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IndustryArena Forum > CAM Software > Uncategorised CAM Discussion > Anyone use PartMaker Mill-Turn Or Mill
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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
    Posts
    99

    Anyone use PartMaker Mill-Turn Or Mill

    I am researching new cad/cam software for myself and the shop i work in.We have one swiss turn lathe(tsugami),2 ZT mori seiki mill turn,1 SL mori seiki, 1 doosan puma 2 axis lathe,1 A55 Makino Horizontal mill,1 A81 Makino Horizontal Mill,and 1 fadal Vertical mill.Has anyone had any experience using partmaker to program these machines and if so what has it been?The biggestproblem i have with our current software(Mastercam) is the posts.They seem to have nothing.Also is partmaker easy to draw in.I have found mastercam to be very easy to draw with as a cad package.Thanks for any input that you can give.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Posts
    54
    Hi Littlebrewman,

    I work here at PartMaker as an applications engineer. We have Posts for all Tsugami's, Mori's, Doosan,s and even the Makino Horizontal. The posts for those machines except for the Makino I can vouch for and since we work closely with all those manufactors, if there is a problem, it's only a phone call away. I have no hands on with the Makino post myself so I can't say but I know our customer with it seems to have no issues with it. If you give a call 215-643-5077, one of our saleman can give you a demo over the web and answer any questions you might have. Thanks
    Bill Cain
    www.partmaker.com

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jun 2006
    Posts
    59
    Hello, I am transitioning from Gibbs to Partmaker in our lathe department and Partmaker is the best program that I have seen so far in terms of post customization. We have received great support in terms of making the post work correctly with your machine.

    For instance I run a DMG CTX310VF - four axis lathe with Fanuc 32i controller. Most of these machines have the Siemens, and Partmaker has been very good about working with us to get all of the little odd syntax that this controller necessitates in the post.

    Partmaker also allows you to customize your post. I would suggest taking part in one of the post customization webinars that is offered through their site.
    Star SR20RII/Fanuc 18i, DMG CTX310V4/Fanuc 32i, DMG CTX310ECO/Siemens 8400, Mori NV5000/MAPS, Bridgeport 760/Fanuc 18i, Kiamaster 4NEII60/Fanuc 3t;Partmaker, Gibbscam

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    4

    use caution before you buy partmaker

    be careful before you purchase partmaker. for a one channel machine it will post fine as would any other package. once you get to two and three channel swiss style equipment the posts require heavy modifications to work properly. we have not used one multi channel machine where partmaker has posted correct numbers "out of the box". the machines would have crashed or just alarmed out.

    for an example, after the post for an star sv-20 has been worked on for about two years it still requires hand editing so it can run properly once posted. this type of machine has been around since at least 1998. why doesn't this post work properly by now?

    i do not believe that partmaker has spent time with the machine builders to be familiar with thier equipment. i know this for a fact from making calls to different machine tool builders.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Posts
    54
    Hi John,

    I am sorry to hear you have not gotten what you need. I looked for a John South in our records and could not find anyone by that name.

    Please also remember that there are many SV models that have been changed over the years.

    As we have many SV users and have good relations with Star I do not understand your comments about the manufactures. I am on first name basis with Applications Engineers from Star, Citizen, Tsugami, Mori, Nakamura, and more.

    To be quite honest most isssues arise when programmers perfer to change the "Style" of the output. Our posts allow for many situations you might or might now run into. The complextity of the machine and the post are very touchy. Also many times there is just a setting inside the software which needs to be changed.

    John, if your still on Maintenance, I would like to help you through these issues.


    Quote Originally Posted by JOHN SOUTH View Post
    be careful before you purchase partmaker. for a one channel machine it will post fine as would any other package. once you get to two and three channel swiss style equipment the posts require heavy modifications to work properly. we have not used one multi channel machine where partmaker has posted correct numbers "out of the box". the machines would have crashed or just alarmed out.

    for an example, after the post for an star sv-20 has been worked on for about two years it still requires hand editing so it can run properly once posted. this type of machine has been around since at least 1998. why doesn't this post work properly by now?

    i do not believe that partmaker has spent time with the machine builders to be familiar with thier equipment. i know this for a fact from making calls to different machine tool builders.
    Bill Cain
    www.partmaker.com

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    4
    I clearly understand that machines change over the years. But basic functionality of the machine posts are incorrect. The posts were repaired by partmaker and kept as an revision change correcting your product.

