What's new
What's new

89 Mazak QT10N ATC good for a homeshop?

CNCBurnout

Plastic
Joined
Oct 6, 2017
So I found a 1989 Mazak QT10N with a 16 pocket ATC and T3 control, I inspected it earlier today at made an offer of 4k but told him I would have to get quotes for the electrical for my garage and rigging before we finalize anything. They powered up the machine, ran a small program on a .5" bar for me. Machine seems mechanical sound for the most part, biggest disappointment is that the C axis for the live tooling doesnt work. They showed me how it faults out, after activating the C axis and trying to jog it around it quickly throws up an alarm "SERVO LAG EXCESS C AXIS". They think the culprit is the motor that drives the C since that was the last thing they messed with before it stopped working. So they couldn't show me the live tooling so I am left to assume nothing with that works. Does any body here have any maintenance experience with live tooling on a mazak, how hard or worse "expensive" of a repair is this? Does come with a decent amount of the VDI tooling so thats nice.

Also trying to make sure I'm calculating all costs on this.
-Machine purchase
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up
-air compressor
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess)
-Coolant
-Tooling!
I'm thinking 10k minimum is what it would take just to get this relic from the past to my garage and make the first chips.

Its a big decision for me to make this purchase for a start of a home shop so I welcome any input from you guys on this.

I took some photos but I can't get them to upload?
 
Photos of the Mazak in question
babd6f626a0b05b6809bad35c5160f33.jpg
1b56223a34b5fdf101e59f5f17f42c81.jpg
c9c6cde23ab8c7d318a295ad36fe48e7.jpg
f15b77fc4a66d861d656d57ba6bc0825.jpg
8c247f5e527b1a45975d207ca0bdcbf6.jpg
94d0be465d5e541cef4cda366f30e4f5.jpg


Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk
 
I ran a qt like that couple of years after I resurrected it from being offline for 5 yrs.
it didn't have live tooling but otherwise same machine. Good documentation with the machine, and good support so it was not a problem to get it setup.
It ran fine for a month and then blew the spindle drive.

Be prepared for fixing something on machine this old, the spindle drive itself cost 5k€

Something dead on the live tooling, might just be a sensor or encoder, might be something bigger.
If you can afford it and it suits your needs the price isn't bad.

Marko
 
It is an awesome machine for a home shop but it is not something you would do casually. I am using an american rotary 30hp for my QT15 and it works well. The phase converter runs off a 125a breaker. The other down side to these machines is that they are heavy. My move was similar to yours and I did it on the cheap. I rented a 10k forklift on the pickup end, had a local guy move it, and on my end I unloaded it with my telehandler. We don't have much in the way of riggers around here so I figured I could do as well myself.
 
Also trying to make sure I'm calculating all costs on this.
-Machine purchase
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up
-air compressor
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess)
-Coolant
-Tooling!
I'm thinking 10k minimum is what it would take just to get this relic from the past to my garage and make the first chips.

Its a big decision for me to make this purchase for a start of a home shop so I welcome any input from you guys on this.

I took some photos but I can't get them to upload?

-Machine purchase: Your Offer ($4k)
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away ($1,000)
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?) ($1,500-@2,000 - American Rotary)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up (You can probably do most of this yourself, or plan on $500-$1,000)
-air compressor ($2,500-$3,000, plus wiring and plumbing)
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess) (I'd expect a drive error to throw a drive error, not a response time/positional error. Save your pennies on this one.)
-Coolant ($150 for a 5 gallon pail should get you something decent)
-Tooling! (Buy most of it as you need it, but expect to have more money in tooling than you do in the machine by the time you don't have to buy a tool for every single job.)

Those are numbers I base on personal experience of buying equipment and moving a shop into a space where there was nothing set up in the last 6 months. Figure another $1,000 for nickel and dime stuff that you haven't thought of yet, at least.
 
the live tool holder are almost worth what you offered
QT 10s are nice garage machines.
there are a couple guys who post in the Mazak sub form that have
that particular model.
that funky tool changer is slow but versatile.
 
-Machine purchase: Your Offer ($4k)
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away ($1,000)
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?) ($1,500-@2,000 - American Rotary)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up (You can probably do most of this yourself, or plan on $500-$1,000)
-air compressor ($2,500-$3,000, plus wiring and plumbing)
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess) (I'd expect a drive error to throw a drive error, not a response time/positional error. Save your pennies on this one.)
-Coolant ($150 for a 5 gallon pail should get you something decent)
-Tooling! (Buy most of it as you need it, but expect to have more money in tooling than you do in the machine by the time you don't have to buy a tool for every single job.)

Those are numbers I base on personal experience of buying equipment and moving a shop into a space where there was nothing set up in the last 6 months. Figure another $1,000 for nickel and dime stuff that you haven't thought of yet, at least.

I don't know about this specific machine but for the QT15 no compressor is needed.
 
3 miles, I would be tempted to just load it onto a 10k forklift, strap it down and drive it the whole way to my shop. Allow a hundred bucks for the tickets.
 
3 miles, I would be tempted to just load it onto a 10k forklift, strap it down and drive it the whole way to my shop. Allow a hundred bucks for the tickets.

nah it's worth the price of a rigger to be able to tell them where you want it in the garage
and they put it there.
no messing about with pipes and a bar to get it in place.
 
nah it's worth the price of a rigger to be able to tell them where you want it in the garage
and they put it there.
no messing about with pipes and a bar to get it in place.

