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#267 - Finalizing New Machines & Tool Installation Processes
197 Plays3 years ago
TOPCIS:
- Saunders is probing on the horizontal.
- Grimsmo is finalizing their Brother Speedio purchase.
- Installing tools on the horizontal.
- Saunders' had a bad day.
- Grimsmo Tornos oil updates.
- Willemin updates & CMM purchases.
Recommended
Transcript
Origins of the Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Good morning and welcome to the business of machining episode two hundred and sixty seven my name is john grims mo My name is john saunters and this podcast with john and john get together every week and talk about what it's like running a business both operating machinery running the higher level business hiring people creating programs and all just everything involved in running our businesses.
00:00:23
Speaker
But it started, it's almost hard to remember back. It started, again, probably a year before we recorded, so five years ago, when you and I were in different places in terms of our story, success, business stage, and frankly had more insecurities then than I do now. And remember, we were just like, hey, we're not the pound your chest. We've got it all figured out. Everything is hunky dory. We're crushing it. There are many aspects that are going well. But I remember thinking like, yeah, I'd love to somebody that I can kind of,
00:00:52
Speaker
confide in or bounce things off of, and I want it to be judged and ask other questions in a private... Does that make sense? Right? Is that... Yep. Yep. Yeah. And we did the podcast privately for a year. It wasn't a podcast. It was just a phone call, right? For like a year, and we'd have our kids on it and be like, hey, William, hey.
00:01:10
Speaker
And then we're like, we should record this. And it felt dumb at the time. Nobody wants to listen to us yammer on as a phone call for an hour. But here it is.
Sharing Ideas and Experiences
00:01:21
Speaker
I didn't have any plans or thoughts of recording. I believe it was Lockwood who wasn't it? Yeah. Anyway. Yeah. I want to hear what you guys are talking about. Right? Yeah. I enjoy it.
00:01:35
Speaker
That's a funny parallel because sometimes you have this idea in your head and you're like, nah, it's nothing. It's no big deal. It's just a thing I do. And then other people get curious about it. And then they're like, that is really interesting. I didn't know about that. And you're like, oh, I've just been playing with that for a while now. It's no big deal.
Probing in Machining: Challenges and Solutions
00:01:53
Speaker
But that's what it is. Share. OK, well, can I kick off with an idea there? Yeah, go for it. Minus and absolutely.
00:02:04
Speaker
horrible, not a crash, but a horrible outcome yesterday on the horizontal, which I will go into. Minus that it has been going cloud nine, level 10, absolutely awesome. Love this machine. What I realized though is the way we're using the probe also has nothing to do with the bad day yesterday. The way we're using the probe is just so absolutely critical to getting the parts that we want
00:02:29
Speaker
And we have this Renishaw probe with a 130 millimeter carbide carbide carbon fiber stem. It's been dialed into a 10th. Um, and I don't want to screw it up. I have an extra because I was joking. I'm going to turn this into a post there's a difference between confidence and cockiness. And one of them involves you having an extra probe tip on hand. Um,
00:02:51
Speaker
That's a meme right there. But nevertheless, when you break pro tips, it's usually when you're jogging them around. And I do need the probe to touch off new programs or fixtures or tests. The machine is useless without a working probe, basically.
00:03:06
Speaker
Totally. And so what occurred to me is I'm a bisectant probe because not to encourage reckless probing, but the reality is the probe that is doing the in-program work is something I want to treat really differently and frankly have a different stylus on it than the one that I'm going to jog around where if it's two or three tenths run out, frankly, not going to be a big deal.
00:03:28
Speaker
Okay. So kind of an open question slash, we should just grab one out of one of our other machines. I'm pretty sure I can just get another Renishaw Probe, which they have them on eBay. So in a semi assembled state or some of the glass is not free of spider webs, if that makes sense. But they claim to be functional. But no, even you appear to buy a non crashed one for like six, 700 bucks.
00:03:55
Speaker
shouldn't that work? Have you ever tried that? I've thought about it. I think you can have two signals going to one receiver. Um, I know there's some rule in that, but it should be fairly easy to find that information or ask the right person. Yeah. Okay. There is definitely concern about crossing signals and you know, the, the probe, um, that would be the critical probe that we wouldn't be using would be back in the matrix turned off. So it shouldn't be in,
00:04:25
Speaker
I think the way they work is they just look to see what's happening regardless. I don't think there's any intelligence. I think it's just the protein machine is just spitting out a signal. I think the issue can be if you had two machines that were probing at the same time and somehow machine A had a line of sight to machine B's receiver. I think that's the issue, which is crazy.
