Some Help for Apprentice?

G'day

First year apprentice Machinist here, I'm 12weeks in.

Working at my families small machine shop (2x CNC Turning & 1x CNC Milling 3 Axis).

The 2 CNC Turning machines are SEIKI HT 25R & SEIKI HT 25S (Milling Machine Unknown will attempt to find out tomorrow).

Summary of my history.

Working in the family business for over a decade.
Been a simple operator of the 2 Turning Machines for +5years.
For the first 2years on the Turning Machines I had 0 teachings.
For the next 2years our business hired a qualified Machinist (+35yrs skilled).
For the past year I've been getting off hand training from our Machinist.
For the past 12 weeks I've been our Machinists official apprentice.

My question is the following with the above machines stated already, my teacher is old school (even he admits it) and I am more new age tech 'savy' than he is himself and this isn't meant to "speak ill" against him but he finds the new age software that can/could be used somewhat "intimidating" having said that he is old school CNC so he is writing the code the hard way raw (he started on the paper rolls with hole punches).

I have the reverse opinion with state of the art software on using it where I can whenever I can not only because I like to but because I already know that you need to in order to stay "up to date", I watch him struggle and even though I know he is great at what he does the mere fact that he writes the code raw like this he visibly shakes (he's not young either) but it's a risk I know I could remove if I could use my young mind and techno savy abilities to find software to effectively run simulations of our specific machines and parameters in a virtual safe manner prior to any real machining being done (which even as an apprentice I would assume is the normality for big business etc.).

So my question is this...

Can anyone recommend to me software for my PC that I can learn and run simulations on but setup to mimic my machines exactly (axis limits etc etc) so that I as an apprentice can also practice safely and also hopefully apply it directly to our machines from the software to help remove this writing raw pray to gods stuff?

I just don't want to 'waste' my time on software that essentially teaches me "things" that do not pertain to my own machines and I have a strong gut feeling that there is some sort of "universally adjustable" cnc turning / milling etc. program out there where you can input your machines specifics and run virtual programs for both practice and reality in a safe manner and (more importantly for me I can do it at home/spare time) but also capable of being directly loaded from software to machine for live machining.

Any input from anyone greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Lots of good stuff out there we use MasterCam. It's expensive but has been around for a long time and works well. You may be able to down load Fusion for free or some type of inexpensive trial version. I think Fusion might be the way to get you off the ground for as little money as possible.

Good luck

Make Chips Boys !

Ron

G'day

Thanks for responding!

I've been told by my mentor / machinist that CAM "won't work" for our machines?

It's not that I am trying to spite him so much as I am starting to wonder if it's more so his personal "fears" of CAM programs?

He is adept at using Autodesk LTE but that is the only Program he uses and it takes him a long time, meanwhile I am watching all these cnc videos on youtube using all this cam software that makes it just look so easy... at least to my technical mind, let alone the ability to run a safe simulation of the product that straight from Autodesk LTE to manual code writing.

Is he speaking the truth basically? I don't want to go behind his back and stuff and call him out I just want to apply new age technology to our business for growth I am still going to learn what he teaches me which is going to be the old way but I want to also learn the new way because time is money.

I don't want to waste my time "mastering" a program if its going to be something I'm just going to upgrade to something else and inevitably have to learn again (that aggrevates me lol) and again I don't want to waste my time on something that just won't work with my machines...I don't want to be compensating (NOTE: ALWAYS REMEMBER Z IS HERE) sort of thing I want 1:1 software to machine.

Cheers.

EXAMPLE:

My mentor is adept at using Autodesk LTE.
However...
He did not know how to install it or set it up on the PC.
(I did that and it was my first time installing & Setting up Autodesk).

EDIT: I guess I'm just worried that HE is worried that if he admits "openly/officially" that he isn't capable of teaching me CAM software skills that it might have detrimental aspects to either my course or his reputation (which I don't want to tarnish I got major respect for this guy) and if this the case then I'm prepared to just self teach myself as I am doing already where and when I can when I am not at work.

Already downloaded the CNCsimulator program from google a while ago and used the 30day trial it was alright but restricting in that I couldn't change many settings to suit my own machines so I didn't decide to pursue purchasing the software.

Kharn said:

First year apprentice Machinist here, I'm 12weeks in.

