New VMC owner - need tips.

bastarddsm · Apr 5, 2020

I recently purchased my first VMC, a very very clean mothballed TREE VMC1050 about 1998 vintage, Dynapath delta 50 control. After a little bit of work, I got the control fixed up with a new cmos battery and the machine runs. I've managed to figure out the dynapath programming, and have been able to run a few small programs to change tools, move the table, start the spindle ect. I have a few questions.

I can't seem to find an M code to start the coolant. There is a coolant switch on the screen, but I assumed it was for the wash down nozzles. How do I start flood coolant?

I have not put coolant in the machine yet, still need to finish cleaning the old gunk out of the tanks. This leads me to my next question, the coolant tank is 2 piece, and looks to be sealed together with some type of silicone. My goto is like permatex ultra-grey. Any other recommendations?

As for coolant, recommendations? Going to be doing 95% 6061, and like 5% 4140ph for now. The PO used one of the blassers, not sure which one. Through some other purchases, I ended up with a few year old half pail of kool-rite 2290. Their spec sheet says good for aluminum. Good to use? Does it go bad in the pail?

How about water? I'm on a well - it's hard and rusty. I can go to my parents and get reasonable city water. Not sure that I could buy enough distilled right now lol. What kind of capacity does this thing have?

What about way oil. I've seen something about mobil vactra. Specific number? Other brands?

How about the way oiler? ZPS sent me a wiring diagram, but I can't find it in the diagram. How is it ran on a machine like this. Pumping when machine on, or when moving? I have the way covers off to clean things up, do I need to unhook any line to check for flow? Yesterday I had the machine powered up for a few hours while I was programming, and it ended up giving me a "low lube pressure" alarm that wouldn't reset. Cycled power and it went away, not back since.

Anything else I need to look at to finish up bringing this thing back to life?

Greg White · Apr 5, 2020

M08 will start ur coolant pump,M09 will shut it off.
prolly best to put it on its own line til u find out different.
I have a D20 on a Lagoon.
Good Luck!
Gw

ChipSplitter · Apr 5, 2020

Way oilers operate on a timer based either on cycle time or power-on time. Latter one is a PITA.
What you can do is disconnect the line coming out of the oiler and put a towel under it. Drips mean it works.

Dan from Oakland · Apr 5, 2020

If you have the way covers off, check the lube line metering units to make sure they are not plugged. IF they are, just replace them- trying to clean them is false economy. Pull a line off with the metering unit in place and cycle the pump and make sure lube comes out. A disconnected pump may appear to pump with no back pressure, so check for flow where it matters.

Vancbiker · Apr 5, 2020

Since you got a low lube pressure alarm, you can assume there is a pressure switch in the system. The logic used by the machine builder will determine what all this is telling you. Typical methods are....

Pump turns on and if the pressure does not build enough to actuate the switch after a set amount of time, then an alarm is raised. Fault can be low oil in the tank, bad pump, leak in a line, etc. If pressure builds and actuates the switch, the timer starts and the pump runs for the set amount of time and then turns off. The control assumes delivery complete

Expanding on the above, some builders add some additional logic...

Pressure builds and actuates the switch. Pump runs for the value set in the timer and turns off starting another timer. If the pressure switch does not turn off before the second timer elapses then an alarm is raised indicating that oil was not delivered quickly enough. Typically this condition results from the metering units being restricted or plugged.

alphonso · Apr 5, 2020

bastarddsm said:
I have not put coolant in the machine yet, still need to finish cleaning the old gunk out of the tanks. This leads me to my next question, the coolant tank is 2 piece, and looks to be sealed together with some type of silicone. My goto is like permatex ultra-grey. Any other recommendations?

I like Permatex "Right Stuff". It is the only thing I have found that is not eventually degraded by coolant and oil.

bastarddsm · Apr 6, 2020

I think I need to call ZPS on this. Played with it tonight. Switch on the coolant switch on the panel, only the wash down pump comes on. If you program an M8, nothing. Switch on the coolant switch, and both wash and flood comes on.

bastarddsm · Apr 6, 2020

Vancbiker said:
Since you got a low lube pressure alarm, you can assume there is a pressure switch in the system. The logic used by the machine builder will determine what all this is telling you. Typical methods are....

Pump turns on and if the pressure does not build enough to actuate the switch after a set amount of time, then an alarm is raised. Fault can be low oil in the tank, bad pump, leak in a line, etc. If pressure builds and actuates the switch, the timer starts and the pump runs for the set amount of time and then turns off. The control assumes delivery complete

Expanding on the above, some builders add some additional logic...

Pressure builds and actuates the switch. Pump runs for the value set in the timer and turns off starting another timer. If the pressure switch does not turn off before the second timer elapses then an alarm is raised indicating that oil was not delivered quickly enough. Typically this condition results from the metering units being restricted or plugged.