    Russ Adams pushed your software as it will produce parts "out of the box", which is not true. Again every machine we have tried the posts on had to be modified just to work properly.

    In the economy we are in not many shops have the time to spend making your posts work correctly. Also, keeping the maintenance agreement going becomes very expensive.

    You really should advertise your product as software that will operate with the buyer being able to commit a lot of time working on the posts. As I mentioned before, even after two years of work on a simple two channel SV there is still hand editing that MUST be done to operate correctly.

    Another thought would be if partmaker would some type of financially reimbursement when your customers make corrections to your posts. We spend the time findind and telling partmaker of the mistakes and partmaker reaps the benifits of the corrections.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Posts
    54
    "John"

    Since you obviously did not use your real name and I dont know who you work for, I can not try to explain the situation that caused this problem with you.

    As I said, the main problems that occur are not the fact the post will not create good parts, it does for many people, but usually the case of "I don't like this code" or "This is not how we do it". At points like that we try and work with the customer to get what they want, but it does not always happen. The main reason as to why this can happen is because the customer wont accept code that works and refuses to comprmize.

    I have a customer simular to that with the SV post. They have modified it to the point where I doubt anything would work right. This happened because they did not like the code, not that it did not work.

    Again, I am sorry you have had bad experiance, but I can asure you that it not the normal case.

    Bill Cain

    Quote Originally Posted by JOHN SOUTH View Post
    I clearly understand that machines change over the years. But basic functionality of the machine posts are incorrect. The posts were repaired by partmaker and kept as an revision change correcting your product.

    Russ Adams pushed your software as it will produce parts "out of the box", which is not true. Again every machine we have tried the posts on had to be modified just to work properly.

    In the economy we are in not many shops have the time to spend making your posts work correctly. Also, keeping the maintenance agreement going becomes very expensive.

    You really should advertise your product as software that will operate with the buyer being able to commit a lot of time working on the posts. As I mentioned before, even after two years of work on a simple two channel SV there is still hand editing that MUST be done to operate correctly.

    Another thought would be if partmaker would some type of financially reimbursement when your customers make corrections to your posts. We spend the time findind and telling partmaker of the mistakes and partmaker reaps the benifits of the corrections.
    Bill Cain
    www.partmaker.com

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    4
    it is not the point of not liking the code your posts produce. the code is WRONG. machines will not work the way they are posted from your software. i will say it again, once we informed you of several mistakes, you then corrected the post and reissued it as a new revision.

    i have 30+ years of experience setting up, running and programming machine tools.

    honestly, we have posted out code for four different machines and every one of them had alarms or were stopped before they crashed.

    we work hand and hand with the machine tool builders and some of the changes we have suggested to the machine tool builders have been put into the ladders for new machines.

    please don't insult us, machinist/programmers by saying somebody who sits behind a desk reading from a machines operation manual knows more about how equipment operates.

    you know your software but partmaker does not know how these machines run.

    what confused me is how when i was at a partmaker training class about a year ago, the individual who runs your training department has never ran or set up a lathe. he told us he operated a wire edm machine.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Posts
    54
    "john" or whomever you are

    I am sorry and did not mean to offend you. We could go back and forth quoting our resumes and experiance and offending each other. I will only say that I have 20 years of experance with Swiss machine that has not been behind a desk and most of that with Star machines.

    Hopefully you find software that satisfies you at some point.