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No doubt about it, 12 weeks / 3 months into the caper. You know shit from clay.

Old school is write things down and look them over befor taking a chance to mess up a job, break a machine , get fired...

New age Hot Rod, Run like a cheetah then find time to play a game on the cell phone...

Where are you? Does your knowledge cup run over and all that good tea run to the ground..

35 year in the trade likely he knows more that you can learn in five years.

Qt Op:[I have the reverse opinion] ..what?

What part of me having absolute respect for this individual did you miss?
Why do you feel personally attacked to make such statements?
I merely requested help, help that he is not only aware of but encouraged as I talk to him daily, work with him daily, there is no secrets, we are a team and I can already if I wanted to yes be a bastard and say even though I'm am not knowledgeable but in OUR situation HE can't do things without ME because I am the MUSCLE in our labor without doubt! But I never use that and I worship his knowledge and skills as he more than appreciates my physical prowess and eagerness to use it for our team work!

I'm not here to waste time on this ego stuff.

Doesn't sound like you're looking for cam software. You're asking about CNC simulation software. I've used Vericut and found it to be OK but expensive. There's others out there including one that had a free trial version you might look into.

Fusion 360 doesn't contain a real simulator. It doesn't parse gcode but runs the simulation from it's internal model. There's no way to configure the machine it is simulating.

I believe Mastercam's simulator might be better in that it consumes g-code. Not sure about its configurability. It is expensive as well.

My suggestion is to get good at cam with Fusion 360 on your own time. Learn everything you can from the old guy and his manual ways while at work. There's a huge advantage to being good at hand writing gcode. At some point in the future, you'll combine the two and be a good cnc machinist.

Teryk

Is this a true apprenticeship or is this just some guy with experience mentoring you? If he doesn't know cad or cam software in this day and age then he does not have the updated knowledge to have an apprentice under him.

I don't doubt he may be very experienced in all other aspects, but if he can't and won't try learning a cad program then he's doing you and the company you work for a disservice.

I have had several people come in here talking about their years of experience but can't setup a simple indexing job on a rotary.

With that being said if it is just the fact he never learned cad, learn all you can from him. Because he has probably done some crazy setups/fixturing that you would never dream of doing. Along with different methods for making parts.

mTeryk said:

Doesn't sound like you're looking for cam software. You're asking about CNC simulation software. I've used Vericut and found it to be OK but expensive. There's others out there including one that had a free trial version you might look into.

Fusion 360 doesn't contain a real simulator. It doesn't parse gcode but runs the simulation from it's internal model. There's no way to configure the machine it is simulating.

I believe Mastercam's simulator might be better in that it consumes g-code. Not sure about its configurability. It is expensive as well.

My suggestion is to get good at cam with Fusion 360 on your own time. Learn everything you can from the old guy and his manual ways while at work. There's a huge advantage to being good at hand writing gcode. At some point in the future, you'll combine the two and be a good cnc machinist.

Teryk

Click to expand...

I'm still going to learn writing the G-code in the way he teaches me but he has already told me that the best method of learning is to teach oneself so he encourages this questioning and searching it's all for the better, I've come to realize he is a certain rare case, originally I never wanted to do the apprenticeship because everyone associated with our company back then was a terrible teacher/communicator (as some have shown in this thread) but then when we hired this man it not only showed me that I was wrong (there not all pricks) but suddenly I became interested, extremely interested nigh obsessed now because I've come to realize that so much of my personal life also applies to what I am learning and can make/do.

Is it "easy" to transition from Fusion 360 to Mastercam?
I would like to logically start out on the cheaper option so long as it's not a complete learning curve for the transition (thus telling me I should just start with the expensive one from day 1, time is more important to me than anything).

Cheers

AARONT said:

Is this a true apprenticeship or is this just some guy with experience mentoring you? If he doesn't know cad or cam software in this day and age then he does not have the updated knowledge to have an apprentice under him.

I don't doubt he may be very experienced in all other aspects, but if he can't and won't try learning a cad program then he's doing you and the company you work for a disservice.

I have had several people come in here talking about their years of experience but can't setup a simple indexing job on a rotary.

With that being said if it is just the fact he never learned cad, learn all you can from him. Because he has probably done some crazy setups/fixturing that you would never dream of doing. Along with different methods for making parts.

Click to expand...

