problems you are having? Let me know you make out.

[xjdubber]

Im presuming you have a HPR130 Autogas system? check your regulators, pressure needs to be within 115 to 120 psi (when running) also make sure th.t your regulators can provide enough flow. You say multicam recommends to not turn on ATHC? or do you mean auto thc? if your torch is crashing normally then athc is deffinetly working, just working on a wrong voltage. Wrong voltage can be several thing, either you set the voltage yourself and simply just dont the right voltage set, which can cause it to crash into the material. Your gas pressures are wacky causing several errors, or wrong torch height. The way the multicam system works you have 3 options ;

1. No THC - the torch comes down touches of on the material by ohmic sensing or secondary switch (in your case because your cutting stainless with vinyl), then pierces at pierce height, lowers to cut height and cuts at that height. Only works on thicker metal (providing your table is very straight), or small cuts. On thin metals the heat will warp the material and the torch will run into it or it will warp toward the table (bowed sheet) causing ugly cut quality and lots of problems.

2 THC you set the voltage- Again torch touches of on material goes to peirce height then cut height, then goes to the voltage you set. works good to finetune your cut (get staighter edges better holes & such)

3 Sample ATHC - same as before torch touches of material goes to pierce height then cut height, then for 3000msec (usually set to that user can define) It samples the voltage that it is cutting at then takes the average and sets the voltage to cut at to that. This works good providing the cut height your cutting at is good.


also for thin metals you need to set voltage gap to 50 (or as high as possible) voltage gap determines when the torch freezes say your cutting at 130 v if the torch voltage rises to 135 or lowers to 125 it will not compensate anymore than that.

hope that helps!

[ggpipe]

First off I would make sure your machine has the latest firmware. Contact your local distributor and ask them.

As a xjdubber mentioned there are several settings you can adjust to control torch height, one of them should work.

With sample ATHC off, the machine is using the voltage specified by Hypertherm for the given material type, thickness and consumable type. Sometimes the real world voltage is different from this and can cause the torch to go too high or too low depending if the voltage is too high or low than the setpoint.

With sample ATHC on it will measure the voltage after a second or two for a few seconds and try to maintain that voltage.

If you are still having problems, let us know. I know quite a bit about Multicam plasmas.

[xjdubber]

[QUOTE]First off I would make sure your machine has the latest firmware.[QUOTE]

You sound like a tech, thats some high class Multicam philosophy. Check the ground and if that doesnt work its operator error?