00:04:50
Speaker
Yours are the infrared kind, right? It's just the flight flashing lights. We've never had a radio or, oh, I think our Okuma Genos vertical, the table probe is wired. I have no idea why, but kind of weird, but everything else is battery powered like light.
00:05:11
Speaker
Yeah, it might work. Sounds legit. I will Google it. If anybody knows or has any tips on that, I'd love to hear because I'm like, this is a great, I very much think that's a cool idea. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Is it related to probing? No, it's related to my bad day yesterday, but you go. Well, on probing. So I'm specing out the brother speedio that I am going to purchase.
00:05:40
Speaker
Good. And I said I want bloom probes on it. Table probe and spindle probe, which is exactly what the current has. And I want the machines are going to be side by side. They're going to be making similar parts, same parts, same pallets.
Machinery Upgrades and Financing Decisions
00:05:53
Speaker
I want the same probes on both machines. So I specced out the bloom probes and I really like them too. I think they're fantastic. And then the dealer gets back to me and they're like, we're going to make the quote with Renishaw probes because service is a little bit better around here. And I was like, no, you're not.
00:06:10
Speaker
you're going to make it with Bloom probes because that's what I want or else I'm going to go and get a Robo drill from somebody else. I felt bad sending that email, but I was like, that's what I need to send right now because that's what I want. And I'm in direct contact with the Bloom sales manager too. Like I know him from shows fairly well.
00:06:28
Speaker
And he's like, what's the guy talking about? Like we do all kinds of service and installs and training and everything in your area. Like this is not a problem. And I'm like, yeah, so I wasn't afraid to put my foot down and be like, do what I ask or else. Yeah. I asked for quoted both ways. Yeah. I mean, the pricing is almost the same. Okay.
00:06:54
Speaker
So I know Renishaw has like an office close by in Toronto with like a lot of staff and they probably do more installs than Bloom does. I don't know if Bloom has an office. They probably just have a couple guys that live up here, but I don't care. I just, I want what I want.
00:07:11
Speaker
The cynic in me wonders if this is more of a margin or kickback. Yeah, right? Situation. Yeah. To your point, get what you want. What's the latest on that? Just spec on that. I heard from yesterday and he goes, I noticed on your latest request you didn't have the chip conveyor on there. When we talked about it before, you wanted the May Fran. I was like, I decided not to get the chip conveyor for now because everybody with this video is like, you're not going to need it. You don't make enough chips, especially for what I have planned for the machine. Even Dennis, he's like, why are you buying a chip conveyor?
00:07:41
Speaker
Oh, okay. But yeah, I think I should be fine with that. And it's like 20 or $30,000 from a friend and space somewhat limited in this corner that I'm shoving it beside the current. So anyway, I'm fine without the chip and bear. So he's formalizing the quote, I should have it like today ish. And then after that already talked to some banks about financing. Fine tuning. Where does where do the where's the coolant chips go if there's no
00:08:11
Speaker
Is there a chip tank or pan? Yeah. I'm getting a high pressure cooling, which comes with a bigger chip tank, cooling tank. And the chips just kind of waterfall out the back through filter paper if you want, and then down into the chip tank, the cooling tank. And it's a sweet little setup. And you're just doing knife prep work where there's, I'm curious about the no chips thing.
00:08:40
Speaker
Most of the time it's going to be spent grinding. Okay. Take that off the current. So I'm roughing hard blades. So there's some, you know, one inch long stringy chips, but still not a ton. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I'm not hogging. Even the current fills up a 55 gallon, um, like a garbage can every week or two. Well, that's a decent amount. It's a decent amount, but the, the speedo won't be roughing that much. Okay.
00:09:07
Speaker
Yeah, fair enough. There's no $5,000 option that's not a may frame, but functions or you're just going to double it out or what? $12,000 LNS, I think, but they all go out the side. I want it to go out the back. So therefore it's a custom build. So therefore yada, yada. So I'm just like, you know what? If I have to buy it for cash down the road, I'll do that. But for now, like keep it simple, just get it in. And it can be filled and sold later. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So I think it'll be fine.
