Mastercam vs Esprit cam for swiss programming

Was hoping someone on here could give me a little insight on esprit if they have any experience programming swiss lathes with it. I currently program a star sr20 and tsugnami swiss with mastercam x4. Mastercam works fine for the tsugnami since its capabilities are farely limited but the work load and complexity of the parts for the sr20 just continues to rise. Im spending way too much time editing code and have an opportunity to esperit and maybe even partmaker through A neighboring shop/customer (boss is family related). Anyway....

I only played around on it temporarily while I had some free time and it seems everything is feature based? Im acustome to picking apart existing cad files or creating my own from scratch to generate tool paths so I feel a bit lost you could say but eager and excited to take advantage of this opportunity. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Also pros and cons of the two softwares mentioned ( esprit and delcam partmaker) in comparison to mastercam is also helpful. Thanks!

Max

Looks like esprit doesnt have a big fanbase judging on the lack of feedback from my thread so ill give my own review and comparison for those out there interested. Ive just gotten my feet wet with the very basics but ive gotten a pretty good feel for the mechanics of the software....

Pros:
- very nice simulation. Even if you dont have the simulation for your particular machine there are many options so you can really visualize what will go on out at the machine.

- works best with solid models and simplifies making tool paths directly off a solid with auto chaining or manual chaining

- many options for multi-axis swiss/turning. Simplifies programming for machines with two turrets. Also options for pick-off and synchronizing spindles. This is big for me because mastercam's multi-axis turning is just awful.

Cons:
- learning curve is tough with this software, not the most "user friendly" software for just clicking around and learning it your own way. Most likely you will have to go through all the lesson tutorials before you are comfortable as i am doing.

- creating levels and geometry, they really should of simplified this. Literally spent hours trying to figure out how to copy and change geometry to a new level. Even when i learned the process of this i still hate it.

- theres no redo button?! Hope this is some kind of joke. If you hit undo by accident or decide you didnt want to undo. Well too bad you will have to redo it the hard way because theres no button for it in the help menu or toolbar. Really?! Lets hope im wrong about this.

-don't think I would rely on this software for simple machining but maybe this will change. The software obviously has great capabilities buts its almost too capable at times where in mastercam it would take me all of 30 seconds to create a basic toolpath.


....i donlike esprit though. So i will contintue to learn and update this thread and give my honest opinion. Would love to here what others have to say about this software.

The folks at DP Technology are super obsessed with creating great tool path. They aren't so obsessed about creating functional user interfaces or making the software intuitive for anyone who doesn't have 100 hours and significant introductory training on their software.

Partmaker hands down. When Delcam bought EGS and combined Feturecam with Partmaker they took the market IMO. DP is great software and has great support but they tend to stay mostly focused on the milling areas where partmaker is about the only software I know of just for round work. Also partmaker is a separate entity within Delcam and unlike powermill and powershape your not dealing with Glen and Chris for support. The best I remember Partmaker comes from IL.

Since I’ve learnt programming with Esprit from the ground during my apprenticeship I can give an opinion. I think the buttons and overall user interface could be improved here and there but the possibilities and exactness of defining features and chaining things are great assets. You can enlarge, search for gaps and double features, clean them up, and more. Once you’re accustomed to it you can reorganise operations for optimum performance very quickly. I like Esprit.

Mastercam X8 that I’ve also been trained on, cost me some $1500, is perhaps more a miller’s friend.

BG225 said:

Looks like esprit doesnt have a big fanbase judging on the lack of feedback from my thread so ill give my own review and comparison for those out there interested. Ive just gotten my feet wet with the very basics but ive gotten a pretty good feel for the mechanics of the software....

Pros:
- very nice simulation. Even if you dont have the simulation for your particular machine there are many options so you can really visualize what will go on out at the machine.

- works best with solid models and simplifies making tool paths directly off a solid with auto chaining or manual chaining

- many options for multi-axis swiss/turning. Simplifies programming for machines with two turrets. Also options for pick-off and synchronizing spindles. This is big for me because mastercam's multi-axis turning is just awful.

Cons:
- learning curve is tough with this software, not the most "user friendly" software for just clicking around and learning it your own way. Most likely you will have to go through all the lesson tutorials before you are comfortable as i am doing.

- creating levels and geometry, they really should of simplified this. Literally spent hours trying to figure out how to copy and change geometry to a new level. Even when i learned the process of this i still hate it.

- theres no redo button?! Hope this is some kind of joke. If you hit undo by accident or decide you didnt want to undo. Well too bad you will have to redo it the hard way because theres no button for it in the help menu or toolbar. Really?! Lets hope im wrong about this.

-don't think I would rely on this software for simple machining but maybe this will change. The software obviously has great capabilities buts its almost too capable at times where in mastercam it would take me all of 30 seconds to create a basic toolpath.


....i donlike esprit though. So i will contintue to learn and update this thread and give my honest opinion. Would love to here what others have to say about this software.

