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Got Esprit loaded, couple setup questions

J

John in CA

Hot Rolled
Joined
Aug 18, 2007
Location
Bakersfield, CA
At long last the boss has tasked me with getting our seat of Esprit 2011 up and running on our shop computer... have it home for the weekend and got the software installed and registered.

I made a trial run at modeling a simple mill part and got toolpaths generated ( I've been working with the CAM Wizard tutorials),
but ran into a bit of a snag when I went to post the code for the part.

I was told by my boss that he had purchased post processors for each of our CNC machines. My question is, when you purchase Esprit, are the post processors that you pay for included on the installation CD, or are they installed seperately? The reason I ask is because when the prompt came up to select a post processor, the menu was empty, and when I opted to browse for them, the search came up empty. I used Windows Explorer to look through every subfolder in the DP Technology program file, and could not locate any file with the .asc or.pst file extension. Did I do something incorrectly during the installation, or is there something else going on?

Other than that, I'm really excited about getting this software going and look forward to getting up to speed with it.

Thanks,

John
 
Your post should be separate text files. I don't think there are any posts included on the disc. What machines do you need posts for? There are some available on the Esprit discussion board, but if you need Mori posts, I think you have to pay for those. My NL-2500SY post was $5000.00. 5 G's for a text file that is supposed to certified by Mori. I am not entirely sure that is the case. If you have the files, it should be located in a "POST" folder in the data folder in the DPTECHNOLOGY folder. How are the training videos going? Is it worth the money? I will try to help if I can but Esprit kicks my butt.
 
Thanks, WOLOG, I'll ask the boss on Monday whether they gave him anything else along with the installation CD. The machine that the trial part would be ran on is a Daewoo DMV 4030 mill with a Fanuc 21i control. I feel your pain about the cost of some of the posts; my boss was telling me how much he paid for the post for our Makino wire EDM and it seemed pretty oturageous.

I've only made it through the Beginning milling tutorial so far, I'm about to start the mill-turn module (though I might work it concurrently with Beginning Turning). I can recommend the first one very highly. I actually bought the Milling tutorial myself, unaware that the boss had already purchased all of them. Now that I know he has them all, I'm really glad I don't have to spend any more money on them, as it would mean a lot more time involved buying them as I could afford.
 
John,

There are 2 posts in the Post section of the discussion board. One is 3 axis and the other is 4 axis. It does not list the control series but it is for a Doosan mill. That post should be a stock generic post unless you are doing something special(= $). What mill turn do you have? Esprit is a pain to change machine setups for the simulation.
 
The mill-turn is a Doosan Puma 2000SY with Fanuc 18i-TB control. It's funny you mention the difficulty in changing over simulation setups as that's one of the things I haven't been looking forward to dealing with. I'm wondering whether there's any way to make it easier with the use of templates... but that's one of the things the Basic Milling tutorial didn't cover. Guess I'll have to use the help function/trial and error and come up with a workable system.

I got registered to use the discussion board, but I'm waiting for my confirmation email. I'll definitely check it out once I get that squared away.
 
The thing that irks the crap out of me is the fact that .stl files are used to simulate the machine and holders. There is a .stl option for esprit that is $1500.00 in order to open and manipulate stl's in esprit. When you are seting up your tools in Esprit, you can tell Esprit how long the bar is or the diameter or the gage length of the milling holder but you can't say you want to use a 1.50" boring bar block on station 9, 10 and 11. Or an axial live tool on 12 and 8. The initial setup file for the machine simulation is what controls that. In order to get a accurate simulation of the current setup you are programming, you have to manipulate the setup file of your turret and move those crappy stl files. There is a Mori addin for this but I think it is for the new MAPPS 4 controls with Esprit embedded(Mori License needed). I have two Mori Y axis lathes that are MAPPS 3 and I have $30000.00 in Esprit and I cant set up a turret without a bottle of whiskey and a sledge hammer to calm my nerves. I was told the setup wil become easier in the next version but I doubt it.
 
Yeah, sounds pretty jacked up. What I was wondering about was whether I was going to be able to model, simulate, and program my subspindle from within Esprit. I do lots of parts where machining is done in both spindles, as well as others where the sub is used as a bar puller, or a work support. Sounds like that kind of stuff is going to be a PITA to configure. Or it could be I'll just have to keep hand-coding those sections of the programs.
 
Programming the sub is not the problem. It's not any more difficult than the main spindle. The simulation setup is. I have been told not to worry about the machine simulation and only worry about the tool simulation. The reseller guy told me that after I complained about the simulation problems. Why is a top of the line CAM system a pain to setup? Seems like there should be a generic set of blocks and live tool holders and such in the program to ease setup simulations. If you figure out an easier way, please let me know.
 
Reseller sounds like a bit of a "tool" himself. Don't worry about the machine simulation? I for one would like to know if the machine is going to try to send the sub through the main spindle on a pickup.

I remembered one thing I wanted to ask... I haven't tried importing a solid model into Esprit from a different CAD software package. So far all the parts I've worked with, I've modeled within Esprit. I'll be using SolidWorks mainly for the drawing that I do in the shop, but customer files could be anything. Have you done this and, if so, have you run into any issues?
 
Since you have Solidworks, I think it will open STL files for the simulation setup. So that may be a help. Just make sure you copy the original file. Importing a solid is easy. I mainly use parasolids or iges files. If you have Solidworks on the same computer that Esprit is on, there is a addon called Solidworks FX. It will bring over all of the tree from solidworks with all of the thread call out and all of that good stuff. Drawing in Esprit is a pain for me. I prefer to use a solid whenever I can.

After you open Esprit and you choose which machine template you want to use, click the open tab, choose your file and click the "merge" box on the lower left hand side of the open file box. Then the fun begins while you rearrange the origin. I don't spend enough time on Esprit to really get good at it. I spend so much time babysitting and begging people to think about what they're doing before the green button is pressed. I really believe that if I didn't have to worry about employees and customers I would love my job.
 
Oilfield/refinery work is a big component of our business. We also do work for companies in several other industries. A lot of the oilfield work we do is quick turnaround/ tighter-than-normal tolerance stuff for some of the service companies around here... Schlumberger comes to mind. We also get wellhead components subbed to us occasionally from a local production shop.
 
Hello,

I'm new to PM and am trying to download the Esprit Post thats available in the Posts section but cant seem to locate. Can you help WOLOG?
 
WOLOG said:
The thing that irks the crap out of me is the fact that .stl files are used to simulate the machine and holders. There is a .stl option for esprit that is $1500.00 in order to open and manipulate stl's in esprit. When you are seting up your tools in Esprit, you can tell Esprit how long the bar is or the diameter or the gage length of the milling holder but you can't say you want to use a 1.50" boring bar block on station 9, 10 and 11. Or an axial live tool on 12 and 8. The initial setup file for the machine simulation is what controls that. In order to get a accurate simulation of the current setup you are programming, you have to manipulate the setup file of your turret and move those crappy stl files. There is a Mori addin for this but I think it is for the new MAPPS 4 controls with Esprit embedded(Mori License needed). I have two Mori Y axis lathes that are MAPPS 3 and I have $30000.00 in Esprit and I cant set up a turret without a bottle of whiskey and a sledge hammer to calm my nerves. I was told the setup wil become easier in the next version but I doubt it.
Click to expand...

I was told TNG will fix it. It does suck at the moment though. But if you contact them they might be able to give you the tables of how much to input for the XYZ values and provide you models of the tool holders.
 
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