00:09:37
Speaker
were we were chewing on a brick eddy machine. I thought the pricing was going to be better than it was. And so now I'm and we're buying the building next door, which gives us some actually covered.
00:09:50
Speaker
indoor space that's not even climate controlled in the very back of the building, which is a perfect spot to store our palletized Gaylord boxes. So it's kind of like, wait a minute here, why would I want to spend, I thought it was X price. It's actually X plus a lot. And so I'm kind of on the fence about, I wanted to love it and I wanted it to be part of this workflow, but it's also
00:10:10
Speaker
I just don't need to spend the money. I don't remember if I mentioned this on the podcast or not, but we've been thinking now about a CMM and this idea of a palletized twin pallet. It's just kind of like, okay, if you don't have that conviction, this is not something where I'm going to have anxiety about overthinking it. It's just simply like, okay, put on hold. Always buy later. Are you starting to think in terms of
00:10:35
Speaker
For example, I could spend $30,000 on a chip conveyor or I could allocate that money somewhere else instead if I don't need that so much and you with the preheading machine. Yeah. I'm at the point now where I'm more comfortable and confident than ever to
Automation and Tool Management Improvements
00:10:53
Speaker
do what I think is what I know is going to be a good leader, which means if our business needs something, we're going to buy it and we'll figure out how to make that work. So that has to do with the machine tools, has to do with CMMs, it has to do with, I just bought a, I mean, I didn't even think about it, a Spanco bridge crane like two days ago, just literally found it, bought it, move on. And that was a four-figure purchase just to be clear. That's not like, you know, but speak on it anyway. Oh, but four years ago, anything over a thousand dollars was like,
00:11:22
Speaker
Oh yeah. No, no, totally. Um, I made a note to myself at the end of last year, kind of like, I don't ever regret having the right people on our team or having the right equipment in our shop. Yes. Period. And so, um, that's something I think a lot of, I don't think a lot about, I want to embody and it's not always easy. Um, yeah, I have a, can I go back to the chip thing? Okay. On that note.
00:11:49
Speaker
horizontal going great. I do want to think long-term, whether it's in a briquette machine or, uh, bins for chips of how we deal better with aluminum versus steel, which is going to be run mixed on the horizontal for the foreseeable future. And I think it might be worth doing a DIY drum roll for the shaking thrown my way, but, um,
00:12:12
Speaker
notwithstanding the fact that it's actually a little bit of a tight spot right now in our shop, what I'm thinking is you can have a pretty inexpensive thrust bearing with a lazy Susan and a stepper and a gear drive that could rotate a steel bin and an aluminum bin. Okay. All you have to do is, frankly, the best thing to do would be an M code, which I think I have access to. Oh my goodness.
00:12:34
Speaker
Um, or, or you could put a manual sensor to check what the magnetism is of the material coming off the conveyor. Cause there'll be a pretty big lag once you switch or not big lag, but like a, I would think a number of seconds, if not a couple of minutes, but, um, why, why not? Right.
00:12:52
Speaker
I mean, M code would be sweet if you did. M code is easy. I just need the IO, which I should have. You should have. But like every aluminum program, the post somehow outputs M2, whatever, M200. And then the steel one M outputs M201. And if you do that at the beginning of the program, before the conveyor even turns on or as it's turning on, it should have the five seconds it'll take to rotate this Lazy Susan.
00:13:19
Speaker
Oh, totally. Without dumping chips all over the floor kind of thing. Oh, that's a good point. That's kind of cool idea. Put a dwell in there. To put a dwell, right? We already have, well, I shouldn't say we already, I'm in the process right now, kind of this header in every program because the way the Okuma scheduler works on the pallet pool, you technically could accidentally run the reversible insert on the top jaw
00:13:45
Speaker
palette, which would be a crash. With the wrong program on the wrong physical part. Yes. All I'm doing, I wrote out the variable code. I ran it once and it looked like it worked, but then I ran it a second time and I didn't like the answer and I've been busy making parts. I got to go play it again, but at the top of every program, we're basically going to say, this is a program for top jobs and there's a validation check to make sure
00:14:09
Speaker
When it's being run, the machine knows that tombstone one is in the machine. If any other tombstone is in the machine, it airs out. Yep. Yep. I've done one of those two on the current because on the current, you can run the way I've set up the scheduler. You can run the wrong program on the wrong pallet, on the wrong physical location in the rack if you're bad.
