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Buy a new Mazak? Not today!

oops

Plastic
Joined
Jun 21, 2006
Location
Canada
Ok, I need to vent. I have mixed feelings about mazaks. Specificly I'm getting tired of drive failures. todays failure makes 5 this year with only 8 mazaks in the shop.

I'm not recomending replacing the machines with a Haas as I'm sure I would kill those too but these mazaks are supposed to be amongst the best machines.

Why do the drives suck so bad.

I would seriously think twice about recomending the purchase of another mazak, but then I'm probably just a bit pissed today knowing that dispite taking the first week of january off I'll be spending the first day of my holiday in the shop fixing another drive.
 
Hello "oops", I have been Programming and runnning Mazaks, Turning and Machining centers for the last 13 years, the shop I am with has 3 mazak turning centers and one mazak machining center, the they range in vintage from 1987 to 1989, in my 13 years there w've never had "drive failures" and from talking to the guys that have been there before me, not one problem prior to me coming there.
>> I've been in this trade for over 34 years and I have worked on warner swaseys, okumas, moris, okuma howas, d&d miniturns, monarchs, hardinges, so on and so on and so on, let me tell you that I will take Mazak before any other Lathe ( personal preference you say? so be it!) I don't know why your machines give you so many headaches ( good preventative maintenance does wonders for keeping machines in proper working condition, not saying that you guys don't do this, just a comment), I'd call Mazak and heve them look them over ( I know, they are expensive ), do what we did many years ago, find yourself a reliable, local Maintenance Tech. and have him check your machines out!

good luck and the best to you in 2007
truly
SteelCutter
 
Hey oops,
The Mitsubishi spindle and servo drives in Mazak machines are somewhat sensitive to high voltages, and excessive heat. This is not unique, as all industrial servo and spindle drives need consistent power and temperature control.
Make sure you're feeding the machines with 220 volts, give or take a little. Getting above 245 volts is asking for trouble. Buck-boost transformers work well to drop the often 240-250 incoming down to about 220-225.
Most older Mazaks came standard with multi-tap transformers. Make sure your transformer taps are correctly set to output the 220 to the machine.
Heat is also an enemy. Make sure all fans on the back side of the drives is working...this can be a pain, as the fans are hard to see.
Also, make sure all your cabinet fans are clean and working properly. My Mazaks used a "closed-loop" air cooling system for the electrical cabinets that prevents shop air from being drawn into the cabinet. The inside of the electrical cabinets must be clean...make sure if any shop air is drawn in, that it is filtered.
Good luck,
Greg
 
I second what cnctoolcat said ==>(Also, make sure all your cabinet fans are clean and working properly. My Mazaks used a "closed-loop" air cooling system for the electrical cabinets that prevents shop air from being drawn into the cabinet. The inside of the electrical cabinets must be clean...make sure if any shop air is drawn in, that it is filtered.) also change your fan filters often ( we do it once a month wheather they need it or not, you can buy the foam stuff @ ace hardware dirt cheap)

SteelCutter
 
Thanks for the replies.

I'm feeling a bit better today so I'm re-evaluting my take on the situation.

I like the mazak machine but I'm getting frustrated with the control and the drives. All our machines are fusion 640's.

The machine that went down yesterday is a VTC200B we have two and it's my favorite machine. We also have a V515 and Nexus 510C. The V515 has alot of torque but the tool changes are sllooowww and it's a bit clunky and the 510 is a piece of .... in my opinion. If I could I would replace the two non VTC's with VTC's in other spindle and table configurations.

As for cooling, last summer after two drive failures I removed the drives from all the machines and cleaned the heat sinks, tested the fans and plumbed fan driven filtered air into the cooling shrouds behind the electrical cabinets on all the mills and two of the Qt300's so I don't think cooling is a much of an isuue as it may have been.

It may be interesting to note the X axis drive on the VTC has no cooling fan mounted to the heat sink so I think I'll be adding a couple small ones as the drive is narrow and sandwiched between the spindle drive and the XZ drive.

Overvoltage is something I never considered as I have been assuming (I know what they say about assuming) the shop owner would ensure proper power supply and setup when the machines were installed. I'll be looking into this more as I could see this being a potental candidate for trouble.

