new lathe software ?

[pit202]

hi all ,

anybody knows about the new version ? use it ? i mean this with promised better simulation and dxf import ? i am so curious , but the haas website is silent and it seems not be updated for any kind of news.

__
Peter

[Donkey Hotey]

I saw it at Westec. The DXF import only works with lines and arcs. If the profile has splines, they won't import. That's fine for most machine parts but not so good for specialized things like nozzles. Those will still need a CAM program.

It's part of the Intuitive Programming Software (IPS). If you're already familiar with that, it had a Profile feature where you could draw the profile on-screen, store it as a canned profile, then activate it in the IPS and run it. DXF import is now an additional option under Profile. You import the profile, set an origin, set a direction, set an end point and the control deciphers that and makes a profile.

I don't know quite as much about the Live Image simulation. I saw it. It looks nice. I didn't ask many questions though. In the lathe, you could always see the same thing in Graphics. Now it just displays it in pretty colors and while the program is actually running.

[pit202]

programming a part with a PC is very graphics full at the simulation and you can easy avoid collisions , I wish the lathe will have a least 5% of this , you know there are only lines , even a bar(stock) or a chuck isn`t drawn

[MikeOD]

it's all drawn with live image...chuck, soft jaws, stock, tools...

[Geof]

Originally Posted by pit202 programming a part with a PC is very graphics full at the simulation and you can easy avoid collisions , I wish the lathe will have a least 5% of this , you know there are only lines , even a bar(stock) or a chuck isn`t drawn

There are only lines but you can turn on the machine position display and find the most negative Z position for any tool by Single Blocking through graphics. Then in handle jog move the machine (carefully) to this machine position to check your clearances.

I have done this to turn parts where I go to within less than .01" of the jaws; it is nerve wracking to watch the machine do a rapid approach like this but perfectly safe.

[pit202]

it seems that I need a software upgrade , mine is 9.016 and live image is from 9.03 , somebody used a live image ? is that worth something ? Thanks Geof I use this method already ;-)

[flyx]

My lathe (a TL-15) was updated from the "old" style to the "new" style software a few months ago and the new software is definitely much better in terms of operator usage once you get used to the change. They really have improved the functionality a lot, but as I say, it takes a week to get back into automatic mode to find everything. Down side is there are a few small bugs in the version we got which I think was quite early - 09.03C - and we have asked HAAS to just get us to the latest version to get rid of the gremlins, all of which are to do with the display, not the operation of the machine. Some odd things in the IPS system cause issues and weird alarms too so ideally that goes away as well with the upgrade, although we hardly use IPS.

[pit202]

I am curious of there is a way to upgrade my 8.05A version to newer 9.xx , one of my haas tech. told me that there can be problems , is he right ?

[flyx]

Our upgrade from 8.xx to 9.03C went flawlessly, though it is not a trivial undertaking, and the HAAS technicians were very careful when they did it. Yes, I guess there is scope for an issue with such a major change. In our opinion for our machine the upgrade was well worth it as it got rid of a control problem affecting our sub-spindle.

[awesome83]

If you have 8 series software you can upgrade to 9 series. But you must have 16meg of flash memory on your processor to run 9 series software.

To check this, power off the machine. Hold Prgm/convs key in, and power the machine on till you get the green letters to show up.

If you have enough flash memory it should only take 1 hour to safely upgrade your software (making backups ect.) and should you need a new processor maybe add another 1 hour and $ for the processor.