This is a long one, might want to grab a cup of coffee or a beer...
Ive been working on learning the programing for the 88HS control.
Found a Fadal Emulator post on here, that has a great program that acts as the Fadal 88 control. I played with it some and tinkered... and I think it will really help me learn... but I cant get it to run on my home machine - I get a NTDVM error - so that kind of puts a kink in some of my playing.
Anyway, I am working on a fixture for some of the parts I plan to do, and have drawn up (in AutoCAD 2004) the fixture base plate. It will be like a sub plate, and have provisions to bolt on the actual fixtures to it (I have some very similar parts with some small changes, and thought it would be handy to be able to mount the plate, set the Fixture offset on that, and then leave it, and then be able to just change out the fixture "blocks" for which ever part I need to do)
I have the bottom of the sub plate set up to fit the table (with key ways for the table slots and hold down bolts). So my plan is to mount that to the table, face it in a separate program, then spot drill all the hole locations, drill for the hold down bolts, drill for the locating pin holes, ream the pin bores, then rigid tap the hold down bores.
I am working with the fixed cycles almost completely with this - learning and familiarizing myself with it and the manual is pretty good, but somewhat lacking in some cases. So I wrote a program that I THINK does what I want to do. I ran it through the Emulator set on Format 2, and dont get any errors. Though it does beep at what seems to be when one calls the H and D words... so I dont know if that is a bad thing, or just something it does - as I havent found documentation on the "beep" for the program. Hopefully, I have everything in the right context, and have the appropriate safety lines in place... but wanted a little more reassurance from those "in the know", that I am on the right track. I realize Ill have to break some tools and learn some lessons the hard way... but hoping for a little guidance to avoid any obvious pitfalls.
If any of you have the inclination to look at the program and give me any thoughts on it, if I did things correctly, things to change to be more efficient (especially around tool changes and safety lines), or just take up less space, or just overall thoughts - Id sure love to hear what you have to say.
I have included a 2D DXF of the top view and the txt file.
Just for clarification on the DXF/program/plate. The sub plate is 2.5 wide, 20 long and 1" tall, the drilled/tapped holes are green and the drilled/reamed holes are pink. Planning on making E1 (G54) the same zero as on the DXF - bottom left corner, and the top face after facing Z0.0. My thinking on the tapped holes was to drill .9" deep and tap to .75" deep (covering my rear for the rigid tap going a touch to far or something). From the digging I did, seems the #1 drill is the closest I have for the required hole size for the 1/4-20 form tap I have, and Im expecting it to drill a thou over or so, getting me close 60-65% - but will verify before I go to tapping. On the alignment pins, use 1" long pins, drill .7" deep and ream to .55 deep (leaving me some room if the pins wear on the plate, I can go deeper and use longer pins - as well as a place for chips to go in the process) I had a hard time finding feed/speeds for the HSS reamer I have, so went with the theory of about 1/2 the rpm of the same size drill. But I didnt know if the "Half the speed, twice the feed" rule means halve the rpm which equates to 2x the feed, or if they meant halve the rpm and double the feed (ie RPM/IPM drill - 1000/10 translating into 500/10 or 500/20). But in the end, Im hoping my .2500 reamer leaves me a bore so that I have a good fit for the pins (that are supposed to be .2502).
Keep in mind... Im completely new to VMCs. So if I sound dumb, its because I am. Only other CNC experience I have, has been running my Okuma LC10 Lathe with OSP3000 for the last 5-6 years, so this is all "new" to me... aside from general theory. So the extent of my knowledge has been based on RPM and IPR cutting cast acrylic, not SFM and IPM. But those of you that know the 3000/5000 OSP Lathe controls will know its a different ball game than the Fadal/Fanuc programming. Im completely "self taught" as in read read read, post questions on forums, read more... no classes or actual training. Just the school of Hard Knocks, Class of "0 $h1t"
If you got this far, thanks for taking the time to read it... and if you decide to reply, thanks even more for the time youre taking to help teach me. And as I move into some other portions of programming, I may do the same with those (ie G41/42, etc...)
I attached the program in the text file and drawing at the bottom of my initial message. Let me know if you cant download it and Ill email it to you.
Im not as concerned with the drawing to the program accuracy... but the use of the different fixed cycles and efficient use of the various codes (ie not calling a bunch of repetitions codes when not necessary). I just attached the drawing above in case someone was not following and wanted to see the top profile.
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Programming - Looking for a double check
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