Let me tell you about Chuck

[james mcgrew]

dan

i posted earlier that the company who sold me my machines put up a forum where all other owners can communicate with each other about particular's with machines, software and all other aspects of cnc newness, this has proved invaluable to the owners and has freed up the company to build cnc's. it is checked daily by multiple owners and some of the company techs, we have the cell numbers of the techs and downtime is reduced to hours at worst. very few salesmen of cnc i met ever really knew how to operate the machines. one of the lessons i took to most was to not purchase a cnc for the first time with a job waiting, i integrated the cnc into what we do not the other way around. then one can increase efficiency and produce product

 

[iSign]

I encourage everyone to have an in depth conversation with someone who has made a similar purchase to ask them what they wish they would have done differently, what their expectations should be...the variables are going to be different for everyone. but these are significant purchases with a significant learning curve that can change the direction of your business. take the time to research the purchase.

great post Dan

 

[Bradster941]

.




Don't you just hate it when people jump on this board Bitching, gets a bunch of helpful replies, and then either

a) can't be bothered to come back to their own thread
b) can't be bothered to say thanks to those that took their time to offer up help
c) can't update the status of still having a problem or the problem is solve and the solution was XXXXXXXXXX XXXXX XXXXXXXXX XX XXXX


Well, I guess there are allot of people out there that thinks the world revolves around them and everyone else is just here to serve their needs..



.

 

[benjercorp]

Janey, Take it easy!!

Because a CNC router it's not easy,it's just matter of time practice makes excellence, how would you know how good you are if never failed.

 

[Janey]

.




Don't you just hate it when people jump on this board Bitching, gets a bunch of helpful replies, and then either

a) can't be bothered to come back to their own thread
b) can't be bothered to say thanks to those that took their time to offer up help
c) can't update the status of still having a problem or the problem is solve and the solution was XXXXXXXXXX XXXXX XXXXXXXXX XX XXXX


Well, I guess there are allot of people out there that thinks the world revolves around them and everyone else is just here to serve their needs..



.

I agree...I hate that when people do that. So much is taken out of context here that I was afraid to give updates. For fear the help I am getting would dissappear.

Briefly I will say that CJ from Chicago has been working on the issure a bit. he actually spent close to 9 hours in my shop one day a few weeks ago and really went through the machine and than ran some files.

He went back made some changes in software. Still having problems. Yesterday he ran some tests to check for slop in the machine. He does this over the internet...pretty cool really. We have some more testing to do but something isn't right just don't know where it is yet.

I think the obvious has been checked, my files, outta square etc, but it is somewhere else. And it is just a matter of finding it.

CJ is a sales/tech in Chicago and the only person with MultiCam that I have had contact with. He is an incredibly knowledgable stand up guy and greatly appreciated by me for all the work he is putting into my machine to get it running right.

There have also been numerous people on the forum that I have been in contact with on the side and have been great...I am just not going to change any code or things like that as CJ is working on it. I will let you know when I know more but for now that is all folks. Peace, Janey

 

[dan.antes]

Janey still has issues

I have looked at Janey's Enroute files and everything is toolpathed the way I would do it although the feeds and speeds she is using are extremely slow. I re-output her toolpaths to my Flexicam CNC and ran them in solid wood in way less than half the time she was having them run out on her machine in sign foam.. I am now convinced she has controller issues and not anything related to her Enroute or toolpath strategies. I do think she is starting to get the attention she DESERVES from the techs from the manufacturer but after five weeks of ownership these issues should have been resolved already. Janey is an extremely tallented lady and I think we will see some spectacular work from her once she gets all of the bugs worked out.
Janey is going to send me some sign foam and the exact tooling that she is running. We are going to run the same project on our two machines with the exact feeds and speeds and see how the two compare in actual execution time and cut quality. I think this may be the only way she knows what to expect from a machine as far as surface finish etc since she has never had any CNC experience prior to this purchase.
I will report back once we have run our head to head test of her Multicam 3000 and my Flexicam Stealth. I hope I am not disappointed but I really do not expect to be since my machine is several levels above her in price range, spindle power, and accel/decell rates. Also I dropped almost $20k more than she did on her system. This test will not occur until the end of next week. Unfortunately my shop got struck by lightning on Wednesday evening and fried a great deal of the electronics in my machines. Flexicam is currently rebuilding my controller CPU and will be FedExing it back to me today. Tomorrow I will have a phone call from their tech that will walk me through the reinstall and configuration of the new CPU. My CNC will have been down for a total of 48 hours due to this catastrophe. I wish my other machines could be repaired as quickly. Flexicam has dropped everything to get me back up and running. Can't say enough about how responsive and supportive they have always been. I hope Janey can develop as good of a relationship with her machine manufacturer.

