Newbie- Large project, don't know where to start

[Sheridan]

Hi everyone, I'm brand-new here and I'm seeking a little bit of advice to improve my (lack-of) knowledge of CNC tooling.

I've got to try to get some initial research into a new project for a new company in Florida. We do not yet have any experts on our team from the CNC arena, and hire them until we get our funding allocated at the start of the new year.

All I'm trying to do right now, is just get my own head around some of the "basics" first, so that I can converse, a little better, with the experts when they do come aboard.

I would appreciate any advice from the pro's here, to help guide me through this complex field.


We want to produce a series of 50 large milled "blocks", broadly similar in size and design-complexity to a large multi-cylinder marine internal combustion diesel engine block. The material is going to be some flavor of Aluminum, but which type hasn't yet been finalized. And we will receive the castings in a near-net form.

The outer dimensions of the block will be approximately 64x64x40" and the structure will have five main 'holes' through it, each roughly 12" in diameter, somewhat similar to the cylinders for pistons, but in this case they will be for a different purpose.

The block will also need to have a series of fairly complex cooling and fluid channels milled directly into it, throughout the structure.

I'm trying to work out what sort of equipment we are going to need to do this sort of work. I don't know whether we need 3, 4 or 5 axis machines? Do we need vertical and/or horizontal machines? What sort of cutting tools will we need to do this sort of work on such large blocks?

I would very-much appreciate any advice to help de-mystify this task a bit for me.

Thanks,

Sheridan.

PS - I hope I've put this request in the right section, but I trust the moderators can move it, if required

[RICHARD ZASTROW]

You'll have to give a better description of the items to be machined.

Best I can offer for a prismatic part of the dimension you gave, I'd roughly guess a CNC Horizontal Boring Mill with a built in rotary table will be the machine of choice.

X,Y,Z,W and A/B rotary axis. However, without more info, ????????

Dick Z

[Dorsal]

A 5-axis HBM with a 60" X 60" (minimum) bed, a 60" rotab and 60+" of Z-travel would be an excellent guess, given the available data. Something similar to either machine in photo #11 in this link of gallery photos: Votaw Precision Technologies
(I spent a couple months there, getting an assembly precision milled.)
Nice S.W.A.G., Dick Z!

[RICHARD ZASTROW]

Machines of this size are EXPENSIVE. They require a floor or foundation to carry the machines weight along with fixturing and workpieces. Also, consider the material handling to manipulate/place workpieces. Then there is in-process storage.

Sub-contracting to an outside shop that already has the required capability and capacity might be a good alternative.

Another may be to lease a machine with the option to purchase if there is enough work to support it.

Dick Z

[Geof]

Originally Posted by RICHARD ZASTROW ....Sub-contracting to an outside shop that already has the required capability and capacity might be a good alternative....Dick Z

I second this.

If you are complete novices to CNC starting with a multi-axis machine that is going to cost a lot of money is a risky way to go. Find a shop that has the capacity to do this kind of machining and work with them. Don't try to cheap-out in what you pay for the work they do for you, don't try to get them to do things a a lower cost based on the promis of future work and keep them informed from day one that your goal is to bring the work in-house sometime in the future.

[mungaro]

Hello Everybody.... I have a cnc Lathe running Mach3. I am looking for a simple tool post for running the lathe. The lazy turn cuts too deep on the initial pass and I am having trouble. Is there a way to make sure that the post or program will cut a minimum on each pass from the start of the program to the end even if it takes 100 passes to do so?

lupo