Thanks again for the responses.

Mike
 
Can you elaborate more on the VCN 510C , I was considering this machine or the Hurco VMX40 to purchase, and try to get into low volume productin work.
Only thing holding me back is can I round up enough work to keep it running at least half the week,
Thank You
 
casvin says:
Only thing holding me back is can I round up enough work to keep it running at least half the week
and I say:
If you are serious about getting into machining on your own and can afford to get yourself a machine, by all means go for it. There aren't any guarantees that you will get enough work to keep it going 1/2 a week for starters like you say but once you get a few jobs in and establish yourself with some customers as a quality shop with good pricing and delivery, the rest will come your way.

best of luck to you "GO FOR IT"

SteelCutter
 
Hey Mike,
I would definitely be checking your voltages going into the machines. Being Japanese standard machines, Mazaks are actually designed to run on 200 volts! So, our standard over here of 240 volts is right at the point of being able to cause trouble.
Mazak will not even hook a machine up now if the power is above 245 volts. If it ever "spikes" above 253V, you're gonna have some damage to the drives.
Make sure you're feeding the machines good, balanced 220V, +-10V.
My new 1997 VTC16B blew a spindle drive the first month I had it because the power averaged 245V. After installing buck-boost transformers, the new drive has ran for 9 years.
If your incoming power is above 240V, sometimes you can get the utility company to either change taps on the big transformers outside, or install pigtail resistors to lower your incoming voltage.
Good luck,
Greg
 
Thanks again cnctoolcat.

Casvin Please understand that my view of the 510 is based on the fact that we do the same kind of work on the 510 as we do on the 200b and some of the smaller work from the 515 can go on the 200b but not always on the 510 in a convienient way.

Cast housings that are heavy are awkward to load on the 510 so the bigger stuff tends to go on the other machines we also tend to run two sides of a casting at once so again the 510 is no good for this because the far side of the table is harder to access with a heavy casting in your hands.

The 200b can machine two 12" daimeter castings at once without removing the 4th axis and both are easily accessable and at a good height for loading and unloading. We can also machine simulatiously in a vice and in the 4th with the tailstock using the 200b. Remove the 4th axis and you can easily accommidate 4 vices each one as easy to access as the next.

Have a look at the two machines. As you can see the table on the 200b is dead center and doesn't move this is my favorite feature and it has some great advantages. We drill some 80" pipe in the 4th axis with this machine by removing the covers at each end of the machine and letting part hang out. No worries the part doesn't move. We also have machined 48x12x1.5 plate again no worries about overhang as the part doesn't move. 4 vices with pocketed softjaws 3" daimeter two places each vice and we run 8 pieces on each green button on a run of 600 we do occasionally with no fancy fixtures just some soft jaws. I wouldn't bother with 4 vices on the 510 because if I left a handle on one of the vices that would be bad and besides I'm not sure they would fit that easily.

If all I had was the 510 I would probably think it's great after all it's equiped with most of the gizmos, even has a renishaw laser touch setter but I'd rather use the 200b with it's plunger type touchsetter not because I prefer a plunger type touchsetter but because I prefer the machine.

A big negative for the 510 is that stupid moving table. If it was only the X maybe I wouldn't mind after all the 515 moves on the X and it doesn't bother me that much but when the part also moves back on the Y and also directly away from me (as you can see the spindle is located in the center of the machine as it should be but the control panel and the door are off to one side). This can make first offs a real pain in the but sometimes. Add in the balerina stance required to remove a tool from the spindle because you can't bring the spindle to you and it's three strikes your out "let's run it on the 200".

I don't know about the Hurco I know nothing about them other than to look at a picture on the net but If I was going to forge out on my own I would heavily consider a 2001 or newer used VTC200b or c with the cat 40 spindle, through coolant, 4th axis equipped and as a must renishaw probe. It's easily everything the 510 is and more.

Btw, I almost forgot to mention we have two sets of progams for the exact same parts. One is for if we run on the 510 and one is for the 200b. Why? because despite the extra 5 horse on the 510 it's not as rigid so it needs to run different speeds feeds and Doc's than the 200 to prevent chatter.
 
