Touch screen CNC monitors - Any user advantages ?

Touch screen on a smart phone or GPS, absolutely.....but on a CNC control monitor....are there any advantages to that ? I bought a 2004 CNC lathe with Fanuc 21iT that has color touch screen. Just got it in today so have yet to fire 'er up.

Also...as long as one is careful not to have coolant or abrasives on fingertips....would it be ok to remove the protective plastic cover and touch the screen directly ? Unlike an iPhone, the Fanuc has no "Gorilla Glass" so one wonders.... but I would think the image clearer without the protective cover.

Which brings up yet something else....in case I want a new one, any idea how much that "protection sheet" cost ? Seems to be Fanuc part no. A02B-0236-K130.

We have them on the two new Okuma machines and I like it very much. Saves a bunch of key pressing for me. (Mostly the arrow keys to get the cursor where you want it, whether editing a program or in dialog boxes.

If the one operating the machine is also the one who foots the screen replacement bill I would imagine it would have the same life span as any other touch screen
device because you will take care not to touch it with cast iron grit and coolant on your hands.

An operator who is just there for the check will cut that time in half.

Watched one of my crew RUB coolant splash off the monitor with the bare palm of his dirty hand....
An LCD monitor not touch screen.

I would love to have a touch screen because I program at the control a lot.A touch screen would make keying in code much easier because you are less likely
to miss a key stroke on a touch screen versus pushing a button.

The only advantage to a touch screen is being able to hire another guy for the sole purpose of cleaning the screen.

I have a few okumas with the p200 controls. The touch screens work great for pc functions. I usually use the stylus to save the screen and to keep from fat fingering small buttons. The way it's setup you can do everything on normal buttons if you don't want to use the touch screen.

On the okumas what appears to be a screen protector is actually a part of the screen, removing it will make the touch screen useless. The lcd is actually part of a small industrial computer. If it needs to be replaced the whole computer has to be replaced.

My oldest p200 is a 2008 and still looks good.

The only thing worse than a touch screen is a mouse. Neither belongs in a shop.

The Okuma is OK I guess. I don't see how it's any better than the old P100 control. At least it still has all the buttons so you don't have to use it. The new Makinos with the Pro whatever are touchscreen only. I don't like that at all.

We had a few balancers with touchscreen monitors. One died in a few months and was never fixed (we hooked up a mouse). The other never had an issue.

Spyderedge said:

The only advantage to a touch screen is being able to hire another guy for the sole purpose of cleaning the screen.

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I presume you are an employee.....no shop owner would have such a warped perspective that it would be an "advantage" to hire and pay another employee to do something that shouldn't need to be done.

I suppose you can keep your forearms from getting flabby when you wave your hands all over the screen. These touch screens are such a great idea that AgiesCharmilles is now including a shelf, a mouse pad, and a mouse with their many of their new machines. Sure, in 2009 all I got was a crummy stylus. Now I suspect that after years of user complaints about not being able to read the darn display on the machines (you know - because YOUR HANDS ARE DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF YOUR FACE!) they wisened up. All I want now is to see AgiesCharmilles switch back to standard monitors, and lower the price of their machines because touch screens were utterly pointless as far as the human-machine interface is concerned.

I think touch screens are great, Our Mazak has a 640m control where you have to Slam the fricken buttons to make it work harms productivity a bit wish it a was touch screen. The screen should be fine unless you have operators who, are hacks and like to destroy things with hammers, I would just buy that protective film put it on when it gets scratched and faded replace it on the go.

Touch screen is great if there is a stylus - so much easier than paging through soft key menus. Otherwise it's a dirt magnet and you're constantly cleaning it.

I have only had to wipe off the touch screen on My Okuma lathe once in the 9 months that I have had it. I also do all my programming on that machine at the control. It is really easy. I don't like having slimy hands so I grab a rag or paper towel I keep by the machine and wipe my hands off. I definitely prefer it over not having it as an option.

I think the value of having touch screens depends highly on the technology of the screen - of which there are many. The Cincinnati Arrows with that A2100 used a touch screen that has a plastic outer skin that is easy scratched (or gouged as my operator did while using an end mill to point at the screen).
There are many better types like PCap and IR that use glass such as the Corning Gorilla glass which is highly scratch resistant and can be had with good glare reducing coatings ( and extremely breakage resistant).
I would say whether or not touch screens are good on a CNC depends on how well its done, just like everything else in machining...

Every machine we have has had a touch screen for the last three years, and I don't see any difference with or without it. If you get a drop of coolant or two on then they are just fine, and don't scratch appreciably. I don't have real issues with them swimming in coolant or rubbing handfuls of grit into them, because I would usually be using an air blower if I have my hands in the chips anyway, and would just blow my hands off. You treat it like your phone and you are fine. We spray ours with windex the same as the keys, and just wipe with a paper towel. Three years on our oldest one and no real difference on the screen between now and the first day. These are all Hurcos, and if I ever did have a problem, if you crack the back cover off and ebay the make and model number off the screen they are readily available for around $200.

A touchscreen in a hog feeding unit that you need to type on to run the lagoon? That might be different, but we're machinists not garbage men. How often are you just all covered in shit on your hands and don't blow them off before fingering something? I thought most all you boys all programmed on Mastercam anyways? (just kidding )

Parkerbender said:

Every machine we have has had a touch screen for the last three years, and I don't see any difference with or without it. If you get a drop of coolant or two on then they are just fine, and don't scratch appreciably. I don't have real issues with them swimming in coolant or rubbing handfuls of grit into them, because I would usually be using an air blower if I have my hands in the chips anyway, and would just blow my hands off. You treat it like your phone and you are fine. We spray ours with windex the same as the keys, and just wipe with a paper towel. Three years on our oldest one and no real difference on the screen between now and the first day. These are all Hurcos, and if I ever did have a problem, if you crack the back cover off and ebay the make and model number off the screen they are readily available for around $200.



