Leveling and aligning I 200 ST

After purchasing a slightly used Mazak I 200 ST, we are now in the process of leveling it and aligning the spindles. It is turning into a nightmare. Our shop technician has successfully done this with several smaller dual spindle machines, but this beast is giving us fits. The floor is eighteen inches of concrete poured on top of hardpan, with the requisite epoxied hold down bolts, so there is no issue there. We are just chasing our tails. Mazak says it can take as long as three weeks to properly complete the job, but we are going nowhere, even following to the letter the written procedure from Mazak. Has anyone out there done this before? Any help would be appreciated.

it is a pain the ass. especially in a used machine that you are not sure about history of crashes.

we bought a geometric laser just for installing these types of machines. what took at minimum a week is now 2-3 days to install and align an E-650.

get the machine as level as humanly possible, what graduation levels are you using?

once you get it as level and lock the machine down with anchors.

take test cut on head 1 to check for taper, if there is any adjust pad either under chuck or rear of spindle. very small movements so you don't overshoot. Mazak's spec is .0004 per 12", try to be half that.

before we move forward what issues are you running into?

I found this online. It may not be the exact manual but i bet it is close. ...section 3 and 4 has leveling procedures. It shows mounting in a leveling plate and using 2 levels. I have leveled several machines over the years but not one of these. One thing I try to do is cut 5/8" too 3/4' thick x 4 x 4 steel plates with spot faced holes with a 2 fluted end mill a hole about 1/8" deep. The dia. approx 1/4" bigger then the leveling screw. As the manual says screw down the screws so there are equal pressure on all of the screws accept the 2 center ones. Get 2 presision levels the same size and .0003 to .0005" per 12". You can buy some European made levels on Ebay for around $150.00 each. Don't mess around with 1 level as you have discovered time is money. have 2 men doing the job...one to watch the levels one to do the bolt turning. I suspect once you get it level you will be good and not have to mess with re-shimming and adjusting head alignments unless you already have. Lastly i also tap on the leveling screws with a leaded cold roll bar say 1 1/4 x 48" to seat the plates on the floor.

Call me if you need some help. 651 338 8141 Rich.
http://victoriacaruk.com/Mazak General Information Manual - CGENGA0015E.pdf

When i am doing CNC lathes and Mills I walk around the machine looking 3 screws that bare the most weight. Think about a Y or a T and 2 leveling screws on the 2 sided end and one screw on the other end. Hard to type this. But with the 2 levels on the leveling block mounted on the turrett raise the machine with the 3 leveling screws until you have the machine level. Then tighten the surrounding screws until the bubble moves 1 line, then raise the screw on the opposite side till the bubble moves back to the middle.

This should get it level. After there is weight on all the leveling screws, then you can lock the jam nuts if you have the pull downs have someone watch the levels

Excellent advice. We are using four precision levels with graduations of .00024. As to the shape of the machine, there are no obvious signs of wrecks, and it has very little spindle time on it.
With levels mounted on the upper mill head, the sub spindle, or the lower turret, there is practically zero movement of the levels in the full Z axis stroke. But if you put a level on the linear guides, they are not even close to level.

Those brackets are sheet metal just bolted on right?

Gobo said:

Excellent advice. We are using four precision levels with graduations of .00024. As to the shape of the machine, there are no obvious signs of wrecks, and it has very little spindle time on it.
With levels mounted on the upper mill head, the sub spindle, or the lower turret, there is practically zero movement of the levels in the full Z axis stroke. But if you put a level on the linear guides, they are not even close to level.

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DID YOU read the leveling instructions? They use clay under each end end of the levels to get them plum with the earth. That means they are not as concerned with the machine being level, but the machine ways being aligned parallel in the movement. Forget about leveling the tops of the linear way tops and think about saddle, turret slide tailstock aligned parallel and square with the travel. They expect the slab under the machine close to being level and when you put equal amount of weight on each screw the machine is close to being level. You may want to have another person do this as you might be making the same mistake over and over again. Your burnt out.