This is a real apprenticeship he is more than qualified for the certification being taught, these details were thoroughly checked by the government and agency involved.

That said, I don't doubt his capabilities at all I just wanted to originally want to know why he would tell me that the machines won't accept CAM?

I'm still to novice to understand why not and that in and of itself should say something if it is a silly question because I don't even know if it is.

If CAM is capable on the machines then why would he say that it isn't? (He is never "aggressive" in his response but a little "distracting" in it again I stress there is nothing 'malicious' involved).

He has already admitted and would openly that my progress is brilliant, the course is set for 4 years but I got the 1st year tests done in 12weeks, I'm just amazed how he made something I once dreaded (working for the family business) into something that I arrive everyday 1hr early to work for!

Kharn, there is a lot to learn. CAM is a benefit to Modern Machining, no doubt. Just like CNC is a benefit, no doubt. You CANNOT learn everything in a short time.

The Art and Majesty of Machining is not in CAM, it is in Shitty old Bridgeports and B&S Surface Grinders.

BUT, we live in a Modern world, and it is very competetive. You have a Master of the Trade, teaching you what he knows!! Learn everything he knows, then and only then, move on. I realize I sound a little David Carradine about it (not sure an Aussie gets that one), but I have to teach people who know how to use Mastercam, Esprit, Gibbscam, Bobcad and a few others, how to use a Micrometer, or why/how Climbing is different than Conventional or the difference between HSS and Carbide. The difference IS those people are NOT Machinists, and they never will be, they are Jockeys.

Learn what you can, it's not a race. Or if you want to be a Jockey, fire that guy and hire a Jockey. I can give you hundreds of phone numbers, probably several in Australia, of Jockeys, but very few real Machinists, it's a depreciating skill.

R

You want answers, what are the machines and how old are they? One of the key quirks of this game, everything’s specific, you want specific answers to specific questions provide us with the info to give you a precise and correct answer.

CAM just like most 3d modelling looks pretty easy, hell im actually inventor certified back on version 6 or 6.1, yeah i done a 4 or maybe 6 day inventor training course even got a certificate! Truth is like most things when you know what your doing its easy. But getting there takes more than just training. To be productive in cam you need to know machining and cad, its not rocket science, but there’s plenty of gotcha's and certainly with a lot of cam - 3d software settings, internal standards and templates are were the real efforts go and what makes it slick and fast to use everyday. In cam its called a post and is generally pretty machine specific, its all about how the CAM software converts the tool paths and call outs into code your machines understand.

Do well o remember in this game fuck ups happen, so just because the first 12 weeks have gone well don't expect it to continue smoothly, remember if its not for the odd bad day you don't realise how good the good days are!

To expand on what adama said earlier, it's the post that makes all the difference. Most of the time you see guys asking for this post or that post because they either don't have the skill or the time to modify an existing template to suit their machine. I understand the time thing, but in your case time is less of an issue. You make yourself much more valuable if you can take the manual for a machine that shows the G code, and modify a post to suit that particular machine. Tweaking little things like preloading tools, moving the table to a user-friendly position at the end of a program, automatically inserting stops where they make sense, and so forth is often what makes the difference between a post that works and a post that's a pleasure to work with.

I worked with a young guy that came into the shop thinking he knew everything. Anyone recall their own early days? The task, as I took it upon myself, was to gently break down what he thought he knew and show him the things that he didn't. More importantly, why those things were important even though "you can just do that on a 5-axis super-mill deluxe 10k".

Be patient and do things the slow way for a while. That will give you the best foundation for intelligently doing things the fast way in the future. Find out what really gets your mentor interested and ask a lot of questions about why and how and how much. If you have a guy that's willing to slow down and explain things to you at that level, you're way ahead of the majority.

To me everyone should learn to program iso programs by hand to give you an understanding of what the program is doing every step of the way. No point in only learning how to do a program in cam yet not understand a thing about what it’s doing.

We had a guy come in for a interview and we gave him a drawing of a piece of rhs steel with a single row of holes in it and he went and pulled out a laptop out of his bag to program it using cam. Needless to say before he even opened the laptop we just told him to leave.

What you should do is learn as much as you can from him and his many years experience while also learning cam on your own time. What if you leave your family shop and your next job doesn’t use cam software and you have no experience or understanding about iso programming.

Thanks to all for responding I am an Aussie so run on Aussie time.