00:14:34
Speaker
So I, you know, in a perfect world, like the probe comes in, like palette comes in, the probe comes in and verifies. That's the physical size of the palette it should be. And then your parts are in place and then the program is the right one, but that gets complicated.
00:14:48
Speaker
I might do that too. I probably need 90 seconds to fix this if there's a bug in this program. I don't even know what it would be because what I did was instead of writing it to an alarm state, I just did a check against the common variable. I signed the common variable and it worked fine. Why is my not equal statement not working here?
00:15:12
Speaker
We just did a video yesterday on the 10 mods we've already done to our posts, some of which were because the post didn't work, which I was kind of surprised. And it also shows how spoiled we are because my understanding is with a lot of other software packages, it's kind of like, oh, you're ready to purchase your post. And most of them are pretty darn decent. But we've done some fixes, but we've done some pretty nice quality of life improvements, including a post thing that will not allow a tool to be run if the gauge length hasn't been set.
00:15:44
Speaker
Yes. That's fantastic. It could be the wrong gauge link that will not stop you, but the way you load this matrix, you have to go around to the back of the machine and it's just too high a risk that you load a tool in, but you forget to touch it off. If it's zero, there's no condition where I ever would want to run a tool with a zero gauge link. Yeah, that's a great point.
00:16:05
Speaker
So say you're running a new job and you have one new end mill to put in whatever half inch end mill. And what is your process for telling the machine that you're putting a half inch end mill in?
00:16:17
Speaker
The process would be to go into the controller tool table, and I would register a new insert, assuming I've never put something in, let's call it pocket, 216, because I have 218. Yes. You would register a new tool for 216, which basically tells the machine that that's now a valid tool potentially. Then you would walk around in the back of the machine, open the matrix door,
00:16:41
Speaker
Put the tool in the matrix staging thing and then hit a store button which would then it's kind of a little inefficient process it will actually take the tool and put it into pocket two sixteen then you walk around the front of the machine. And you because we're touching off in the machine we would then call the tool up and then touch it off to the r2d2 probe that pops up out of the.
00:17:02
Speaker
Comes up out of the two so now we've also used our pre-setter and in that case you wouldn't have to call the tool up because you could just punch in the height when you registered the insert that's the process which i guess is the. Probably the best workflow is to buy a pre-setter and use it that way and people print off the little tags and.
00:17:22
Speaker
You know what I mean? Otherwise, well, otherwise you're manually standing there and G68 P9857, like touching off the tool. No, it's an M201 for us. It's super simple. Okay, still. But you're still, the machine has to be off and you're manually touching off that tool. Fair point. It is not what I would say has been prohibitive or whatever. Not yet, but you're three weeks into this machine.
00:17:47
Speaker
Yeah, but I got most of the tools set. My philosophy on a Presetter is if you're going to use it for gauge lengths, it should be the master. We wouldn't be a huge issue.
00:18:03
Speaker
because the way we're running tools and programs and probing. Where I had to use the presetter is that the Okuma is a little bit more laborious to touch off a face mill because you have to actually clock it, find the angle, set that up. And most of the time with face mills, I don't care if it's off by nine tenths in height, like not that it is, but it's just, you know, within a foul is good enough for a lot of the work that they're being used for. So those are way easier to throw it on the spironi and then just punch the value in. Cool. It's going great.
00:18:31
Speaker
Nice. Yeah, on the current, it was similar. You'd have to, so you're holding the tool, you measure the gauge length from fit taper to, you know, from face to tip, and you type it in the tool database.
00:18:45
Speaker
You need length, diameter, some other stuff. You need to define the touch off point if you want to touch off in the center or offset a little bit. When you touch the side, you got to define how high up the side. So there's a couple, probably five or six required features you got to type into the tool library to make the tool work.
00:19:05
Speaker
But then you have to manually call the touch off program. And yeah, it's just one line of code, but the machine has to be not running and you have to stand there and you have to like do that. And I got sick of that because I'm like, this machine is supposed to be running all the time and I have a new tool to put in while it's running. Yes. So I created a script on the current that if I type 999 into one of the
00:19:29
Speaker
variables on the tool table. Now the current knows that the next time that tool is called, it sees a 999 and it auto touches off and it has been, and it resets the current time and it sets everything the way it's supposed to be. It has been glorious. There's nothing wrong with that except that scares it. Sure. But with enough testing, it's fine. Like of course it's scary the first time.