    Bill Cain

    Quote Originally Posted by JOHN SOUTH View Post
    it is not the point of not liking the code your posts produce. the code is WRONG. machines will not work the way they are posted from your software. i will say it again, once we informed you of several mistakes, you then corrected the post and reissued it as a new revision.

    i have 30+ years of experience setting up, running and programming machine tools.

    honestly, we have posted out code for four different machines and every one of them had alarms or were stopped before they crashed.

    we work hand and hand with the machine tool builders and some of the changes we have suggested to the machine tool builders have been put into the ladders for new machines.

    please don't insult us, machinist/programmers by saying somebody who sits behind a desk reading from a machines operation manual knows more about how equipment operates.

    you know your software but partmaker does not know how these machines run.

    what confused me is how when i was at a partmaker training class about a year ago, the individual who runs your training department has never ran or set up a lathe. he told us he operated a wire edm machine.
    Bill Cain
    www.partmaker.com

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    1
    Hello John. Normally I don’t reply to postings like yours but prospective customers may read your posting so I thought it best to reply with a short review of my experience. I have 17 years in the progressive die industry; Programming and operating Haas Mills and Charmilles wire machines, running a CNC department of 11 machines and 4 employees. In addition 5 of those years were designing the progressive dies. I taught in the public school system for 2 years before coming to PartMaker. As lead trainer for PartMaker CAM software I travel both domestic and internationally training new customers the basics and giving existing customers advanced training. I really love what I do.
    As a teacher I know that people (teens or adults) can come to a class with preconceived ideas about a subject or product, or an attitude against it. I would recommend you come back in for training to go over things that you may have missed. Our sales department maybe able to arrange that at a reduced cost or even free. Please contact them at your convenience.
    Glenn Ellis

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    4
    All I would like to say, is that your sales people should be honest about what your software can and can not do.

    Bill you were very helpful and knowledgable about your sofware.

    I feel that partmaker is making posts for many machines and does not have time to or does not want to spend the money to test the post to ensure they work properly.

    Glen, that does sound impressive. But, partmaker is supposed to be all about software for lathes especially swiss style. Your lack of knowledge of lathes was very obvious and when I was there this was very frustrating.

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Jun 2006
    Posts
    59

    Post

    Quote Originally Posted by littlebrewman View Post
    I am researching new cad/cam software for myself and the shop i work in.We have one swiss turn lathe(tsugami),2 ZT mori seiki mill turn,1 SL mori seiki, 1 doosan puma 2 axis lathe,1 A55 Makino Horizontal mill,1 A81 Makino Horizontal Mill,and 1 fadal Vertical mill.Has anyone had any experience using partmaker to program these machines and if so what has it been?The biggestproblem i have with our current software(Mastercam) is the posts.They seem to have nothing.Also is partmaker easy to draw in.I have found mastercam to be very easy to draw with as a cad package.Thanks for any input that you can give.

    Littlebrewman, I find Partmaker very easy to draw in. You can easily trim and extend lines with a very intuitive interface. You don't need to explode intersected segments to trim them or remove them as each intersection bisects the segment which allows you to individually manipulate the segment (also similar to other Delcam products). Post support is second to none (yes, we are on maintenance.) On more than one occasion I have submitted post modifications and received updated posts within 1hr. I have a less than common machine/control combination which has lead to a small amount of R&D to get the post perfect. But, I do not believe in hand editing as it takes too much time, and increases the chances for having a crash. I had the post perfect from the last software – still a great competitors program and it took some time. I foresee absolutely no reasons that will inhibit the Partmaker post from being perfect as well.
    Star SR20RII/Fanuc 18i, DMG CTX310V4/Fanuc 32i, DMG CTX310ECO/Siemens 8400, Mori NV5000/MAPS, Bridgeport 760/Fanuc 18i, Kiamaster 4NEII60/Fanuc 3t;Partmaker, Gibbscam

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Jul 2007
    Posts
    82
    Quote Originally Posted by JOHN SOUTH View Post
    All I would like to say, is that your sales people should be honest about what your software can and can not do.

    Bill you were very helpful and knowledgable about your sofware.

    I feel that partmaker is making posts for many machines and does not have time to or does not want to spend the money to test the post to ensure they work properly.