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I was, am, a Mastercam user for 24 years. Started with version 4.11. I started a Swiss shop 11 years ago and we did the same thing you are doing. Cut and paste. No fun, not productive and clearly not post perfect. We bought Esprit for our swiss machines and I am really glad we did. Although the learning curve is steep, DP Technology has the best customer service I have dealt with in the software world. Also, there is a DP run forum for questions about everything from creating geometry to improving the tool and process database.

The shop I work for now, sold my share of the swiss shop, just recently changed over from Mastercam to Esprit for ALL of their programming. Vertical, Horizontal, 5-axis Mills, Lathes and Mill-Turn Lathes, EVERYTHING.

When I first went to Esprit from Mastercam I had a REALLY hard time figuring out how to create geometry for chains and so on. But, after purchasing a 3rd party tutorial for Esprit ($400-$500, if I remember right), it all just clicked. The problem was I was trying to do everything like I had do it in Mastercam for years and they do NOT use the same approach for toolpath creation. Now that I am fully immersed in using Esprit every day, I wouldn't go back to Mastercam for FREE.

There are pluses and minuses to every CAD/CAM software and you just deal with them as you learn their shortcomings over the years. The way Esprit pulls WAY ahead of Mastercam IMHO is their customer service. Mastercam's customer service (and I think this depends on your local reseller) is CRAP! Esprit's customer service, on the other hand, is fantastic. You get FREE post modifications to ANY post you have a license for, as long as your maintenance contract is current. You get unlimited customer support. You send an email to their support team and generally within a few minutes the question has been assigned to a tech and within a few minutes after that you get an email from the tech with the answer or questions to make sure he undertands your issue.

My 2 cents. If you have more questions, post them here or PM me.

Make sure they give you a working post in Esprit before signing the check. Couple local shops waited a year + for a finished post

Yes pretty kick a$$ software.With over 600 posts in there libraries.The user can usually find some he likes with a post

So i did get a bit more time to learn some basics, the software seems very efficient at creating tool paths directly off the cad file which makes things pretty painless. I definitely want to get comfortable with this software because i feel I could pump out programs three times as fast if i get familiar with the toolpath process.

My other big question is how well it does for 3d milling tool paths. With emphasis one contour irregular shapes with ball endmills and lollipop mills. Just finished a job using mastercam to make a prototype implant that made me nearly pull my hair out trying to get mastercams sporadic toolpaths under control.

Creating all this extra geometry and containment boundaries just to keep the tool to the right surface is far more of a burden than I feel it should be. Especially with the software technology today, i feel these types of tool paths shouldnt be an issue.

BG225 said:

So i did get a bit more time to learn some basics, the software seems very efficient at creating tool paths directly off the cad file which makes things pretty painless. I definitely want to get comfortable with this software because i feel I could pump out programs three times as fast if i get familiar with the toolpath process.

My other big question is how well it does for 3d milling tool paths. With emphasis one contour irregular shapes with ball end mills and lollipop mills. Just finished a job using Mastercam to make a prototype implant that made me nearly pull my hair out trying to get Mastercam's sporadic toolpaths under control.

Creating all this extra geometry and containment boundaries just to keep the tool to the right surface is far more of a burden than I feel it should be. Especially with the software technology today, i feel these types of tool paths shouldn't be an issue.

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I use their 3d pretty often, not often enough to call myself and expert at it, but I am always able to get what I am looking for. I think you are just going to have to live with the containment boundaries. They are very powerful and you will grow to love them.

The "help" within Esprit is also VERY good. Whenever you are in an operation page and you click on the Help button it actually takes to the portion of the help info you are looking for help on! Not a stupid index like Mastercam has done forever.

Keep learning, I am convinced I make better programs in Esprit than I ever did in Mastercam and I just fully stopped using Mastercam 3 months ago.

I dont dont have an issue with containment boundaries so long as they work. In mastercam ofter the tool path will disregard the containment or check surfaces i have created, then i manually edit the errors out. Or the toolpath will generate oddly and the tool will not follow the surface completely and leave imperfections, or uncut areas.

I would like to be able to select the surfaces i would like to machine, and select the check surfaces i want to stay clear of without issues. Would love to be able to quickly make these type of toolpaths efficiently because i do many job lots that are only 2 to 3 pcs.

Have you looked at cam wizards tutorials.For the little bit a money they charge.They are so useful.You would find that you can pick surfaces that you want to machine.Are just as easy do the opposite to pick the ones.You don't want to machine.You should check out camwizard some time

TCEDM said:

Have you looked at cam wizards tutorials.For the little bit a money they charge.They are so useful.You would find that you can pick surfaces that you want to machine.Are just as easy do the opposite to pick the ones.You don't want to machine.You should check out camwizard some time

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+1 on cam wizard

If Esprit price is getting high then I would also check out others in that range. In CAD/CAM/CAE you generally get what you pay for and that typically means more programming automation and less manual programming and geometry creation/manipulation. I know our Mastercam programmers create a lot of geometry to get paths just the way they want them but our NX programmers rarely create any extra geometry.