A touchscreen in a hog feeding unit that you need to type on to run the lagoon? That might be different, but we're machinists not garbage men. How often are you just all covered in shit on your hands and don't blow them off before fingering something? I thought most all you boys all programmed on Mastercam anyways? (just kidding )

Click to expand...

Although I guess we have all done it ,blowing your hands off with the air line is not such a good idea ,it is possible for air to get in the blood stream with dire consequences ,or so I have been told ,might be OK with a low pressure gun but be carefull out there.

Ewlsey,
Saying they have no place in a shop,and you don't like them, isn't a whole lot of help. Giving some sort of reasoning would help a person discern if it's just your personal preference, or if there's a legitimate concern with touch screen in the shop.

I haven't used one but the first thought that comes to my mind is the possibility that you won't have expensive mylars to replace when they wear?

My dilemma / quandary ;-
I don't like touch screens - period!........... BOTOH a good percentage of my work is making parts for machines for making them. :-(

The obvious, correct, and not particularly helpful answer is that it depends hugely on the software the screen is an interface to, and what other UI elements (full keyboard, mouse, etc) are at hand. There are numerous times when various flashy touch interfaces are cumbersome, and just being allowed to type on a keyboard would be much better. Other places, especially those constrained by real estate (phone, gps) where touch is a big win.

So, is the fanuc software well worked out to be fast and efficient via touch screen? Does it have good input widgets? Does it have a decent keyboard, etc? Those will inform whether that particular machine/controller is good/bad/indifferent.

In other words, try it and see.

bryan_machine said:

The obvious, correct, and not particularly helpful answer is that it depends hugely on the software the screen is an interface to, and what other UI elements (full keyboard, mouse, etc) are at hand. There are numerous times when various flashy touch interfaces are cumbersome, and just being allowed to type on a keyboard would be much better. Other places, especially those constrained by real estate (phone, gps) where touch is a big win.

So, is the fanuc software well worked out to be fast and efficient via touch screen? Does it have good input widgets? Does it have a decent keyboard, etc? Those will inform whether that particular machine/controller is good/bad/indifferent.

In other words, try it and see.

Click to expand...

Yes, and since that is obvious, why did you type it ? It should be "obvious" the point of my post was to find out in which, if any, senarios of software and convenience would a touch screen be advantageous. The question was answered by a few and that is helpful. Responses like "I don't like touch screens" with no reasons given as to why, are OTOH unhelpful responses.

I think touch screens are great, so long as there correctly located so easy to reach and there's a key board for typing. IMHO having a few smudges on a cnc control is hardly a big deal. Its not like your standing there staring at it tweaking things all day long like a cad workstation. Equally nearly all touch screens have a replaceable protective film, the good film, properly floated on with IPA or similar brew so its bubble free is damn tuff and next to invisible, when it gets to bad just replace it, its like £5 a sheet tops. Heck you lot won't sharpen drill bits your running hard enough to blunt every half hour preferring to toss them, but replacing a clear piece of plastic a few times a years a outcry? Talk about double standards!

Maybe its a generation thing, but the only time i want to be hitting a button multiple times is not to scroll through some stupid cnc menu that should be one click away, the only time i want to be hitting the same button more than once and that’s the fire button to nuke some little hyperactive 8 year old shit in a online mutli player game like teeworlds :-)

Personaly i detest some of the cnc controls i have encountered were you have to scroll through pages then scroll down to get to the variable you want. I want to hit a tab, hit the variable slot i want to change and type in the value on a keyboard with a std fucking layout, not a japs wet dream of a random alphabetical order key pad interspersed with random other functions + requiring a 3 button press to get a symbol :-( Maybe its a generation thing. but mine came along with the touch screen, the querty keyboard and windows. By all means fuck with the basic interface if you have something better to offer, but from what i have seen most machine tool controls have vary little thought put into speed of programming - std common user interfaces using what the user already knows as a std layout.

Don,

About the Fanuc touch-screen, I can't offer any experience. I DO wish the new 0i-D series controls had touch-screen capability. It seems like Fanuc keeps adding more and more functions that require the use of the soft-keys. For those functions, I believe a touch-screen is a plus.

As to other makes, it depends. Okuma's touch-screen works really well. One reason is that the monitor is setup so that the touch-keys are really large. It's easy to see the "key", hit it without fat-fingering others, and I think it really speeds up working on the control. Of course, you still have the typical hard and soft keys if you prefer to not use the touch-screen.

The Hurco touch-screen, I didn't care much for. The screen wasn't as sensitive to touch, and it really needed the stylus to work well. If I have to use a stylus, then what's the point of the touch screen? Of course, I felt the same way about the rubber "key" buttons too. They weren't sensitive to being pressed like hard-plastic keys are, and I felt like you really had to mash them for them to work.

As to the Fanuc, if it's like their other hardware I'm sure it will be nice. And I'm sure there's a parameter that you can use to disable the feature if you'd like. I would think the Fanuc screen layout would benefit from touch capability though... Please let us know what you think.

By the way, a lathe with a 21i-T, and a touch-screen option? Sounds like a nice machine. Mind if I ask what make/model?