    Glen, that does sound impressive. But, partmaker is supposed to be all about software for lathes especially swiss style. Your lack of knowledge of lathes was very obvious and when I was there this was very frustrating.
    John South,
    I'm one of the PartMaker users and I fully agree with You. They made a soft without testing it. After I generate program I need 1 to 2 hours to get rid of the crap, for simple part I'm able to write the program faster on the paper than using PM. On top of it, drawing is a disaster - let say drawing simple line under the certain angle, I never know wher that f... line is going to arrive. The only good thing about PartMaker is idea of using "faces". The whole thing needs a lot of work, this is just another product like Ms Windows - made to make money not to improve anything.
    Bill and Glen, You Guys need to humble yourselves, stop bull...ing on the forum and think how to improve your soft

  14. #14
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Posts
    1
    I use Partmaker on a daily basis and although there are still post issues I find that most of them are only because I like my programs posted a certain way. They usually work fine, although filled with some redundancies here and there. But I doubt I'll ever get over skimming through the program to check for errors.

    It's really very easy to edit your own post guys. Make a copy and start plucking away and testing and I'm sure you'll tune it in in a quicker time than you think. It's certainly a million times easier than editing a Mastercam post to work with a Swiss...

  15. #15
    Join Date
    Apr 2010
    Posts
    16
    I use Partmaker on a daily basis for Swiss, turnmill, mill and and wire. I have had post problems and rather than fix the posts have been patching the programs together to make them work, It has finally occurred that I am not better than Partmaker at writing programs and in fact editing posts is not all that difficult or time consuming. I have been happy to discuss and moan about its short comings with my work mates in the past but the bottom line is that if it does not work the only person to blame is the operator. I am now fixing the posts I can and getting help with the ones I cant. Partmaker never comes to work in a bad mood or makes mistakes and is therefore better at its job than many people I work with. It works if you do.

  16. #16
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Posts
    0
    I have a Star SR20R PartMaker post that I have all the bugs worked out of using the post editor. But I still like a few things on the SV32J. If you have a Miyano ABX 64 do not even consider a PartMaker post.

  17. #17
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Posts
    0
    I can help you with the angle thing with partmaker. Just remember that after you pick your end point, the next line you pick next to is going to be relative to the angle input you entered. I know it sounds complicated, but once you figure it out, it is simple.

    1. enter angle 45.
    2. pick end point.
    3. pick beside the line you want the angle to be ralitive to.
    Example: If you pick on the left side of a 90' line. Your angle will be 135'. Also remember partmaker uses the line closest that you pick to for its ref. So if you make a wrong line get rid of it or else you will have so many lines that you will not be able to tell which line partmaker is using for ref.

    I got really flustrated with this software till I figured this out.

  18. #18
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Posts
    0

    Partmaker post

    I have a near perfect SR20R post because of the post edits I have done. Most are very easy. Some I had to get creative on.

    But If you have a Miyano ABX64 do not get a partmaker post.

  19. #19
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Posts
    54

    Posting

    JR, I am sorry you feel the way you do but I want to let you know I do not Bull**** anyone. Our track record with multi-axis posting speaks for itself.

    If anyone is having issues with a post, we are always here to help. Obviously there is issues that arrise when creatng a post and feedback to us is ecential to moving forward.

    While we work with all the manufactures on posts as well, many customers are quite picky and was to not only have code that works, they want it in thier style. This is why we "give" the ability to edit posts with the software.

    We have also found that just because a post works for one customer, another may be looking to do different processes or utilize more complex process's which may have never been used. These machines can be configure to process a part up to 10,000 different ways depending on the number of axis and configuration.

    If your having issues with your ABX, please report them so we can look more into it.

    BTW, I agree with you on the "Line on an Angle".
    Bill Cain
    www.partmaker.com

  20. #20
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Posts
    0

    Partmaker CadCam Post

    Bill,

    Can other people with Partmaker utilize the post I have that run really well. I think it would be a good idea if CadCam users that have close to bug free post for a particular machine could send them to other people that are having problems. I know I would like to get my hands on a good ABX64 post. We do not do maintenance anymore. I was one of the first to get the ABX64 Post and it was flawed from the program number to just above the M30. When we had the maintenance current, I was not the programmer for that machine.

    Junior

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