F.T.A.O Milling machine peple

[Woody.v8]

Has anyone any opinions of this machine?
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/221955440071?ssPageName=STRK:MESINDXX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1436.l2648

Is it the right money? Will I be able to use it bearing in mind that I have NEVER used a cnc mill, I do have hundreds of hours of experience with a manual mill.
Cheers all.

Edit: I spelt people wrong in the title but cant seem to edit

 

[brightspark]

Be GREAT IF U HAVE 3 PHASE AND A HELL OF A L;OT OF WORK FOR IT TO DO and a crane to lift it

 

[Woody.v8]

Be GREAT IF U HAVE 3 PHASE AND A HELL OF A L;OT OF WORK FOR IT TO DO and a crane to lift it

I have all of the above so we be reet

 

[Spark plug]

Depending on its condition wear etc, dosent look too bad. It uses a standard control system so there's plenty of books etc out there regarding programming.

I think the biggest issue with them is the electronics if they go wrong.

 

[Chris Stevens]

Someone I know has 3 of them. If its good mechanically but control side dodgy, then it can all be replaced with new Chinese, for less than the cost of one board. Maybe though Ebay isnt the best place to buy something like a CNC mill, for the simple reason you might well be buying an overpriced piece of junk?

 

[awemawson]

Absolutely excellent solid machines, and the Heidenhain control is surprisingly good for it's age. Only problem with that particular one is that it has a TNC150 controller, which cannot 'drip feed' longer programs into it from a PC. It can load from PC but only up to it's maximum storage, whereas the TNC151b could do that on the fly, so as it's internal program was run, more could be put in on a continuous cycle. This is important when you use a CAD/CAM package to generate code which will be very large. In their day most stuff was manually keyed at the console so much smaller.

I had an Interact with the TNC151b for many years and loved it. Sadly it fell off the lorry when I moved some years back. It didn't half make a dent in the tarmac

 

[agrimog]

tnc150 controller, glitchy, very very small memory, drives are glitchy as hell, spindle doesnt have the speed, or power to fully utilise cnc, a second generation cnc machine that would make a good boat anchor, there are cheap chinese hoby mills out there that are 100% more capable than this, and if your not familiar with "g" code programming, and posting it to heidenhain, code, look, smile, and walk away

 

[ukracer]

tnc150 controller, glitchy, very very small memory, drives are glitchy as hell, spindle doesnt have the speed, or power to fully utilise cnc, a second generation cnc machine that would make a good boat anchor, there are cheap chinese hoby mills out there that are 100% more capable than this, and if your not familiar with "g" code programming, and posting it to heidenhain, code, look, smile, and walk away

Got any links to the cheap Chinese hobby mills mate? ?

 

[awemawson]

tnc150 controller, glitchy, very very small memory, drives are glitchy as hell, spindle doesnt have the speed, or power to fully utilise cnc, a second generation cnc machine that would make a good boat anchor, there are cheap chinese hoby mills out there that are 100% more capable than this, and if your not familiar with "g" code programming, and posting it to heidenhain, code, look, smile, and walk away

Quite contrary to my experience

The Heidenhain controllers can be switch from Heidenhan Conversational code to G code by altering one parameter and there is even an overlay for the keyboard that labels up the keys appropriately that fixes with inbuilt magnets.

If the drives are glitchy they need new brushes or the Bosch servo card tuning.

 

[agrimog]

awemawson, I made my living in a shop that ran several different cnc mills, interacts, boss controllers, and ****zuma generics, everyone had the same problems, there all getting on towards 30+years old, the electronics, if you can call them that, are shagged, unless you are willing to rip the whole lot out, and update with new more stable power supplies and drivers, you'll just get more and more faults, and unless you know the systems, its a fortune to get someone out, yes the components are pennies on the old cards, but do you know which diode, or triac has gone , and on which card, plus remember most of these older machines are built on a base structure of an ordinary manual mill, this interact being a series 2 bridgeport base!, get onto the web and start looking, google hoby cnc mill, theres plenty out there.

 

[awemawson]

My first NC machine was a Moog Hydrapoint 1000 - a hydraulically positioned machine based on a beefed up Bridgeport.It had a 24 station tool carousel. That was replaced by an Interact with a TNC151b control that worked reliably for several years until I moved, and it failed to survive falling of the back of a lorry, neither did the road, there is still a pothole where it landed. It had been an excellent machine but I missed the tool carousel.