00:19:59
Speaker
If you had like a power outage or something kind of a black swan events that do happen, somebody hits reset and you restart the program, is there any chance that you lose the 999 though? Nope. What about- There's a chance you don't type it in. This is actually something I thought of this morning. Can you not set the gauge length to 20 inches? It's the same thing. So that way it doesn't run the 999? Well, no, it wouldn't because- Well, yeah, it would run safe.
00:20:27
Speaker
It would run safe, which is nice. Well, we always gauge the tools, the end mills when we put in, like they are always half inch or they're always one inch or whatever the stick out. And we have a spreadsheet that tracks that. So anytime a tool goes in, me or Angelo knows how much the stick out is. So it's always going to be the same as it was before. Um, yeah. It's a safety wise. You might be off by a foul tooth out. Right. Right. Right. But okay. I see what you're saying. It's not, you're not going from zero to 4.4. Correct. That's fair.
00:20:58
Speaker
I'd still, I don't know why these machine tool builders don't fail to a safety point of like, Hey, every tool is set up at 20 inches instead of zero inches because zero is going to smack.
Troubleshooting Common Machining Issues
00:21:08
Speaker
Yeah. It's a good point.
00:21:10
Speaker
Okay, so on that note, my bad day. Yeah, what happened? Oh no. What happened is not what I expected at first, which is kind of the lesson. So parts were running great, like great, great, great, great, great. And I loaded up a few more at like six o'clock, went to the gym.
00:21:30
Speaker
came back, they're still running fine, went home, so it's cycling pallets. There's only two pallets running right now, two tube zones, but it's still on them, it's good to go. Came back in the morning, pulled the parts off, was like, miking them, totally just expecting that to be a cursory mic check to confirm what I expected, and they're off by seven thou. There's a mile, and I'm kind of like, double you.
00:21:54
Speaker
And so I, um, and to be honest, it kind of hit me cause I've been kind of grinding the last two, three weeks, which is fun. I loved it, but I was, I was looking to continue the momentum of things falling into place and I was going to spend a lot of yesterday.
00:22:09
Speaker
sort of fine-tuning some of these postings and probing things and macros and stuff. This wasn't a big deal. It's like a slap in the face because you come in, the machine's done. You're like, yes, the parts look good. You're like, yes. You take them off. You're like, yes. And then you measure them and you're like, what the?
00:22:29
Speaker
No. And so this fixture has been flexing in an area that I didn't expect it to, and I don't like it. But it's flexing repeatedly by about 5,000 consistently. The datums account for it. I still don't like it.
00:22:44
Speaker
I was thinking that to me is the red flag. I'm like, okay, something's going on here. So I drilled, reamed, and pinned this rail that was flexing after I did that, put the indicators back on it, didn't change a thing about how it's flexing, which is actually kind of interesting in and of itself. But then I'm like, okay, I'm looking at my cam. I'm looking at loading the parts. I'm looking at just machining these features from two different angles. I'm like, what could be going on? Do you know what it is yet, John?
00:23:15
Speaker
No. Okay. That makes me feel slightly better. A tool pulled out by 20,000. Oh my goodness. Last thing you think about. Well, and it shouldn't have been because frankly, you know, it was so telling of like, there weren't issues elsewhere that would have been the case if the fixture were bad or plexing and all that. It was only on a couple of these dimensions that it was off. And I should have immediately just looked at the state of that tool retouched off compared to values.
00:23:43
Speaker
all that. Um, so luckily no big deal at all. And I'm, you know, frankly in hindsight, I guess kind of glad that it took the time to go be a detective and tweak this fixture. Like I learned a lot. Um, so that's what, what, what holder is that tool in and why did it pull out?
00:24:00
Speaker
Great question. I don't actually have the perfect answer for you there. It is in an ER20. So you could argue that that's not the strongest solution. Usually fine, though. Yes. And we've run these parts for years. Different machine, but very similar workflow, tooling, setups, et cetera. What's the end though? I think YG V70 plus. What size? 3.8. 3.8. Decent size, ER20. Kind of the upper end of an ER20, isn't it? Average. Average, yeah.