I want to make it crystal clear, my mentor is teaching me and as such I am going to learn what he teaches me but he has told me to do as much self learning in my own time as I can he knows me better than anyone on here and he has already told me where I should focus my efforts in spare time / in general because a lot of certain things he is more than confident in my already on the job training so far its his opinion that I personally in my situation with my current level of skills and abilities to learn that I should focus on what he says will be the most difficult areas even though we aren't up to that right now.

My bedroom is covered in Blackboards I made from MDF and painted with chalkboard that I have filled with Gcode and Mcode (specific ones my mentor says to focus on because its those that we use at work on the job for our machines).

I'm going to do research into Mastercam I'm not trying to rush anything and my mentor and accessor well and trully understand that when Im the one requesting repeats etc cause I wont move forward until its nigh second nature and thats my own system.

Not wanting to waste time does not equal rushing.
I already use programs for unrelated to work things that I self teach myself in and am becoming above Intermediate at like the latest Photoshop/LiteRoom/PremierePro as I have a hobby in photography and filming but no one taught me to use them and I am without doubt beyond amateur abd they aren't MS paint in their operation....

Im 12weeks in yes but I can edit code in any of pur programs to bring it back to tolerance if the tips start to wear that alone he says is impressive for 12weeks.

If it takes gcode, CAM will work with it, period. It just has to be setup right. Also IMHO if you don't know at least one CAM software you're not a qualified CNC machinist these days, anymore than someone could call themselves a qualified auto mechanic and not know anything about fuel injectors and engine computers. You might be a wizard at tuning carburetors on crate engines, but that doesn't make for a fully qualified auto mechanic these days.

It is good to learn manual machining before going to CNC, and hand coding before going to CAM. If you want something cheap to check your hand-code with, try NCPlot.

mhajicek said:

If it takes gcode, CAM will work with it, period. It just has to be setup right. Also IMHO if you don't know at least one CAM software you're not a qualified CNC machinist these days, anymore than someone could call themselves a qualified auto mechanic and not know anything about fuel injectors and engine computers. You might be a wizard at tuning carburetors on crate engines, but that doesn't make for a fully qualified auto mechanic these days.

It is good to learn manual machining before going to CNC, and hand coding before going to CAM. If you want something cheap to check your hand-code with, try NCPlot.

Click to expand...

All really good points, I would just add that, yes if G-Code works CAM will work, but one of the critical parts of getting CAM integrated with your control is figuring out how to actually transmit the text file with the G-Code from the CAM PC to the CNC control. When you get to a certain size or complexity of program you really don't want to be manually rewriting your CAM-generated code into the controller. These big programs are needed for all the really fun CAM-enabled stuff like surfacing and HSM.

If you give us the make/model of the controllers that run the CNC machines, someone can probably give you some guidance. Usually with older machines it is some flavor of RS232 serial connection. There are lots of interfaces to streamline using RS232 with modern PCs, including over USB, ethernet, etc. Check the calmotion website for some idea of what is possible, they make good interfaces including one I use to put files on my 1984 Fadal over my LAN (ethernet or wirelessly). Not sure if their specific units would work for you without knowing the controls. If you don't need the fancy features of the calmotion even a $20 RS232-USB adapter and an old laptop might do the job. The setup can be tricky but there's lots of people here who know the ins and outs.

As others said, once you can "communicate" over RS232 you will also need a post-processor to make your CAM software spit out the right G-Code dialect. Again you need to know which control you are using. Once you know this you can check if a post is available for F360, mastercam, whatever.

Now where cooking with Gas ok I can get this information I'm at work now on lunch sitting opposite my mentor and am about to ask him these questions so I can relay them back.

He has already looked over this thread and is upset with some responses and in his own words.

"Those people are the reason our Trade is dwindling, they bully and abuse apprentices albeit online or inshop and as an apprentice it only serves to destroy your confidence that you so desperately need to have, in short anyone who speaks to you like those individuals is just not worth obtaining information from and a high likelyhood that they themselves have never had an apprentice because no apprentice would want to work with them anyway."

I have an apprentice who I trust with setups and inspections. I'm also teaching him Mastercam and Solidworks. We make titanium orthopedic plates and 17-4 H900 surgical implements on a five axis Haas. Our parts would quite literally be impossible to make without CAD and CAM software.