My current CNC mill is a Beaver Partsmaster with a 16 station carousel that uses a Heidenhain TNC 355, which for all practical purposes is the same as the TNC 150 series. I've added a 4th axis using a Niken rotary to which I've added a servo motor from an Interact and am using the ex Interact Bosch servo control card. They all work extremely well together. The only problem I've had with it is that the monitor failed. I replaced it with an LCD panel, but then found the odd few minutes to fix the original, which I now keep as a spare.

I suppose I have the advantage of understanding and being familiar with the electronics, but in all honesty I've had zero problems with it other than the monitor. If they are looked after properly, the back up batteries changed annually, and given a reasonably 'clean' electrical supply there is no reason why they should not be reliable.

 

[Shox Dr]

Last time I was at Slideway services. They were on with reconditioning 14 Interacts, from the RAF. Total strip and rebuild.

 

[MrFluffy]

Quite happy with my interact, do have linuxcnc + new large steppers retrofitted on it though. I might chop it in one day but only to get something with a int40 spindle and a toolchanger with carousel and maybe a enclosure with some other bits and bobs. I paid a LOT less than that too because I bought a mill with no electronics expressely to retrofit more modern stuff on it. I think this one is overpriced at 3.5k unless its something special though unless you need it for something right away, and you will crash it a few times learning things and getting your cam toolchain etc sorted out unless you plan to write raw gcode by hand, in which case you will crash it when you make a fat fingered typo in the code instead

Agrimog, calling it a series bridgeport is quite a bit of a stretch, if you compare a manual bridgeport vs a rigid ram BOSS interact, only the column and knee layout is similar as it has a rigid head casting and can't nod or incline the head (hence rigid ram) so they are a lot more ridgid aorund the spindle support and I've had mine up to 2500rpm in a moment of madness. They have automatic oilers, positively lubed ball screws out the factory and other things, the only real pain is the amount of travel in the quill before you have to move the knee and making sure you touch off appropriately to keep things in the range of the limited z travel during cnc operation if your doing a lot of 3d work on a new job.
Also the interact1 mk2 (like that one in the auction) is a monster in comparison to a interact1 mk1 (what I have) at almost double the weight and the extra mass has gone into beefing up the rigidity of the machine. I too would like to see a link for a hobby cnc mill that matched it...
3.5k though, think id go for a beaver if I had that much to spend...

 

[Woody.v8]

Its cheaper now! it would perhaps come for £2200-£2500 with a cheeky best offer?
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Bridgepor...cal-Milling-Machine-Heidenhain-/221982976453?

 

[Rocketman]

I'd advise go for a old Hurco if you can get one for a reasonable price in the UK. The on-board software is pretty easy to use, like basic CAD. You can do like 2 1/2D work on the on-board old software. Quite sort after machines though.

Something like this
http://www.ebay.com/itm/HURCO-KM-3P-3-Axis-CNC-Vertical-Mill-Ultimax-Control-/221677272887

 

[Woody.v8]

I have been watching this but i think it may be beyond my skillset to repair
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/172072387177?ssPageName=STRK:MESINDXX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1436.l2649

 

[MrFluffy]

Its cheaper now! it would perhaps come for £2200-£2500 with a cheeky best offer?
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Bridgepor...cal-Milling-Machine-Heidenhain-/221982976453?

To give you a guideline, thats still over double what I paid for mine, and while I did get a bare of electronics machine this was deliberate by choice (came with 20 qc30 toolholders, 3 massive new steppers and a lot of other stuff though) and also it was the variant that originally can only move one axis at a time (can't do co-ordinated simultaneous multi axis moves in the control) so was a perfect candidate for a control retrofit and was genuinely in a college therefore was sat unused most of the time while students trained on stuff that could move in a modern way. End result, its very very unworn. It also came with 20 qc30 toolholders, a fair amount of them brand new chinese ones in the packets which just needed a fettle on the surface grinder to get the flange thickness right to make them useable, and some massive steppers new in the box. The guy selling effectively gave me the mill itself for the cost of the bits and bobs it came with.
In truth I dont know the current going rate for a interact, but Id wince at dropping 2.5k on one personally.

 

[awemawson]

A good working clean Interact with a TNC151b or TNC155 or TNC2500 is easily worth £2K5. It'll make money for someone all day long or give a hobbyist years of fun. An old clumper with a TNC145 and worn ways is worth less than scrap due to the cost of moving it.