00:24:29
Speaker
I think, so I took the tool out, cleaned the collet, the holder, all that stuff. It's brand new for what it's worth, holder and collet. But I think what happened, the tool doesn't even actually do that much. It does a lot of time in the cut, but it doesn't do that. We're not asking that much of the tool, which is also what made me
00:24:48
Speaker
I think what happened was I probably had one of my parts pushed just 30,000 to one side, which the tool cut fine, but it was more tool pressure than it was used to seeing. I think that could have been the pullout, relatively shortcut, which explains why it wasn't catastrophic.
00:25:06
Speaker
Anyway, I lightened up the cam there just as a double check, cutting a little bit more air. No big deal for now. Retighten the tool down, all that stuff. Should be fine. There's more of a sharing. Yeah. Funny. I mean, I've had ER 16 call it nuts, crack, and even the tool holder, I've had a crack across the threads, like down the threads. Holy cow.
00:25:30
Speaker
Yeah, you only find out when after making some scrap and investigating and then like imagine the ER 16 nut is cracked. When you take it off, the crack closes. When you install it, the crack opens up. You know what I mean? Because you're expanding it kind of. Oh yeah. Hilarious. So it's not until like you're looking at the run out and you're looking at all this stuff and you're like, what is that?
00:25:52
Speaker
Holy cow. Are you twerking them? We're not. We're just tightening them. We twerk our 32s. We have the Mari tool twerking for that. I really should buy the 20 because I should. Right.
00:26:07
Speaker
Like I've had stuff in my Maritool cart for years and I just I don't order it because I have everything I need really for like their kind of stuff. But when the speedio comes in, I'm going to place a Maritool order and then I'll buy all the torque wrenches and all the stuff that I've been meaning to get forever. And those what
Machine Repairs and New Acquisitions
00:26:24
Speaker
are they magnetic filter papers you put over all your filter inlets? Oh, from CNC coolant guy or whatever.
00:26:33
Speaker
Yeah, Maritool sells them. I've been meaning to get those. And just all that stuff that's been in my cart forever, I finally have an excuse to buy it all. I'm adding this ER24, because we have the torque wrench. The adapter is not cheap. It's $60, but it's done buying it. Yeah, it's a process peace of mind to know that every operator is installing them to the same value, and it's, yeah. Yeah, I agree. Yeah, we need to do that.
00:27:03
Speaker
Um, I would like to ask her an update on three things. Coolant in the herb oil in the lathe, the Willeman and CMM. Excellent.
00:27:15
Speaker
Okay, so yesterday, I think we figured out the cause of air in the oil on the Tornos Swiss lathe. Because we've replaced all the hoses, most of the fittings, everything suction side seems to check out and is fine. There's this blue transfer pump that doesn't make a lot of pressure, but it just moves fluid to the high pressure pump, which then pressurizes it. And if you take the outlet of the blue transfer pump and you just
00:27:43
Speaker
dump that into a bucket and turn it on like foamy oil comes out. Interesting. And we've known this for a week or two so that something in the transfer pump or before the transfer pump is the problem. And then we've taken the front, it's almost like a turbocharger front housing that suctions in the oil and spits it out the front like in this kind of number six like shape.
00:28:12
Speaker
Okay. Oh, I see what you're saying. Like a turbocharger that whips it around and shoots it out. Exactly. So we've taken that front housing off. There's a big O-ring around the outside. We're like, Oh, it's gotta be the O-ring.
00:28:23
Speaker
And we looked at it really close. I looked at it on the microscope. The O-ring is mint. There's not a scratch, not a nick, not a dent, not a whatever. So I'm like, I can go get a new O-ring. And then I'm like, thinking of this pressure system, there's a low pressure zone where things come in with vacuum pretty much, and then there's a high pressure zone where oil shoots out.
00:28:43
Speaker
But in that chamber, there's got to be another seal, not just the big o-ring, but another seal like on the motor shaft that prevents air, oil, whatever from leaving through the motor shaft something. So I told Pierre to take off the impeller so we can see behind there and there's a carbon seal. Have you ever seen a carbon seal before?
00:29:06
Speaker
It's like imagine, it looks like a piece of graphite, like a bushing, but it's made of carbon or whatever. It's meant to be stationary and have a shaft spin through it as like a bushing, basically. Like a rotary union though? Yeah, very similar, very similar.
