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Looking to buy a wire edm, what am I getting myself into?

as9100d

Stainless
Joined
Apr 19, 2019
Location
Paris, Arkansas
I have a need for a wire edm, personal use not business.

What am I getting myself into by buying a lower prices used machine? $5000-10,000

Machine in question is a 1995 Mitsubishi cx-20

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I took the plunge on a '99 FX-20 for personal use a couple years ago -- got it on ebay for somewhere around $7,000. I'd never even seen a wire EDM machine in person before, so there was quite a learning curve.

For the Mitsubishi machines in particular, the first thing you'll need is to make sure you have good copies of the software for it: system software, a language disk (unless you can read Japanese), E-packs, and a parameter disk. The last one is very important: you could replace everything else by copying someone else's disks, but the parameter disk is specific to your individual machine. The disks that came with my machine were partially damaged (no data loss yet but took several tries to read). I figured out how to read them on a PC and create new copies, and eventually just replaced the floppy drive with an SD card floppy emulator.

Manuals for this era of machine are hard to come by. I have a manual set for the CX series that I picked up on eBay (after monitoring a saved search for over a year) because I just can't find FX series manuals. Manuals for the earlier machines are easier to get -- there are plenty on eBay. They're close enough for programming but the maintenance and repair stuff isn't going to line up.

My machine was reportedly in working order before being decommissioned, although I never saw that in person. It didn't take much to get it cutting, that was mostly a crash course in wire EDM-specific gcode. Getting the auto threader to work was an exercise in cleaning _everything_. It took many hours attacking it with Brasso and various brushes and polishing tools to get the critical surfaces cleaned up so the auto threader was reliable. I didn't have to replace too much: some rollers and bearings, and a new blade for the wire chopper. Couple hundred bucks in consumables.

At this point the machine is reliable enough that I can leave it cutting unattended all day. It's been pretty low maintenance after the initial burst of cleaning. I've got several hundred cutting hours on it. I know that's nothing for production machines, but for a personal-use machine that lives in my garage, I feel like I'm getting my money's worth. Just wish the wire wasn't so expensive...


Anyway, I guess you should expect to put a bunch of time and probably a thousand bucks worth of deferred maintenance consumables into the machine, but it is totally possible for one person to run one in a garage as a hobby or for side gigs.

Knowing how it turns out, I would absolutely do it again. I'd probably buy an FX-10 instead, though, the larger work envelope of the FX-20 is complete overkill for the parts I run.
 
as9100d,

It's likely you will be in for a good amount of work and expense that has not been anticipated.

Wire machines typically require a good amount of proactive maintenance (that's once the machine is in good condition to start with). Tooling is expensive, parts are expensive. Also, if it's a submerged machined especially, there will be a chiller to maintain water temperature in the work tank, and those can consume a good amount of power (the one on the Agie I had in the past was a 4-ton chiller).

If you have the desire to cut very accurate parts, then the machine should be in an environmentally controlled space held at a reasonable temperature.

PM
 
I've got clean to area I plan to stick the edm and my entire shop is HVAC controlled to 74 degrees.

I'm not too worried about the ongoing costs, I have two waterjets and nothing is more expensive than those.


I don't understand the expensive tooling, I will probably just run them through the shop to be made. We have surface grinders, od grind, centerless grind in house.




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I've got clean to area I plan to stick the edm and my entire shop is HVAC controlled to 74 degrees.

I'm not too worried about the ongoing costs, I have two waterjets and nothing is more expensive than those.


I don't understand the expensive tooling, I will probably just run them through the shop to be made. We have surface grinders, od grind, centerless grind in house.




Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

I think they were referring to the fact that for production work, you're gonna spend a butt ton of cash on 3R bases and pallets.

Since you said it's for personal use, I doubt that's an issue for you.
 
I think they were referring to the fact that for production work, you're gonna spend a butt ton of cash on 3R bases and pallets.

Since you said it's for personal use, I doubt that's an issue for you.
I don't understand why those systems cost so much. Maybe if you don't have a machine shop you're forced to buy??



Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk
 
I took the plunge on a '99 FX-20 for personal use a couple years ago -- got it on ebay for somewhere around $7,000. I'd never even seen a wire EDM machine in person before, so there was quite a learning curve.

For the Mitsubishi machines in particular, the first thing you'll need is to make sure you have good copies of the software for it: system software, a language disk (unless you can read Japanese), E-packs, and a parameter disk. The last one is very important: you could replace everything else by copying someone else's disks, but the parameter disk is specific to your individual machine. The disks that came with my machine were partially damaged (no data loss yet but took several tries to read). I figured out how to read them on a PC and create new copies, and eventually just replaced the floppy drive with an SD card floppy emulator.

Manuals for this era of machine are hard to come by. I have a manual set for the CX series that I picked up on eBay (after monitoring a saved search for over a year) because I just can't find FX series manuals. Manuals for the earlier machines are easier to get -- there are plenty on eBay. They're close enough for programming but the maintenance and repair stuff isn't going to line up.

My machine was reportedly in working order before being decommissioned, although I never saw that in person. It didn't take much to get it cutting, that was mostly a crash course in wire EDM-specific gcode. Getting the auto threader to work was an exercise in cleaning _everything_. It took many hours attacking it with Brasso and various brushes and polishing tools to get the critical surfaces cleaned up so the auto threader was reliable. I didn't have to replace too much: some rollers and bearings, and a new blade for the wire chopper. Couple hundred bucks in consumables.

At this point the machine is reliable enough that I can leave it cutting unattended all day. It's been pretty low maintenance after the initial burst of cleaning. I've got several hundred cutting hours on it. I know that's nothing for production machines, but for a personal-use machine that lives in my garage, I feel like I'm getting my money's worth. Just wish the wire wasn't so expensive...


Anyway, I guess you should expect to put a bunch of time and probably a thousand bucks worth of deferred maintenance consumables into the machine, but it is totally possible for one person to run one in a garage as a hobby or for side gigs.

Knowing how it turns out, I would absolutely do it again. I'd probably buy an FX-10 instead, though, the larger work envelope of the FX-20 is complete overkill for the parts


I run Agie Charmilles, Agie, and Mitsubishi H, HA, FA.....Mits is the easiest. The Agies is real good for precision and speed, but they are way more complicated if you start having problems. Our Mits. are late 80s and early 90s. They are simple. If anyone needs some Mits. manuals I have a whole set that I believe went with our H series. My company was going to toss them when we moved it to the warehouse to make room for our new machine. Anyone interested email me... [email protected]
 








 
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