Think about it as if your building a house. Start at the footings and build up or out. If the ways are aligned with the levels then the other slides above should be aligned to if the machine was good when you got it. Tomorrow get the base ways close to level and parallel and leave the levels on the machine. Take a picture of where the bubble is or make a sketch showing their location. Then let is alone and on Monday see if they moved. Meaning your floor is weak. If not start making test cuts and tweak it in like the book shows.

Richard King said:

DID YOU read the leveling instructions?

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An i-200 machine structure, and hence alignment procedure, is nothing like anything shown in that general information manual.

having just watched a YouTube video on what you got there i'm not sure that is a DIY start up you got on your hands. if that thing ain't string straight all of its fancy capacity is seriously handicapped.

Richard King said:

DID YOU read the leveling instructions? They use clay under each end end of the levels to get them plum with the earth. That means they are not as concerned with the machine being level, but the machine ways being aligned parallel in the movement. Forget about leveling the tops of the linear way tops and think about saddle, turret slide tailstock aligned parallel and square with the travel. They expect the slab under the machine close to being level and when you put equal amount of weight on each screw the machine is close to being level. You may want to have another person do this as you might be making the same mistake over and over again. Your burnt out.

Think about it as if your building a house. Start at the footings and build up or out. If the ways are aligned with the levels then the other slides above should be aligned to if the machine was good when you got it. Tomorrow get the base ways close to level and parallel and leave the levels on the machine. Take a picture of where the bubble is or make a sketch showing their location. Then let is alone and on Monday see if they moved. Meaning your floor is weak. If not start making test cuts and tweak it in like the book shows.

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We are following the Mazak leveling procedure to the letter.

Funny, I noticed my daughters website still referenced in this thread. The Integrex must be accurately leveled to cut properly. While I've used the epoxied pads to secure very heavy machines, I prefer the cast in place J bolts, or rawl bolts for an Integrex. The first question I'd have is how fresh is the concrete, and is it moving?

I installed a large CNC plasma table years ago that they customer had pourde a fresh slab for. It was still curing when the machine was installed. Rails were perfectly flat and paralell when I left at the end of the day. The next morning there were 1/8" gaps in the rails near one end. Turned out they poured the slab over loose fill, and the floor was still falling under its own weight.

It might be worth setting up a laser, checking a couple psots on the machine and rechecking the next day or after the weekend. It would be good to eliminate it as a problem as well.

That said, often when you torque the bolts to set the machine, they "set" themselves, and a couple days later you can easily tighten them.

I always laughed when I had one particular guy help instal rawl bolts. He'd pound them into the concrete and pull them down tight, even using a 2' cheater bar and grunting for all he was worth. I could always wait a few hours and go up with a 1/2" ratchet and tighten them another half turn or so. Drove him nuts. I never told him they loosened as they set into place.

Good luck

The concrete was poured seven or eight years ago and is not cracked. It is roughly eighteen inches thick and was poured on top of hardpan.

After you were happy with the level using the brackets, did you make test cuts to check the alignments?

this

With levels mounted on the upper mill head, the sub spindle, or the lower turret, there is practically zero movement of the levels in the full Z axis stroke. But if you put a level on the linear guides, they are not even close to level

Click to expand...

seems to contradict this

get the machine as level as humanly possible

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that machine has got more geometry than a Bucky ball (how old do you have to be to know what that is?)

that machine was built from the ground up with the bed flat like a pancake I would imagine it needs to be set up in a similar fashion. I'd say start by going with what a guy who has actually touched one of those suggests and get that thing flat and locked down

We get the height of the machine right for the conveyor so it doesn't leak. Then put levels on linear guides and get it rough leveled, using 4 pads. Now mount the levels on the brackets, Use the model clay to "level" the levels and start traming.

Traming should basically be adding weight to the pads where it sags.