00:29:22
Speaker
And I think there's a gasket or a seal, like a rubber seal as well. But anyway, we looked at that carbon seal and it is very cracked and chipped in two places. No. So I think, I mean, clearly that's wrong. So we're fixing that. But I think it's in kind of, we were thinking of the low pressure and high pressure zones. I think it's in the low pressure zone. So it's sucking in coolant from the front and air from the back through this little crack in the thing.
00:29:49
Speaker
And I think that's it. I think it's perfect. So, um, I think Elliott Metzora down the street has one in stock. So we're trying to figure out that today. But yeah, I think, I think we got it. Super excited about that. How the hell do I crack? I don't know. I don't know. Like.
00:30:06
Speaker
This kind of happened about a month ago when we did a coolant swap or an oil swap and a full tank clean out and stuff. So maybe it happened then, or it's always been a problem and that just cleaned it out and made it worse or I don't know something. But, um, that said, we're still, we're still running the Swiss and we're making parts, but limited capacity. Um, my understanding on the, at least on the hospital reunions is it's a.
00:30:30
Speaker
I think it's carbide on carbide, two faces that are basically two washers. They're preloaded with a spring. If you were to run them, one is stationary, one is rotating at your spindles RPM, which is for us up to 12 or 15,000 RPMs. That would be catastrophic. What it does, it's pretty cool, is it has a
00:30:51
Speaker
forks off a small amount of your cutting fluid coolant and it forces that cutting fluid coolant through that gap. So it forms a hydro film layer, which lubricates, cools, all that stuff. And there's actually, if you go for the folks out there that have Haas machines, if you look on most of them, I believe you look at your spindle and you follow the sheet metal back toward the column, you'll see somewhere a half inch, three quarter inch, or sorry, three eighths inch hose that has
00:31:20
Speaker
Nothing coming out of it except a small drip when it's running. That is the drain of the coolant that's running through your rotary union. It's constantly cleaning the seal, sort of. Not cleaning it, just lubricating it. It's flowing through. Yes. Yeah, that's really cool. If you have bad coolant, like fines or chips, it will erode that. I was thinking in your situation, if somehow you
00:31:48
Speaker
didn't have any lubricant or fluid there, I gotta think it would heat up in the rack or the cycle would crack it. That's why it's carbon. That's a bush. I don't know.
00:32:01
Speaker
But the shaft itself looks fine. There's no scoring or heat marks or anything like that. And there is no extra drain valve like what you're talking about on this system. So I don't think it's meant to leak at all. Got it. But I think it's meant to be under oil and then the rubber seal on the other side kind of seals it shut. But yeah, super excited to get that fixed and replaced. And that's one of those, well, there's your problem.
00:32:28
Speaker
That's great. Do you know if the pump got accidentally run dry? Possibly, yeah, through the changeover and it's possible. It was like a sump style coolant system where that needs that presence of oil to self. Yeah, you have to prime it, but I don't know, something. Okay, good. Yeah, so that's fantastic. We should have a fix for that in a couple of days, hopefully.
00:32:59
Speaker
Willamond, I took, was it Thursday? Thursday and Friday to be a surgeon, literally put my gloves on. I did film a video, kind of Fraser just hovered and watched me do some stuff. I got the transfer plate put together with all the wires and all the hoses and everything. It's like an umbilical cord of information, fluids and everything. I got that all assembled.
00:33:26
Speaker
basically right now it's ready to put into the machine. So this week, sometime I just need Angelo's help and we will finagle this thing into the machine and then it can all go back together pretty quickly. And then we'll know if it works. Awesome. So that's huge progress. I haven't done that much work on it in months. Um, so I'm stoked. That was, that was fun. It was fun to do that. That's great. Yep. And then once that backs together, it's like, try it, you know, it,
00:33:56
Speaker
If everything else is working, then it should be usable. If, I know, I know. But I mean, a couple months ago, I was able to test everything. And like, I got the spindle turned on. I've done a tool change. I've moved all the accesses. I fixed a couple of fan errors.
00:34:14
Speaker
I shook it down somewhat. It's a fair point. And then it developed this error. And I think I saw the broken wire. There's a 25-pin connector with little tiny 20-gauge wires coming out of it, like a printer cable, an old-school printer cable kind of thing. And as we took it apart, I'm like, there's a broken wire here. That black wire is not going anywhere. And I think it's supposed to. I think that's the problem.