If you can get a good rigger, I'd agree. The crew I hired to do it turned out to be a bunch of knuckleheads who smashed the enclosure on one of my machines, then put it down on the floor just inside the overhead and said "There you go, that's as far as we'll move it."

If I could have driven it on a forklift myself, I would have.
 
nah it's worth the price of a rigger to be able to tell them where you want it in the garage
and they put it there.
no messing about with pipes and a bar to get it in place.


Trust me, if he buys a 1989 vintage CNC machine, driving a forklift 3 miles and scooting it into his garage is going to be the easiest thing he does to that machine to make it run :)

I wish Glen Seekins was still on here, so he could tell the story of the time we were self-rigging one of my machines using his 3/4 ton Dodge Diesel... I decided to leave the machine rigged to the forklift and trailer the whole thing at the same time. Went to offload this monstrosity from the trailer and it was heavy enough to lift the back wheels of his truck off the ground. Turns out the parking brakes were on the back wheels; so me, the forklift, the mill, the trailer, and Glen's truck went rolling down the hill we were parked on towards the busy highway. I had to decide if I should Duke's of Hazzard it off the back, or drive the forklift forward to put weight back on the truck. I picked correctly; then Glen drove us to a nice flat church parking lot, and I drove the forklift and the mill the 1/2 mile back to my house :)
 
good point about the not needing air to run
no air hooked up on my QT10 I think you can hook it up for air blast on the tool eye.

funny how the rigging thing goes,I couldn't have rented and had a forklift with delivery,
and pick up for what the riggers charged.

not sure what that one weighs my latter model is only 6000, so one of those
hydraulic droop trailers would be tempting, with some skates.
the way the casting is would be hard to do on pipes
 
good point about the not needing air to run
no air hooked up on my QT10 I think you can hook it up for air blast on the tool eye.

Just for information, the QT10N ATC/MC style machine absolutely needs air to run. It uses purge air to clear chips and debris from the tool changer to work properly. The turret machines do not need air.
 
Hello,
I desperetaly need the hidden parameters for that control. I do have the other parameters but not the hidden ones. I believe there is one or two pages. If you can share them or sell themI´ll be really grateful.
my email addressis [email protected]

Thanks

jolulank



So I found a 1989 Mazak QT10N with a 16 pocket ATC and T3 control, I inspected it earlier today at made an offer of 4k but told him I would have to get quotes for the electrical for my garage and rigging before we finalize anything. They powered up the machine, ran a small program on a .5" bar for me. Machine seems mechanical sound for the most part, biggest disappointment is that the C axis for the live tooling doesnt work. They showed me how it faults out, after activating the C axis and trying to jog it around it quickly throws up an alarm "SERVO LAG EXCESS C AXIS". They think the culprit is the motor that drives the C since that was the last thing they messed with before it stopped working. So they couldn't show me the live tooling so I am left to assume nothing with that works. Does any body here have any maintenance experience with live tooling on a mazak, how hard or worse "expensive" of a repair is this? Does come with a decent amount of the VDI tooling so thats nice.

Also trying to make sure I'm calculating all costs on this.
-Machine purchase
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up
-air compressor
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess)
-Coolant
-Tooling!
I'm thinking 10k minimum is what it would take just to get this relic from the past to my garage and make the first chips.

Its a big decision for me to make this purchase for a start of a home shop so I welcome any input from you guys on this.

I took some photos but I can't get them to upload?
 
So I found a 1989 Mazak QT10N with a 16 pocket ATC and T3 control, I inspected it earlier today at made an offer of 4k but told him I would have to get quotes for the electrical for my garage and rigging before we finalize anything. They powered up the machine, ran a small program on a .5" bar for me. Machine seems mechanical sound for the most part, biggest disappointment is that the C axis for the live tooling doesnt work. They showed me how it faults out, after activating the C axis and trying to jog it around it quickly throws up an alarm "SERVO LAG EXCESS C AXIS". They think the culprit is the motor that drives the C since that was the last thing they messed with before it stopped working. So they couldn't show me the live tooling so I am left to assume nothing with that works. Does any body here have any maintenance experience with live tooling on a mazak, how hard or worse "expensive" of a repair is this? Does come with a decent amount of the VDI tooling so thats nice.

Also trying to make sure I'm calculating all costs on this.
-Machine purchase
-rigging from existing shop to my garage 3 miles away
-RPC (whats a good brand that doesnt break the bank?)
-Hire electrical wizard to wire it up
-air compressor
-C axis issues (can be dealt with later i guess)
-Coolant
-Tooling!
I'm thinking 10k minimum is what it would take just to get this relic from the past to my garage and make the first chips.

Its a big decision for me to make this purchase for a start of a home shop so I welcome any input from you guys on this.

I took some photos but I can't get them to upload?

I think the machine is a score.
$4k? One or two jobs and paid for. Even if she needs a little TLC.
Mazak is a top drawer machine and can make money for years to come.
I say go for it.
 
Hello,
I desperetaly need the hidden parameters for that control. I do have the other parameters but not the hidden ones. I believe there is one or two pages. If you can share them or sell themI´ll be really grateful.
my email addressis [email protected]

Thanks

jolulank

Hi Jolulank,

The QT10 ATC/MC with T-3 control does not have any values in the hidden parameters, nor does my ST30 ATC/MC with T-3 control.

I was told by Mazak that the only machines that used the hidden parameters were the T-2 controlled ST35 ATC that had a separate 64 tool changer magazine married to the machine.
 








 
Back
Top