Need CAM info for mini lathe.

[GeeBake]

Hi, I need some info.

I'm in the process of converting a HF Mini Mill and a Homier Speedway lathe to CNC with Ron Steele's conversion kit.

Eveything is going well with the mill, but I'm a bit confused about the lathe.

The issue is software. I think I finally have a clear picture in my head of how this all works, but I'm stumped by one thing. What kind of CAM software can I get for the lathe?

I think I'm going to go with Sheetcam and Mach2\3 for the mill. I think Mach will handle the actual operation work on the lathe, but I understand that Sheetcam has no lathe toolpath creation capability. I've looked everywhere I can think of and the only options I'm coming up with are way out of my price range. Is there affordable CAM software for turning?

Thanks very much for the info!

Greg

[BobWarfield]

I have OneCNC Lathe Express, but opinions vary on whether that is "affordable".

I did notice that TurboCadCam also has a lathe capability. You might check into that.

Best,

BW

[GeeBake]

TurboCadCam looks interesting. It's $1000 though. Boy is this getting to be an expensive hobby! Dare I ask what the OneCNC pricing is like?

Thanks,

Greg

[BobWarfield]

OneCNC costs more than TurboCadCam. I won't quote a price other than to say it can be much less than list and it's individually negotiated. If you can document you are a student, they will cut you a better deal.

Another one to consider that's cheaper is DAK Engineering's TurboCNC.

The one thing I will say about TurboCadCam is at least you can combine the cost of Cad, lathe, and mill. OneCNC also allows that possibility, but to add the mill and decent Cad capability plus lathe and you will start to see some eye popping prices.

In any event, the only thing I have any experience with is my newly purchased OneCNC. Do try the various eval downloads you can get your hands on. Some have them, and some don't. For OneCNC, you arrange a live online demo with them. That's actually quite valuable, but I'm not sure its worth your trouble if you're trying to keep to a fairly tight budget.

The Visual Mill people have a Visual Lathe product in Beta that may be out soon too, but it is again, not cheap.

Best,

BW

[RotarySMP]

Remember that a lathe is a 2D machine.

I find I use the MDI about 70% of the time. TurnoCNC has great canned cycles.

I hand write small programs about 20% of the time (mostly things where the tool would dwell on the work between inputs).

For the few times I have used more complex geometry, I have just drawn the tool path in acad V14 and saved it as DXF and used ace to convert it to a g code.
http://www.wrathall.com/Images/Bellmouth.jpg

Remember, doing it this way, you learn to write G code, and are then better able to trouble shoot machine written code.

http://www.wrathall.com/Interests/interests_index.htm

Cutviewer turn is an excellent G code editor and file verification tool.

[kdoney]

Mach 2/3 has g-code wizards for the lathe software, which you get free with the mill software. Try this and see what else you need first. Also you might want to look at KipwareT. I have used it with success and they have good service.