Three questions regarding the Haas

Machine Shop HAAS
#1

I am considering the DSM Haas mill for a project. A brief, description is a pressure chamber out of 2.25" aluminum rod. The chamber will be hollowed out and a plug will be milled out of same stock to insert into the chamber. The plug will have an o-ring channel. Now to secure the plug, my second choice is to bore a hole behind the o-ring thru the chamber and plug for a cotter pin. My prefered method would be to cut threads behind the o-ring in the male plug to screw into the chamber.

Questions:

  1. can the DMS Haas cut threads?
  2. when is the next 2 day training for the Haas?
  3. what is the best CAD s/w to create a design in that will be loaded into the Haas’ CAM?

Bonus question:
Is it better to create my design in mm or inches?

Thank you for your thorough answers.

Mike

#2

When I worked overseas, they always complained about how backward we Americans were using inches. When I saw this poster, got a copy for my office.

Actually, most CAD systems can convert back and forth instantly. If you will be using this things for calculations, use metric, much easier.

3 Likes
#3

Ok, good questions.

1.) Can the HAAS cut threads - yes, of course it can. Proper tooling and tool paths, it must certainly can. You’ve listed the the stock size, but not the desired thread size. Depending on that you might find a tap off that size and then open the door for things like rigid tapping or the use of our floating collets. So it depends on many more factors.

Personally never tapped in rye HAAS, and I remember the was previously an issue with it that might be resolved with our new software.

2.) next class - that’s a million dollar question right now that we are soon to have an answer for. Soon as we have the new class worked out it will get posted so be on the lookout here and on the calendar. It likely will fill fast.

Estimate: maybe two weeks from now.

3.) Software - at this point you have three options for CAD as we are setup for HSM on the HAAS: Fusion 360, Inventor 2016 (or higher), or Solidworks. All of these have HSM built in. Side note there - it is possible to use other CAD programs, but the CAM has to be HSM. So you could import your CAD into HSMworks and be fine. I don’t remember if we have a license of that thing on the jump server.

Bonus: mm is for girls… Lol… No no, like David said it doesn’t actually matter with today’s software UNLESS you are working with very tight tolerenances. Then I would personally go with mm… I’m sure you’ll be fine in either direction.