Training, as always, is key to hitting the ground running, to shorten the learning curve and to get the most out of any software. I have run into so many people over the years who stumble upon software features by chance or never knew about some features while their counterparts have been using them for years. Especially in the bigger, more capable softwares.

BG225 said:

I dont dont have an issue with containment boundaries so long as they work. In mastercam ofter the tool path will disregard the containment or check surfaces i have created, then i manually edit the errors out. Or the toolpath will generate oddly and the tool will not follow the surface completely and leave imperfections, or uncut areas.

I would like to be able to select the surfaces i would like to machine, and select the check surfaces i want to stay clear of without issues. Would love to be able to quickly make these type of toolpaths efficiently because i do many job lots that are only 2 to 3 pcs.

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I had to pick one (to quote), so here it is. I don't have these problems with X8 99% of the time. Containment boundary has several options, (inside, outside, center, additional offset), it is very powerful once you learn how to use it. For the record, the HS surfacing do not recognize check surfaces so that might be a problem for you depending on toolpath. There are also advanced options depending on toolpath, like how to transition between surfaces/faces, gouge checks, etc. Yes, sometimes the toolpath is not a nice match to the surfaces you are trying to machine so you have to a) pick another machining option b) finagle with some of the advanced options, manipulate your boundaries, etc. I am sure ALL cad/cam have these same little glitches, either that or you never have had to do anything very complex (not you specifically, but people who say "my cam software is perfect and does everything right EVERY time).
To the OP, asking about comparing mastercam X4 to a (presumably new up to date esprit version)... well, uh, ya LoL. I've heard esprit is badass for swiss and live tooling and stuff so I am not not knocking it, but at least compare apples to apples (or red delicious to granny smiths!) haha.

The product you want to compare to that CNC software makes (acquired a few years ago from a Swiss company) is called Swiss Expert:
https://www.mastercam.com/en-us/Solutions/Swiss-Machining/Swiss-Expert

Not Mastercam... Completely different animal. Machine simulation with feeding stock and all.

AG

BG225 said:

I currently program a star sr20 and tsugnami swiss with mastercam x4.
Max

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Hi Max, I saw you post on the other site but just in case you didn't get the message:

I have been developing a Star SR20 RII post for 7 months now. It's not a fancy solution, but it works and it is considerably cheaper since you already have the software.

When I got the machine I was searching for posts and alternate software. I decided to just develop one since it would take me months and big $ to get proficient at something new.

It works well even though the legacy lathe product has no support for that style machine.

I threw up some pictures. I will post a manual to this page soon. No editing of code is required, just post upload and run...

Link To Post Info



AG

Mike1974 said:

either that or you never have had to do anything very complex (not you specifically, but people who say "my cam software is perfect and does everything right EVERY time).

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Mastercam FanBoy...you don't see the pattern yet? All these programmers who keep saying their CAM software is perfect and does everything right every time...and they all happen to NOT use Mastercam...?? Weird huh

goooose said:

Mastercam FanBoy...you don't see the pattern yet? All these programmers who keep saying their CAM software is perfect and does everything right every time...and they all happen to NOT use Mastercam...?? Weird huh

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Who would that be? I see, along with probably everyone else that checks into the CAD/CAM forum. SOMEONE is always saying "gee HSM works great, except this one thing" "I have used Surfcam for XX years and I love it, although..." That is every software, Mastercam included... I believe I also said, and I quote myself here - " I've heard esprit is badass for swiss and live tooling and stuff "
Pretty sure no one says that ^ about mastercam, no matter what version, but I don't run or program a swiss or live tooled machine of any kind...

DiabloLucky13 said:

When I first went to Esprit from Mastercam I had a REALLY hard time figuring out how to create geometry for chains and so on. But, after purchasing a 3rd party tutorial for Esprit ($400-$500, if I remember right), it all just clicked. The problem was I was trying to do everything like I had do it in Mastercam for years and they do NOT use the same approach for toolpath creation. Now that I am fully immersed in using Esprit every day, I wouldn't go back to Mastercam for FREE.

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i'm 100% with you on this one
I started on mastercam and learned it through high school and into college. My first job was Multi-axis lathe programming and i still used mastercam very extensively. My coworker did alot of programming on a star and tsugami swiss and it was all copy and paste / manual coding. I can't speak from the swiss programming aspect of esprit, but if it's anything like the milling it'll be amazing. It was definitely a steep curve to learn esprit. When i started this job i had around 8 years of mastercam experience, with 3 of those being in the work force. I have now been on esprit for 3 years and I love it. The speed that i can create programs, with better tool control. It would be really hard to have to go back to mastercam after using esprit.