So essentially all of your complaints about the 510 are based on the fact that it's a moving table, like virtually every other VMC on the market? That doesn't seem like justification to call the machine a P.O.S.
 
I guess not!

For myself it's relative to what's available and the moving table isn't necesarily the issue in itself.

I have available to me a machine that I initially felt was inferior due to it's lower spindle horsepower and it's lack of laser touchsetting and age. It has proven itself the winner by use not stats and features.

The 510 is the newest mill and it is also the glichiest. It hangs up alot with the only fix being a shutdown and restart. Despite having more horsepower I can machine a piece faster with better finishes with the 200 because of its' higher rigidity. the 510 is more awkward to load and unload than the 200B and inspecting the tools requires you to practically climb in the machine or remove the tool which is also awkward compared to the 200. the 510 has a much smaller screen than the 200 and cleaning the machining area requires you to get right in there whereas most of the enclosure is accessable on the 200.

Maintenance and repair is more difficult on the 510. For example, I can and have on both our 200s' replaced the Y-axis ballscrew bearings. Total time required the first time I ever attemped this was 4 hours down time that includes machining .0015 off the bearing retainer for proper preload interference. I doubt I could remove the waycovers on the 510 in that time.

Take into account the smaller table and the fact that all these "features" could be yours for likely more $ than a 200 and it becomes clear to me that there is only two advantages to be had with a 510 over a Vtc200: full enclosure and smaller footprint. That's it.

I guess this doesn't make it a POS on its own but relative to the 200 it is to me considering the type of parts we produce and the machines that are available.

I started out prefering the 510 because it was new and loaded with the most up to date features but I came to my dislike by working it.

BTW, I happened to notic many of the machines on the market seem to be X table and YZ spindle not XY table and Z only spindle. Most also center the operator with the spindle rather than have him off to the side.
 
Ditch the Mazaks and get some Okumas. Ha ha actually it's important to get the machine from a good distributor but if you are buying solely for the machine which isn't a great idea then I wouldn't go with Mazak you are paying a lot more for the control than you are the build of the machine. I like that Okuma is Okuma from head to toe, what I mean is they use all there own parts and control and are engineered to run. Then when you have a problem people don't point fingers at each other. Plus I think there conversational is just as easy as a Mazak. Mazak doesn't usually have the latest greatest stuff and they try to cut costs. Sorry to hear about your problems with the boards hope it all gets worked out, Mazaks Okumas Haas and Mori all have great resale so sell them and pick whatever you want. I think Mazak is more like a Haas, if you want something that is made right go for Okuma or Mori.
 
Yamazaki didn't get to be the largest machine tool builder in the world by competing with Haas. From what I've seen and heard, Mazak is doing a better job with their commodity line of machines (Nexus) than Okuma has done so far. I'm a big fan of Okuma, and own 4 of their turning centers. None of them are from the commodity lines though. A friend of mine has replaced the spindle drive in a 99 Crown turning center 3 times so far, at $5500 a pop. No drive troubles on any of the other 8 CNC machines in his shop, so its unlikely that the cause is some grinch in the shop electrical system. Some of Okuma's commodity VMC's were disasters, and their resale value reflects this fact fairly clearly. IMO, Okuma's conversational turning doesn't hold a candle to Mazatrol for simplicity or ease of use. A couple of my lathes have it, but it never gets used because its more trouble than its worth.

Okuma, Mori, and Mazak build the best broad lines of machine tools in the world today, but they've all got their strong and weak points. Having any one of those names on the outside of the machine doesn't necessarily mean its the best machine of its type though. If Mori expands their line further into the lower cost machines like Mazak and Okuma already have, chances are those won't be quite as perfect as the Mori name would make you think either.
 
I have over 15 Mazak machines and love them.
I had the same issue once before and ended up being to high of voltage. Once I took care of that never had a issue since then.
MR. Smilenbseen don't every put HASS in the same class as MAZAK. I hope you know what OKUMA stands for. (Ok Until Mazak Arrives) I think all brands of machines have strong and weak points. It boils down to the distributor that you have. If you buy used you are usually buying someone else's problems. It also depends on what you are trying to make on the machines you have.
 