I will post an update on Janey's case as soon as I get to speak to her again. She is overhwelmed with orders (lucky girl) and with the distraction from the issues from the CNC she may not be responding her herself for a little while.

 

[BobM]

Grampa-Dan, could you stop by 1,600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

Welcome from Cape Cod.

 

[iSign]

CJ is a sales/tech in Chicago and the only person with MultiCam that I have had contact with. He is an incredibly knowledgable stand up guy and greatly appreciated by me for all the work he is putting into my machine to get it running right.

I just noticed these new developments & thought this was great news. That's the Multicam I'm familiar with, so I guess it's easy for me to say "better late than never" ...but of course it's true anyway... just sucks that MC's level of attention seems to have been so late in coming. I hope it solves everything though.

Janey is an extremely tallented lady and I think we will see some spectacular work from her once she gets all of the bugs worked out.
Janey is going to send me some sign foam and the exact tooling that she is running. We are going to run the same project on our two machines with the exact feeds and speeds and see how the two compare in actual execution time and cut quality. I think this may be the only way she knows what to expect from a machine as far as surface finish etc since she has never had any CNC experience prior to this purchase.
I will report back once we have run our head to head test of her Multicam 3000 and my Flexicam Stealth.

I would be happy to run an HDU file on my 3000 series MC, using Enroute 4. Let me know if that will help with trouble shooting Janey.

 

[Janey]

First I want to say thank you to all my fans, my family…okay I am kidding around. But I do want to thank all of you that offered to help and went out of your way to offer assistance. It is truly appreciated.

As I had mentioned before CJ from Chicago was really trying to find the issue but had limitations due to time and lack of testing equipment. Certainly not for lack of interest as CJ was really into it up to his elbows trying to figure the thing out. But time and cost of material waste started to become our issue and we wanted resolve.

So we called Multicam Texas (last Wednesday) and left a couple messages with the higher ups and within a few hours had a return call from them and followed quickly by one of the techs in Texas. We sent pictures and files and the tech started with some ideas for a fix but looking at our machine history, Shaun (Texas tech) quickly decided that they just needed to send someone to our shop to work on the router.

Monday afternoon Russell from Texas arrived and brought a Chicago protégé. After frustration of testing with their rather expensive laser and numerous accuracy tests it was difficult to find error in the machine. The test cuts did not confirm with the accuracy of the test equipment. So it was bit frustrating for everyone. But he kept working on it and finally got it resolved.

I asked Russell (I like to call him god) to recap what he did so I can share it with all of you. Basically, there were three main items corrected. One - There was up to .004 error in the Z and there was compensation made for that to correct error. Two – There was an issue with the calibration of the tools that was corrected. And three - acceleration in the vertex was adjusted. Vertex is where angles meet and tool path changes direction. There were several other tweaks made and the machine is really running nice.

One thing that I learned in this process is most people just cut stuff out with their router and dead flat bottom finishing is a rare request of these machines. Multicam has the capability to do the job. But it may take an extraordinary and experienced tech to optimize the machine, tooling, and cutting strategy to get satisfactory results.

 

[Gino]

I like happy endings.

 

[grampa dan]

I'm glad to hear that things are finally getting worked out with Janey's machine. Hopefully it will serve her well for many years as it should. I look forward to seeing some of the stuff you are now doing with your router. Have you mastered textures yet Janey??

-grampa dan

 

[Janey]

Have you mastered textures yet Janey??

-grampa dan

I moved on from textures...and to bas reliefs. working on both those right now as I write this. Hope you are well...send me what you want metal coated...we have the time. Peace, Janey

 

[JFitzgerald]

Hooray!

I just read the whole thread and I was hoping it would have a good ending!