Seeking Opinions and Experience on Older (Mid 90's) Matsuura VMC's

[CoolHand]

Specifically the RA-IIF (or RA2F, seen it both ways).

I'm looking at a couple of different machines, both are 1995 models, both look to be in pretty damned good shape for their ages, and both have Yasnac i80 controls. Price for either machine is less than $15k, could probably be had for $12k.

Anyone here have any experience with these machines? They appear to be quite heavily made and technologically advanced for their age (which can be a double edged sword).

What say you guys? Good, bad, ugly, what? Anything to look out for? Anything weird about the Yasnac control (I've never operated one before)? How is Matsuura the company? Are they still in business (or rather, is the current Matsuura the same company, and do they still support legacy machines)? If so, are they easy to get along with? Are spares available, or rarer than unicorn dandruff?

Thanks for your time guys.

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[Mike283]

Matsuuras are very well built machines. The company is still in business, their offices are in St. Paul MN. If I were looking to buy used Matsuuras I'd call them to see what the spare parts situation was for the machines. Methods Machine Tools (Sudbury MA) may also have some spare parts left for these machines, has been selling them for 30% - 50% less than Matsuura to try and move them out.

I would be more concerned about the control than I would about the machine. Yaskawa Electric no longer supports the I-80 controls or drives. There are a few companies out there doing a good job of repairing these but who knows how long their supply of parts will last.

Hope this helps.

Specifically the RA-IIF (or RA2F, seen it both ways).

I'm looking at a couple of different machines, both are 1995 models, both look to be in pretty damned good shape for their ages, and both have Yasnac i80 controls. Price for either machine is less than $15k, could probably be had for $12k.

Anyone here have any experience with these machines? They appear to be quite heavily made and technologically advanced for their age (which can be a double edged sword).

What say you guys? Good, bad, ugly, what? Anything to look out for? Anything weird about the Yasnac control (I've never operated one before)? How is Matsuura the company? Are they still in business (or rather, is the current Matsuura the same company, and do they still support legacy machines)? If so, are they easy to get along with? Are spares available, or rarer than unicorn dandruff?

Thanks for your time guys.

[CoolHand]

Matsuuras are very well built machines. The company is still in business, their offices are in St. Paul MN. If I were looking to buy used Matsuuras I'd call them to see what the spare parts situation was for the machines. Methods Machine Tools (Sudbury MA) may also have some spare parts left for these machines, has been selling them for 30% - 50% less than Matsuura to try and move them out.

I would be more concerned about the control than I would about the machine. Yaskawa Electric no longer supports the I-80 controls or drives. There are a few companies out there doing a good job of repairing these but who knows how long their supply of parts will last.

Hope this helps.

Yeah, that is a bummer that I was unaware of. I've heard good things about the Yasnac controls, so it never occurred to me that there'd be no way to keep one going. Hmmmm....

I'm also looking at several Fadal 4020 machines, and honestly, while I like the simplicity of the service (or I guess you could say rudimentary design) on the Fadal, it just doesn't look like it's the same class of machine, even though it actually has a larger machining envelope. Half again bigger travels at 2/3rds the weight tells me that's a lot lighter duty machine, but maybe I'm wrong.

My current VMC is an orphan as well, but has a single company here in the US that collects and resells parts to keep the control and machine alive. Without those guys, I'd have had to scrap this one I've got now ten years ago. The parts are just expensive, because there's literally nowhere else to get them.

It'd be better to avoid that situation again, IMO, but maybe if I buy the thing cheap enough I can afford to go out and buy a bunch of spares to keep on the shelf myself. I dunno.

Did Matsuura ever build these machines with a Fanuc or other more mainstream control?

I suppose if I bought it really cheap, a retrofit wouldn't be entirely out of the question either. I'm just not sure if that's a good idea or not. Say you bought it for $8k and then spent another $8k on a professional retrofit, would that $16k machine be as good or better than a newer $16k machine with a Fanuc control on it? I have no idea how to quantify that answer? Seems at first blush like that's a looser, at least to me, but there again, I'm FOS on a pretty regular basis, so who knows?