Sorry the Nexus was designed to compete with Haas. I find it odd that they can make a better machine than the QT for less money. True I would take a Mazak over a Haas anyday, but there is no way mazak holds a candle to Okuma or Mori, first of all there small lathes are linear guides and not box way that alone would crush them. I don't agree with the conversational being worse either but I don't use conversational so I can't totally argue that. There are a ton of Mazaks out there, I won't argue that but I think they are way over rated. True they have strong points ex. there Integrex machines are still probably the best like it on the market, but designed for 1-2 runs not production. ORBEA I must be honest you being in WI I would assume you wouldn't like Mazak either the Dist. is poor to horrible and has no service. I have friends that have mazaks and actually dislike buying more but feel stuck because of the control. In that respect in the WI area Haas is better than Mazak, Gossiger is a great company and although I would never buy a Haas I would buy something from them before MSI.
 
We have had the QT and we have the good luck with both.Nexus machines are about 20% faster then the old QT with the T-PLUS controls. I think its how good you take care of your equipment. If you do no PM's and do not watch for things then they will come around to bit your later.As far as box ways go I feel its a Ford verus Chevy thing.
But I feel what ever works for you stay with.
We must have a good thing going with MSI. We get GREAT Service. So why would I change.
I take you had a bad experience with MSI.
 
Wow Orbea you must be a HUGE shop, maybe S&S cycle? I don't know anyone who's had good service from them. How can you when they go through service men like kleenex. I use one of there old service guys Quantum, Bill Judson. I have heard more bad things than good, MSI isn't what it used to be. That's good that you get good service though, and I don't really think box way vs. guides are like chevy vs. ford. It would be hard to argue that if rapids don't play any consideration that box way is a better way to go. So with smaller lathes go box way and then figure out what works best for you on the rest. By the way when I mentioned Nexus I was more making a stab at Mazak for screwing there customers selling them worse machines for more when they just changed the name made the machines a little better and all of a sudden reduced the price by like 20k. All manufacturers do that though, it's kind of bogus but supply and demand I guess. I generally listen less to the guys running the machines and talk to the guys that work on them they see better than I why one machine is more solid than the next. And then distributor is most important after that, Okuma and Haas definetely take the cake in WI there isn't competition they're the largest and have the most service and support. Sorry something just ran through my head, imagine the guy with the shop full of Fadals or Hyundais or any of the other manufacturers that changed controls recently, they're probably sitting back thinking what are these guys worried about? Ouch with that being said who knows what will be good or bad tomorrow...
 
You for sure got a point there about Fadals and Hyudais. I was very close to buying my First Fadal when I was starting out 15 years ago. Glad I did not otherwise I do not think I would be here today.
I mostly deal with Mazak out of Milwakuee and only deal with MSI when it comes to new. So everyone all ears when it comes to new.
Jeff Gregor has been great to deal with and without him they would be hurting.
How about those Badgers?
 
BTW, back to the drive issue.

Found thee problem today.

Voltages ok, actually drive ok. Problem turned out to be a loose encoder cable on the X axis servo.

Throws the same alarm (servo malfunction) but the code is different.

&0000002F,&0001 If you see this code with a servo malfunction check your encoder and servo cables. We do alot of feedmilling and the vibration must have worked them loose. you can also check the led display on the drive itself you will see "F1" then "2F" flashing on the display.

I have a spare IPM that's weak but works for the 20-35 amp drives and after swapping it with the IPM on the X drive I still had a Servo malfunction as soon as the machine entered the cut. After double checking the code I realized my mistake. Swapped back to the origonal IPM and tightened my servo and encoder cables and all is well.

When I saw the servo error on friday I made an assumtion about what was wrong.

Anyway I'm happy I was wrong, the only expense incurred was 3 hours downtime and a reminder not to make assumtions.

Mike
 
Smilenbseen, I don't want to sound rude, but there isn't really any way to say this without sounding rude:

You have no clue what you are talking about. Absolutely none. Every time you try to post a specific example, it just makes it more obvious that you have no idea what is going on.
 








 
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