Thanks to jb's lunicy wev'e had some good threads, thanks jb.
Although, I think we are missing the boat...
First of all there's talk of shaving off minutes from making a program. Sounds honest, practical, etc.... But if Spok was writing this, he would say "That's f****ng stupid."
If youv'e had a taste of programming, and read web pages, sales ptches, etc...you buy into this "save programming time" BULLSHIT. But people who do it full time just laugh.
Let me explain.... You make a program in mastercam to cut a circle. If you happen to have mastercam open, you could draw a circle, and slam thru an ops page in seconds, post....whalla, what 2 damn minutes? But that's not reality. First you decide wtf I am going to do. Then you wander around for a print. Then you decide on cutters. Then you decide where your going to do it. Then you start up mastercam...chug, chug,chug...it starts. You set up a layer. You draw a circle. You op page it. You post it. You setup another layer. You make a drawing setup sheet for the mill guys to run. You print this setup sheets, tool lists, etc... You walk to the printer, and get the print. You edit a schedule. You save the file. You deliver the setup sheets.
All that crap for a circle. Now compund that for a 10 tool electrode.
So basically what I am saying is, the time saved picking a tool off a toolist is literally such a small percentage of the total time, who...cares. What I need is a little time setting up cutters so I can think of the best way to do this. I need time. We are obsessed with speed of programming. But we should slow down, zoom in on speed of milling or lathing, not speed of programming.
Just like the mold industry, a project will go for 5,000,000 million dollars, say to mold a shampoo lid. So they order the tool, or "mold" and it costs 130,000.
1.3%. It's insignificant,....yet, go 20 f****ng hours over and you have sunk the ship.And the cursing...I'm trying to bring some machine shop atmosphere to the group.