Thanks. That all makes sense. I'm not 100% but, it seems like this one has a plunger. The motor runs and picks up the plunger, and a spring pulls it down, pumping it. It looks like you can turn the knob and adjust the stroke of the plunger. It's a Bijur TMD-5. Trying to find some info on it after this. I assume the flow rate is slow enough it would be hard to tell that it's actually pumping oil?

Thanks guys.

I

Greg White · Apr 6, 2020

turn the coolant switch on then cycle a M09,
see if it shuts coolant off?
I am confused ,doesnt take much.....
Gw

Vancbiker · Apr 6, 2020

bastarddsm said:
.....I assume the flow rate is slow enough it would be hard to tell that it's actually pumping oil?

If you open the output line and cycle the pump, oil should come out quickly.

That style of pump has a suction filter that clogs pretty easily when used with some way oils like Vactra. Should be checked too.

bastarddsm · Jul 8, 2020

TREE VMC 1060E - Running FINALLY!

I finally made chips with this thing tonight. Before March, all I had really run was a sharp knee mill with an Acurite 2axis on it. Pretty big learning curve between rigging it, repairing it, setting it up, and using it. Not that anyone cares since it's sort of an obscure machine these days, but thing holds like 125gal of coolant, I used RO water, and Permatex Ultra Black to seal up the coolant tanks. The yaskawa drives don't seem to mind too much running on a home built 15hp RPC. I did move a couple wires around on the tool changer power to keep the wild leg where I wanted it. Oh and it's a VMC 1060E not a 1050.

I ended up having all the way covers off. The ways have some rust stains/pitting where they were parked for an extended period of time - the stains reflect what I'd expect the roller truck things to look like. The way covers had some damage, and could use new seals, I cleaned them up and repaired them the best I could. I'll work on that more once I get it going and verify it's worth fixing.

Anyway, Monday I made some calls to a couple coolant manufactures, and Qualichem sent a guy over today with 2 pails of Q-Cut 215 CM for me to try. So I ended up filling the sump with RO water, added a recirculation hose to the wash pump, started it, blended in about 9 gal of the Q-Cut, and then let it run for an hour or so.

So I finally got a hunk of 6061 in my new $100 china vice and carved on it - Faced the top, profiled the outside, and cut a circle pocket in it. I'm a little dissapointed in the surface finish. The cuts in the x direction have some sort of periodic waviness that I can feel. The period is somewhere around 0.75" I was running a cheapie 0.500" HSS 2 flute from FMT/Fastenal. I was holding it in a cheap china ER32 Collet Chuck, I checked runout with my dial indicator, and it shows 0.000" - not even a twitch. I don't have a tenths one to try on it.

Anyway this cut was 6000RPM, 20-60in/min, 0.200" axial and radial DOC, then it came around for a 0.050" finish on the bottom, and another 0.050" finish on the side. I fiddled with the feed override to see if feed rate made a difference - doesn't seem like it did.

Any ideas? Technique? Junk old iron? Junk tooling?

Mike1974 · Jul 8, 2020

9 gallons of coolant? How big is your tank?

Get one of these to save money on coolant, mix to 7-10% concentration. https://www.mscdirect.com/product/details/73615726

Might find one on ebay for alot cheaper. Just make sure you can get distilled water to calibrate if buying used.

Also, some controls are a little funny with syntax. Did you use M08, or M8? It might make a difference, but I don't know your machine. Along those lines, always use a decimal when programming feeds to be safe. Say you want 20 ipm, need to use F20. not F20

^ Not positive on your control, but a good habit to get into.

Mike1974 · Jul 8, 2020

bastarddsm said:
I finally made chips with this thing tonight. Before March, all I had really run was a sharp knee mill with an Acurite 2axis on it. Pretty big learning curve between rigging it, repairing it, setting it up, and using it. Not that anyone cares since it's sort of an obscure machine these days, but thing holds like 125gal of coolant, I used RO water, and Permatex Ultra Black to seal up the coolant tanks. The yaskawa drives don't seem to mind too much running on a home built 15hp RPC. I did move a couple wires around on the tool changer power to keep the wild leg where I wanted it. Oh and it's a VMC 1060E not a 1050.

I ended up having all the way covers off. The ways have some rust stains/pitting where they were parked for an extended period of time - the stains reflect what I'd expect the roller truck things to look like. The way covers had some damage, and could use new seals, I cleaned them up and repaired them the best I could. I'll work on that more once I get it going and verify it's worth fixing.

Anyway, Monday I made some calls to a couple coolant manufactures, and Qualichem sent a guy over today with 2 pails of Q-Cut 215 CM for me to try. So I ended up filling the sump with RO water, added a recirculation hose to the wash pump, started it, blended in about 9 gal of the Q-Cut, and then let it run for an hour or so.

