Good day to the hive! I need a little help with my soft jaws for holding this piece when flipping over for op2. I had cut a pair of soft jaws and everything was going fine until my 1/2" 3FL end mill was on the 2D contour towards the bottom right side walking around the part. The part pulled up and I snapped my tool. I checked everything out, setup a new tool but this time I decided to go with a smaller tool and less woc/doc and my jaw was no good because the part started to lift in the same area.
What strategies are you all using for work holding on the 7M?
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@TroyGomez are you cutting a negative of the part in your jaws? How much clarence, gap between the jaws do you have when you cut them? What toque are you tightening the vice?
When you cut the jaws put a 1/8 peace fo stock between your soft jaws and toque to 45 foot pounds. Put the part in and toque it to 45# and cut the part.
I hope this helps.
Did you get the answer you needed in the FaceBook group page? Part # 31640
I never did see a part number but someone did mention they would get the number when they returned from the holiday vacation time. I also called Mitee Bite yesterday and was given the part number. I also decided to try something a little bit different. In F360 I edited my sketch shifting the jaws a bit to where the right side of the part has an open area. The jaws are 1/2" apart and I machined another smaller piece of stock to 1/2" x .66 tall that will sit on my parallels to provide the clamping force that is needed. I ran a trial run on the trashed piece and it seems to be holding fine.
Thanks again for the input and part numbers. Now I just need to find a vendor for the clamps.
I was the one that was going to get back with you. You can buy the clamps from MSC, but if you are only doing one to complete the tutorials, it will set you back about $100 for 4 clamps. We will make about 90 2nd op 7M runs per year minimum, so the fixture was a cost savings and provided my students with an alternate clamping method. Here is the part number in MSC. https://www.mscdirect.com/product/details/35250257
Stephen,
Thanks again for the information. I just finished the top side and began my setup for op2 for the bottom. I’m a bit confused at this point because it looks like my WCS is off when it isn’t.
On the top side I drilled one hole all the way thru the bottom so I could reference that machined hole for the bottom probe. I chose “selected point” and selected the top left hole which went all of the way thru. The first operation for the bottom I am trying to perform a 2D contour to cut away the hat but it looks like my tool (.5 3FL em) is cutting above the part. if I eye this up it looks like its .23 off.
I moved my material away from the spindle and entered G0Z0 in the MDI and my Z height looks good. Also in Fusion 360 I have my heights set to Stock top and the bottom height is set to Model top since there is stock needing to be cut away. What am I doing wrong at this point? I don’t mind paying someone for their time to instruct me on this because I am confused as to whats going on.
Thanks! I’m leaving things alone for the time being until I can find out what my issue is because I truly do not wish to scrap another 4.5 inches of material lol. If you can help send me a message on FB and I’ll post my number there then let me know how to pay you.
When I CAM the 2nd Op, I set my WCS to a hole for XY and the top of the fixture (or bottom of model) for WCS Z. I make sure I add .230 stock to top of model, so when I run a contour or facing operation it knows how much it needs to take off when processing the cutting paths.
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I guess I was confused because for my heights I am setting stock top since .23 needs to come off and the bottom would be model top but this didn’t work. So once I set my z I need to compensate my z height .230? I’ll do this and try with an empty spindle.
I only have a little experience with a desktop cnc machine when i was making my own pcb’s. I never had to flip parts over so this is all new to me. I’m assuming the software still knows about the stock being there but maybe this assumption is wrong and its beginning to look that way. I never could understand this and this is what’s holding me up the most because it feels like I’m having to guess a lot when flipping a part. I’ve been in the internet service provider business for 30 years and developing software and when we assume, bad things happen. I cannot stand guess work. I’m a visual type of person and learn quick but when I have nothing to go off of or a mentor where I can ask questions without being slammed its much harder on this end.
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There is a choice in setup stock tab to select remaining stock from previous setup. It is just as easy to duplicate the stock sized you used in the first operation, just swap the bottom value to the top and zero out the stock at bottom of model. I have used both, the first one, using select remaining stock gives you a more realistic simulation.
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That’s exactly what I did for the bottom setup. I put the .23 on the Z positive and 0 for Z-. I think I understand now having to manually add the .23 to my Z offset. Like I said I thought F360 knew this .23 has to come off but after manually adding it got me where I needed to be. Thanks again!
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