I have been working as an "apprentice" for the past year at a family owned foundry/startup machine shop. I use the term "apprentice" loosely because I had no teacher who would take the time to properly teach me what was needed. He gave me only enough to be able to program with very little understanding of how much of the cnc world works.

With that said I do have a fair grasp of how to program, but my controller is an old Fanuc 6M that has quite the temperment. I see programs others write and either I am using a very simple version of programing or my controller wont handle it.

I am seeking information on how to go from nothing, to I can handle myself without bugging a nearby machinist friend every 5 minutes with "simple" questions. I am enrolling next fall into a cnc program at a local College. But I do currently work as my family's machinist and need to be able to get work done.

If anyone can recomend books that I can buy or online resources that I can make use of that would help a ton. Specifically programing with guides of how and why a machine does what it does vs just the code forms. The mathmatics end of it I could use alot of help specifically on formulas that are used on a regular basis. I don't know if there is much for this one but any help on blueprint reading and mechanical understanding is a big issue I currently have.

Thank you for reading my little story here, if you can recomend anything I would appreciate it much. In advance you have my thanks and forgive the rantings of a noob stuck without a master to teach me lol.