So I finally got a hunk of 6061 in my new $100 china vice and carved on it - Faced the top, profiled the outside, and cut a circle pocket in it. I'm a little dissapointed in the surface finish. The cuts in the x direction have some sort of periodic waviness that I can feel. The period is somewhere around 0.75" I was running a cheapie 0.500" HSS 2 flute from FMT/Fastenal. I was holding it in a cheap china ER32 Collet Chuck, I checked runout with my dial indicator, and it shows 0.000" - not even a twitch. I don't have a tenths one to try on it.

Anyway this cut was 6000RPM, 20-60in/min, 0.200" axial and radial DOC, then it came around for a 0.050" finish on the bottom, and another 0.050" finish on the side. I fiddled with the feed override to see if feed rate made a difference - doesn't seem like it did.

Any ideas? Technique? Junk old iron? Junk tooling? View attachment 293566 View attachment 293567

.050" for a finish is too much IMO. I usually only leave .005-.01" (for milling). Depending on how good your setup/machine is, you might want to finish the walls and floors separately too. For example, finish the walls with your tool just above the floor surface, then program another pass finishing the floor.

ripperj · Jul 8, 2020

Might try a three flute endmill.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Mike1974 · Jul 8, 2020

Didn't see the part about using a 2 flute HSSS endmill. LoL. Get yourself a carbide endmill, 3flute as ripper said. They do cost more, but will last forever if you don't crash it. Check out 1/2 3 Flute Carbide End Mill SE 38 Deg Helix .750 LOC MariTool

He is a member here.

bastarddsm · Jul 8, 2020

I put 110Gal of water in it. The QChem guy told me run it around 8% for what I'm doing. I have been using an M8 command, but I'm pretty sure the control changes it to an M08 once it's entered.

I'll take a little less of a finish pass an see. The only reason I even did a finish pass was because it was an option on the canned routine I was using. I'm pretty sure it was finishing the floor first,then finishing the sides. I should specify my finish issue is with the side milling part.

Also I do have some 3 flute stuff from MariTool. Just wasn't keen on breaking a $40 endmill learning, when I could break a $9 endmill instead.

Lastly, HTF do I find my part. On the old 2 axis it was easy, turn the motor on and use the handwheels to bring the edge finder in, and set my coordinates. On this I can't figure out how to run the spindle without running a full program.

Mike1974 · Jul 8, 2020

bastarddsm said:
I put 110Gal of water in it. The QChem guy told me run it around 8% for what I'm doing. I have been using an M8 command, but I'm pretty sure the control changes it to an M08 once it's entered.

I'll take a little less of a finish pass an see. The only reason I even did a finish pass was because it was an option on the canned routine I was using. I'm pretty sure it was finishing the floor first,then finishing the sides. I should specify my finish issue is with the side milling part.

Also I do have some 3 flute stuff from MariTool. Just wasn't keen on breaking a $40 endmill learning, when I could break a $9 endmill instead.

Lastly, HTF do I find my part. On the old 2 axis it was easy, turn the motor on and use the handwheels to bring the edge finder in, and set my coordinates. On this I can't figure out how to run the spindle without running a full program.

Not familiar with your machine. Do you have an MDI (manual data input) button? If so type in "S1000 M3" that will turn your spindle on at 1000 rpm.

Post a pic of your control panel if possible, will make it easier to get help.

bastarddsm · Jul 8, 2020

I don't think there is an MDI input. I did figure out that I can put a simple program in auto mode to grab the edge finder and start the spindle. I can then go to jog mode and do my buisiness. Got a lot to learn with fixture offsets and tool lengths and all that. Got the fixture offsets kinda figured out.

I revised the program that cut my sample piece, tamed down the finish cut, .010" cut, and like 30ipm at 5000RPM. and it's still got the waves. It looks much better, but it's not actually any better. Not flat at all. Out of curiosity, I checked the backlash on it and it seems to be well below 0.001". The numbers in the control are down around 0.0003" Circle pockets have marks at the inflection points. Mechanical issue? Or do I gotta slow way down on finish pass?

Hardplates · Jul 8, 2020

IIRC on a dynapath delta to get to MDI (they don't call it MDI) you have to hit MODE SELECT the select PROGRAM, I think its 3. Then type N 0 (zero) ENTER. Then you punch in what you want to do and hit cycle start

bastarddsm · Jul 9, 2020

I ran some more testing today. It's really hard to measure but the waves on the part seem to be about 0.002" deep. Looks like the table moves (oscilates) in the y direction about 0.001" while moving in the x. It's hard to measure, but sweeping both the table and the vice jaw with the indicator it seems they both say the same thing.

I then sidemilled with a big 1" 4 flute, both conventional and climb milling. Still has the waves.

This is box way machine with some kind of roller packs. I'm wondering if the rollers have a rust spot on them that causing it, or maybe congealed way oil on a roller? The surface that controls the y axis motion on the x axis ways was very clean iirc. Guess I'll be calling ZPS tomorrow to see what they have to say.

New VMC owner - need tips.

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