00:34:41
Speaker
Yeah. Well, that's kind of one of those wonderfully refreshing. You've found the, uh, exactly. So I bought all new parts from Wilhelmin, the cable harness and the new hydraulic hoses and some other stuff was like three grand. Yeah. Sorry. But it's like, whatever, let's do it. You know, I'm already this deep into it. Let's get it fixed. Um, yeah, so that's exciting. So hopefully within what's today, Wednesday, maybe by the end of the week, we get that installed.
00:35:09
Speaker
If you want it to pick a date, pick a time. And that's what I did last week. Yep. You can also don't think of it as, and this is me talking to myself as much as it is to you. It doesn't have to be finished, but just say, I'm going to set aside two hours to turn your phone off. The world will continue. Exactly. Turn your computer off. Just two hours to get as far as you can get. Yep. And that's what I meant to do on Thursday, but it turned into all day.
00:35:34
Speaker
And I definitely felt not getting anything else done, you know, in a, in a weird way, it was fine, but you're right. The world goes on if I don't do a lot of things, but normally I do multiple projects in a day and it was kind of weird to slow down and only do the one. Um, it was nice though. It needed to happen. So that's, that's fine. That's great. Um, yeah. And then on the CMM heard back from financing yesterday, they approved me. Good to go.
00:36:02
Speaker
Awesome. Good terms, good rate, very happy with all that. Now we're just, I guess, finalize the paperwork on that and get it all sent. It's taking a little bit longer than I hoped it would. It's probably been three or four weeks since I was like, I'm going to get this, but whatever. It's good. It's in stock though, so it's really a matter of just
00:36:21
Speaker
Probably, I think they quoted four to six weeks. It's in stock in the US. If they were really nice, they might have pre-ordered one and gotten it on the way already. I don't know yet. I could see them doing that because they like to have two or three in flow. They know they sell a lot of them. What's the size or model? It's a Zeiss Duramax. There's only the one size. It's like the size of a filing cabinet. It's not huge.
00:36:49
Speaker
It's tall. It's like six feet tall with the whole thing, but, um, it's pretty small footprint. Okay. Yeah. You happen to know, I guess I'll look it up the X, Y, uh, 20 by 20 by 20. Oh, okay. That's not so bad. Yeah. Yep. Plenty big enough for our prints. Yes, exactly. It's like a tall Datron. Got it. Yeah. Cool. So I am pumped. That is going to be so fun. I just, I want that here now. Yeah.
00:37:16
Speaker
Yeah, so those are my three updates on that. Let's see, that includes some of my things. I remember a couple weeks ago, I was telling you that on the Kern, I was trying to make this like four inch bore and it was way too big. Yes. Right? Yes. I figured it out. I came in on a Saturday. Claire actually came with me and whenever she comes with, she's like, how long are we going to be? And this time I was like, I don't know.
00:37:41
Speaker
But I figured out that I was actually applying a double offset to the part. I drew a sketch that was like, call it four inches. And then I drew another circle that was my three thou radial undersized. So I drew the sketch of the roughing pass. And then also in the cam settings, I put a stock to leave of three thou. So stupid me put a double offset onto it. And I'm like, why is it always six thou oversized?
00:38:10
Speaker
Love it. We just helped somebody who was having a treadmill. They were frustrated with thread milling. I went into the CAD side of Fusion and I sketched out concentric rings in like 2,000 increments and zoomed in a bunch and then hopped back into CAM and they could see how the stepovers toolpath correlated to the CAD sketch that we know what the CAD sketch is because we made it.
00:38:35
Speaker
right now. Yeah, it's kind of one of those wonderful like almost like you're bringing a toolpath into the physical real world checks and balances, you know, yeah, we're good. That's awesome. That's funny. Yep. Sweet. I would like to take a moment of silence. I also came in on Saturday to machine the third tombstone to get it ready. And I would like to take a moment of silence and remembrance for everybody out there who has the machine cast iron. Oh,
00:39:02
Speaker
It is the worst. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I literally am sitting there with coolant. Oh, good grief dry. I don't want to contaminate my coolant. And I'm sitting there with the dust deputy shop back and the shop wipes things and like, oh, just yeah.
00:39:24
Speaker
Yeah. Anyway, unsubscribe. Yeah. Hopefully done with that for a while. I guess you got to run. Okay. I'll see you next week. Sounds great, man. Take care. Have a good day.