Takisawa TCN-203j

Aside from the sales brochure, anyone have any experience and/or opinions on this lathe? I'm looking to do mostly aluminum work in the 3-5" diameter range, although some work outside that range would come up. I'm mostly asking about reliability of the machine and ease of use of the Fanuc control. And what about rigidity, could this thing turn 3" diameter workpieces in steel? Is 8 stations on the tool turret enough?

I've had a really positive experience with Yamazen since I bought my Brother TC-S2Dn and I'm interested in the Takisawa for that reason. I am troubled to find that there is even less info online about takisawa lathes than there are about Brother mills.


Cheers,
Matt

Good little machines, I have had manual and CNC Taks and never a problem. They are built like a tank, hold good size and easy to set up. The 203j is great but I hate they went from the top mounted Fanucs as this was a good prop when programming at the machine. My only gripe is getting a call back from service. make sure your distributor is worth a damn. When I called it may be two days to get a response even if I was buying parts.

g-coder05 said:

The 203j is great but I hate they went from the top mounted Fanucs as this was a good prop when programming at the machine.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure I understand. From my understanding the 203j has a Fanuc controller. Or is that not what you meant?

yes it does have the fanuc but they moved it from the top to the right side of the machine. Some people prefer the side mount fanucs but if I do a lot of work at the control I like resting my arm on the ledge above the door.

I have a Takasawa TC-1 with a Fanuc 0T-C circa 1989 (IIRC) and it runs and runs, great iron, fast but small. FWIW

Dave

As a former Yamazen sales engineer, I encourage you to really give the TC-203J a chance. You probably won't find a ton of info out there but in training they told us Takisawa was the oldest lathe manufacturer in japan. I personally had Mr. Takisawa come out to an account of mine in the Midwest. They are very well built. I had takisawa products in my territory that were older than I was and still running 2-3 shifts a day. If you have the chance to go to IMTS this year, I encourage you to swing in Yamazen booth as well, I know two years ago they had a gantry takisawa lathe there that was pretty impressive. If yamazen is the service provider and you already own a brother, I would think it would only build your relationship with yamazen. good luck

What about resale value? In my opinion, something like a Mazak or Okuma might have a better resale value because they're just more popular. From the limited number of people I've talked to, none of them have ever heard of Takisawa, but they've heard of Okuma and Mazak. I'm under the impression that the Takisawa would last a long long long time, but that doesn't always translate into good resale value.

Just wanted to update this thread. I've now had the Takisawa TC-203J for 18 months, and this machine is really great! Here's what I like, dislike, and things I learned:

Like:
-Extremely repeatable. I was running a job in 4140 that had to hold +/- 0.005mm. The part would run for about 10 minutes, and I would only run it roughly once per hour (because I would do milling and sawing and other misc things in the shop). According to my micrometer, over 8 parts, the machine repeated within 3 microns. Keep in mind that the machine wasn't being used constantly, so it didn't really get warm, but even still, I think this is pretty good (and this was over the course of a day). Also, on jobs that are longer running and keep the lathe running continuously, I've found that the repeatability of internal bores to stay within my gage pins which are spaced by 0.0008". Other than that, I don't really have any hard data on the repeatability.
-Reliability. This thing keeps working without any problems. Sometimes it runs out of way lube and it will give you an alarm. It will wait until the end of the program to do so though, which is really nice. I haven't had any hiccups, at all, regarding the reliability. I turn it on, I use it, and it just works. Same as yesterday and all the days since I got it.
-Compact size. I'm not sure the exact measurements off the top of my head, but it does fit in a pretty small space (I'm sure this is no unique to this lathe though).
-Rigidity. I've taken some pretty big cuts (0.25" depth of cut and 0.025" feed per revolution at 3000 rpm in aluminum) without issue. Sure, the spindle load goes past 100% (which the machine doesn't even care about), but it will do it. The only real sound I hear is the sound of bullets hitting the chip enclosure.
-Does exactly what I tell it. No complaints here, no funny moves or anything. It just goes.
-Repeatability from tool setting. When I take a test cut by manually jogging a tool to cut the OD or ID of a test piece, and then measure the x value with a micrometer to set the tool x offset, my actual size is pretty damn close to that when I actually cut the part.
-Build quality. This machine has great quality oozing out of it. The sheet metal is thick, the finished surfaces are very very nice, it doesn't make weird noises during operation or rattle it's sheet metal.
-Chip conveyor works great. I haven't had any issues with stringy chips clogging up the chip conveyor. Not sure how common this problem is, but I have heard of it.
-You can name your variables in your program and some system variables have names as well. I like this a lot. I hand write my turning code and I use a lot of variables.
-Supported by Yamazen. I went from never turning a part to making some pretty fancy widgets over the course of 6 months in no small part due to Yamazen. Bill Mills has been very responsive not only with questions about the machine, but also about general strategies for turning parts. He's been really helpful and I appreciate it very much. Also, when he came and set up the machine he knew exactly what he was doing and didn't run into any problems what-so-ever. Typical of Yamazen support IMHO.

Dislikes:
-The program is loaded via PCMCIA adapter via CF Card. Not that big of a deal, but I have to get pretty picky to find problems with this lathe.
-Fanuc control isn't as user friendly as my Brother B00 control. Not as big of a screen and a few more button pushes to get things done, but still very manageable.
-It uses way oil. It's a box way machine, it's to be expected. Way oil consumption isn't really all that fast though.
-The hydraulics make a little noise sometimes. I think there might be air or something in the hydraulic system, but when I first turn the machine on in the morning sometimes it'll make some noise. It goes away after running it for awhile and it only occurs when actuating the power chuck. I'm told it's nothing to worry about.


Things I would do differently from what I learned:
1. Buy a larger lathe to start out with. Most of the parts I make are small (2" diameter and smaller), but for learning I wish there was a little more room inside the machine so that clearance is more obvious. I've come kind of close to hitting the tail stock at times. Hasn't been a huge issue though.
2. Buy a lathe with more tool positions. I have 8, 12 would be nicer I think. Maybe next time.
3. Buy a lathe with quick change tooling (like VDI or capto). I know it's super friggin' expensive, but I do wish changing tools out was as fast as doing it on a mill.
4. Buy a lathe with a subspindle. This would just be really nice to have I think.

All the things I would do differently require spending more money. For the amount of money I spent, I got an enormous value. It also helps that it's supported by Yamazen.

Just thought I'd report back to this thread.

Cheers,
Matt