Transfering programs to and from a handheld device

Hey guys,

I work for a major metal fabricator in central WI and my team is pushing to get a DNC system in for our entire shop. Once the boss saw what the system costs (over $9000 just to hook up the machine shop) he shut us down. What I would like to do is be able to hook a tablet into the machines through the USB port and transfer programs that way. Keeping them in the machine controls has been a real pain for us and it is much smarter to keep all of that information in a separate location.

The entire purpose behind this is to avoid all of the idiots we have working there from playing mad-scientist with our programs.

Any ideas?? Other than the DNC?

Don't think you want dnc. You just want rs232 to transfer programs. This can be done with a old laptop and free software, and a few bucks worth of cable. Do you have wireless in your shop now? There are plenty of rs232 to wireless adapters available. Just really depends on how far you want to go. I've even seen it done with an old palm pilot bought on eBay for about 10 bucks.

I want the DNC without a doubt. We will be able, as supervisors, to micro-manage the editing of programs and control the work flow in the shop a lot better. There's people that tend to take all the gravy work and leave the rest for someone else.

We only have one machine with a RS232 port on it. The rest of our equipment is capatible with either a USB drive or a standard Mori Seiki media card. I just want to have all of the programs in a secure spot where my team or myself can assign them to the designated machines when we need to. The DNC is the best way. But since my boss isn't willing to spend the money, I want to find a more economical way of doing this and still be mobile (I don't want to carry a laptop with me in a shop all day).

Our goal is to have all of the machine controls wiped clean of ANY part program. The only program in the machine will be the one running. And when production is done, the program gets dumped and you start clean again. Every program will be GibbsCAM based. I just need to get the programs to the machines.

I'm gathering you really don't know what dnc is then. Dnc is full remote operation of the machine tool from somewhere other than the control. You might be looking for drip feed, so the program is not stored (tape mode). That can be an issue with the newer mori controls, since they will store a program in tape mode on the maps panel side. Standard mori seiki media card? A compact flash card? Mori does not use anything special for transfer, and they are all capable of rs232 as well. If maps 3 panel or newer, you also have network ability, you just need the mori server software. The machine controls will act like any other computer on the network. All the new moris from the last three years or so come with mori server standard.

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Originally Posted by steel_tech_427

I want the DNC without a doubt. We will be able, as supervisors, to micro-manage the editing of programs and control the work flow in the shop a lot better. There's people that tend to take all the gravy work and leave the rest for someone else.

We only have one machine with a RS232 port on it. The rest of our equipment is capatible with either a USB drive or a standard Mori Seiki media card. I just want to have all of the programs in a secure spot where my team or myself can assign them to the designated machines when we need to. The DNC is the best way. But since my boss isn't willing to spend the money, I want to find a more economical way of doing this and still be mobile (I don't want to carry a laptop with me in a shop all day).

Our goal is to have all of the machine controls wiped clean of ANY part program. The only program in the machine will be the one running. And when production is done, the program gets dumped and you start clean again. Every program will be GibbsCAM based. I just need to get the programs to the machines.

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How many machines, and what types of controls are you dealing with? The thing you are looking to do has been done for years with DNC software (Predator DNC, Multi-DNC, Cimco, etc.) All of these are capable of program transfer, as well as drip-feeding of programs that are too big to fit in memory.

One way to look at the $9,000 cost of the system is that you don't have to pay someone to walk around and plug in a tablet each time the operator needs a new program. Most all DNC systems have a "remote request" capability where the operator can punch-out a small program which triggers the DNC to send the specified part program.

I understand what the DNC is. You can store and send programs from a remote location. Editing programs and regulating program usage is done from a desktop location. Sending programs is done either by wireless connection or hard wired through the RS232 or, on newer machines, through the USB drive. I have seen connections that will even upload through the standard memory card reader (yes, the "compact flash card" that most older Mori's were equipped with). Our newest machines include two NHX5000s and there is talk about buying a NHX10000. All of those are equipped with the Mapps IV control so I will have to look into the Mori Server Option.

