Post for a Brother HS 70A

[ewest]

I have Esprit 2007. Their support sucks, and the guys have to stand in front of the machine for HOURS re-programming all the wire cuts, threads, cutoffs, etc, because the posts are garbage. Does anybody have or know anything about a working post for a Brother HS 70A? I'm doing pretty well editing the posts, but when it comes to stuff like "If (NextClFile(213)>10)" the help files are only somewhat helpful (the CL file register numbers aren't even listed in any particular order)

Oh yeah, we're also subscribed to the $1000 a year handjob extortion support club, but they're not much help.

Anybody got a wire EDM post for a brother HS70A that actually works?

Thanks!

Andy Baker

[purplecheese]

Just $1000 a year? We pay $10K a year for our three copies of Esprit.

If you aren't getting results try this:

Call up California and complain. Call up all the time. When we had a problem with Esprit 2K3 (IIRC) not calculating ellipses properly (such as if you cut an ellipse in half, the area would double!) we get no satisfaction with their 'support.' Calling up the home office in Cali. got a bit more satisfaction.

Contact Brother - they might be able to help you get the processor worked out.

[ewest]

Yeah, see, I've been calling them. They insist that "everything is fine" and that it's something I'm doing, which is completely BS - Why would the post processor, with all it's big bad if then conditional arguments, be incapable of cutting the wire before rapiding to the next threading point? A day of learning and playing with the post got this problem fixed - but come on! I'm not the only guy that has this problem - can't be!

Then, our local support guy tells us that there's no way for the machine to automatically raise the nozzle after cutting off the slugs so we can remove them, and that we have to manually jog the head up and down. He simply told us "It's not programmable, and even on more advanced machines, it doesn't work." Needless to say, I managed to figure it out, and it's working well. The only problem will come when I'm cutting really thick stuff (which won't happen) and the machine Z's up beyond the physical limits of the axis. If course if I was cutting stuff that thick, I wouldn't be able to remove the slug anyway without jogging the machine over to the side too.

There's still a lot of work to do however. I'll take your advice, and I'll call their home office if I have trouble.

Also, I got the following piece of advice from nuthinbuttrubl89@aol.com that I located in an older post on CNCzone and contacted him asking if he had any advice on learning the post processing format... He had this to say..

Hey.

well, I just started working with one of the engineers from DP technology and after he showed me a few things i was off to the races working on my own stuff and modifying posts to my liking. the only advice i can really give you is to read the post help and if you go to www.cimtulsa.com you can order their instructional videos on post processor creation. as far as the CLfile stuff goes, you have to view the cutter location file (clfile), extended NC code and all of that for debugging so you can see whether to use nextclfile or currentclfile data and so on and so forth. if you are in the esprit interface and you right click on any box in the operation windows you can click the "edit properties" and on the top it will tell you the CLfile number for what each box is linking to. for example if you right click on the feed per revolution box under a solidmill facing cycle and click edit properties the window will have (123) in the title bar... that's the CL file number (although no t correct in my example) and you can use that to write logic in your post to output the code you wish to use. there's a lot of power in their posts you just have to know how to harness it.

hope this helps.


So that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Sorry to hear you're paying so much for Esprit support, though it sounds like the bargain we're getting is in line with the shoddy support.

Andy

[purplecheese]

I understand where you are coming from, though. Dealing with DP Tech's support can be pretty much an exercise in having your brain stroke out...

As the message you got, CIM does do some nice tutorials, and are easy to work with. We use the basic ones to teach the new guys the basics about Esprit without having to stand over their shoulder and teach them.

I believe they also work on post processors, for a fee of course, and might be able to help you out personally with the brother processor issues.