Need help with CAM for a Chinese machine

[OldDog64]

Hi,

I'm looking at buying a Chinese auto load CNC lathe the manufacturer tells me that it can only use Powermill to generate the G code. He seems like a very genuine guy but I can't get a clear reason why this should be so.

I've never used Powermill but I use Deskproto to do my 4th axis machining on my router and for the love of me I can't understand what powermill has that Deskproto can't do when it comes to 4th axis machining?
Anybody have any Ideas?

This is the machine I'm looking at;

[awerby]

Lathes work differently from mills. I'm a big fan of DeskProto (and a distributor) but I don't think it will generate the right kind of code to run your lathe. On the other hand, there's plenty of other lathe CAM software that should work with your machine, like VisualTurn from Mecsoft (which we also sell). I've never heard of a CNC lathe that was tied to one particular brand of CAM software, although it may be that your manufacturer is only familiar with that one.