Our shop is growing at a very fast rate and I just want to do something now that will allow me to pull all of the programs off of the controls and store them offline. From my PC then, I want to be able to upload to a mobile device. Something light and mobile that I can take to the machines and input the programs that we will be running for the day. Leaving the programs at the controls has been a complete disaster lately with all of the new "experienced" machinists we've been getting. They all think that they can cut cycle times down with their ideas and when the other lead and myself try to run a program, that has been proven no less, it tends to be either wrong or crash. I want to eliminate that completely.

My idea was to find a tablet computer that I could store all of the programs on now and be able to move from machine to machine without carrying something heavy all day. This is something I want to take to my boss and get him to invest the money in a $500 tablet instead of investing over $9000 on the DNC, right now.

This is nothing more than a temporary fix for a big problem. The DNC system is the way to go. The boss is looking at things and saying "well, we've made it this far without it so what's the big deal." This will show him some of the benefits of doing things offline. It will drive rework down and force the other operators to run according to the work schedules.

I have a little ASUS netbook with a copy of Predator Editor loaded, and a SIIG Industrial strength USB to Serial convertor. I can carry it to any machine, plug in the RS232 cable and up or down load programs.

It has USB ports so I can plug a USB stick into the machines that use those and copy the program to the stick then from there onto the netbook. I can also plug a USB C/F reader into it and transfer programs to/from the CF card equipped machines.

Then I go back to my desk and hook up to the network and do my bookkeeping.

I'm not saying they're not out there, but I haven't seen a handheld that has that much flexibility.

Thank you. I have a netbook now I'll just have to get the software and give it a try to show my boss the advantages. I talked to one of the "Geek Squad" techs at Best Buy and he said basically the same thing. It's not a question whether or not the tablets would support the files. It's more about whether or not the machine controls would accept it.

Thanks for the info

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Originally Posted by steel_tech_427

Thank you. I have a netbook now I'll just have to get the software and give it a try to show my boss the advantages. I talked to one of the "Geek Squad" techs at Best Buy and he said basically the same thing. It's not a question whether or not the tablets would support the files. It's more about whether or not the machine controls would accept it.

Thanks for the info

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You can also use NC Net Lite from CADEM.COM to transfer via RS232. It's free and includes an editor.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by steel_tech_427

Hey guys,

I work for a major metal fabricator in central WI and my team is pushing to get a DNC system in for our entire shop. Once the boss saw what the system costs (over $9000 just to hook up the machine shop) he shut us down. What I would like to do is be able to hook a tablet into the machines through the USB port and transfer programs that way. Keeping them in the machine controls has been a real pain for us and it is much smarter to keep all of that information in a separate location.

The entire purpose behind this is to avoid all of the idiots we have working there from playing mad-scientist with our programs.

Any ideas?? Other than the DNC?

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Wouldn,t locking them out of the machines edited be easier,
unless your drip feeding , dnc will not solve your problem

Not all of the machines have keys. And some of the ones that do are machines that we use for proto-type parts. The biggest issues we have are the "Mad-Scientist" types that try to cut cycle times and save over the top of the original programs. The only people that we want to have any access to the programs are the people who actually understand what they are doing. Just last week one of my guys came in and the first time he pushed the cycle start button after setup the machine grabbed the wrong tool and piled into the table.

It was a job he has ran a thousand times and knew all of the tooling should have been there for it. Instead the tools in the magazine were swapped around and things added to the program because the other operator didn't want to take the time to do things right. It's a problem we have a lot and when a 2 inch Mitsubishi insert drill piles up, the boss wants answers.

We have all decided that it would be better if we just asigned the programs to run for the day and dump them at the end of the shift. Stopping the idiot operators from editing will be a challenge until we decide how to handle it. To be honest, I don't even know where all of the keys are for the machines right now. But at least we can still save our orginals to avoid more expensive crashes like the one last week.

All of that is actually why I joined this site...I'm good at what I do but still alittle green compared to the senior guys around here.