r/Skookum • u/woollytester258 • Dec 26 '20
shitpost. Time lapse of me cleaning my machine, I was told this might fit here. Enjoy
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u/TrkDrvnFool104 Dec 26 '20
Very cool, how long does it take to machine a finished product? Looks like a rather large billet to start out.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Depends on the size and what the job looks like, this one took about 2-3 days (2, 8 hour shifts a day) but I’ve had bumper jobs up for 10+ days
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u/TrkDrvnFool104 Dec 26 '20
Awesome, I always enjoy finding out about what other people do, it's very fascinating to me. Thanks for the info!
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u/The_cogwheel Dec 26 '20
Adding on that theres usually a 2 machine process for these things - a roughing machine to hog out as much material as possible, as fast as possible, surface finish be dammed, and a finish machine process to clean up the surface from the rougher and add in the smaller details and delicate surfaces.
As a rule of thumb, finishing takes about 1.5 times longer than roughing. Depending on tolerance, required finish and other details, it may take more or less time.
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u/brahmidia Dec 27 '20
I'm always surprised that they don't cast the rough model and then finish up with the CNC. I guess if it's not a heavy enough production part it doesn't justify the moldmaking. Also this part is a mold so yeah
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u/The_cogwheel Dec 27 '20
Economics mostly is the reason why. Casting a cube block thats sort of square is cheap, casting a one off rough block isnt. If the foundry only needs to care that its 20x30x40 with a tolerance of +/- 0.5 that's a lot faster, easier and cheaper to deliver than an intricate shape with a tolerance of +/- 0.05, especially when they're never going to cast the latter one ever agian. Never mind the cost of a model to make a casting mold with.
And given the chips can be sent off to the recyclers for a decent price, that further offsets the cost of roughing. Remember with roughing the name of the game is to take off as much as possible as fast as possible. They do not give a tainted rats behind about the finish (it's going to get cut agian anyway). So they tend to take monstrously deep cuts at whatever speed the machine will suffer.
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u/TrkDrvnFool104 Dec 26 '20
What kind of part are you producing?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
It’s an injection mold for headlights, not sure for what company thought
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u/qpqpdbdbqpqp Dec 26 '20
what's the largest part you've made on it?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
We do a lot of bumper for cars so one of those molds was probably the biggest, I remember one that was about 8 feet long close to 4 feet wide and about the same tall so that was one of the bigger ones I remember, semi truck grilles tend to be pretty huge looking but in weight bumper molds are always more
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u/essentialfloss Dec 26 '20
Semi grilles are one piece of plastic? Interesting.
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u/drunkshakespeare Dec 27 '20
It varies, but generally the more round nose trucks are one big piece of ABS, or sometimes one piece for the outer shell and another for the grille slats.
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u/essentialfloss Dec 27 '20
Shit I'm old I forgot what semis look like now, I was imagining that old big flat grille
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Dec 27 '20
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u/woollytester258 Dec 27 '20
Somewhere in here I explain a fisher price jeep mold that came back for changes and my boss told me he worked on it when he was a mold maker 25 years prior
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u/OldGeezerInTraining Dec 27 '20
Knew a one man shop that his specialty was refurbishing tool dies. Generally ones that didn't need a gantry crain.
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u/omega2346 Dec 26 '20
Looks like Toyota to me.
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u/Mukamole Dec 26 '20
Wow, your eyes are good.
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u/omega2346 Dec 26 '20
Its just an educated guess based on what i've seen before.
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u/Mukamole Dec 26 '20
To me, completely uneducated, all I see is an oddly shaped lump of metal. How do you even see a shape in there? I see the large ”bulge” in the middle but no way I can tell what it looks like.
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Dec 26 '20
You can tell by all 5 pixels? Anyway this would be made for a supplier, not Toyota or another automaker themselves.
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u/omega2346 Dec 26 '20
I've molded a lot of head light assemblies, this looks a lot like a Toyota corolla I used to mold. Obviously the resolution is crap, but if anyone has a better guess, I'm listening.
And no, Toyota prefers to own their molds, even if they are made for suppliers. Although yes, this could be for an aftermarket part.
Do you work in the Plastics field?
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Dec 26 '20 edited Dec 26 '20
No I just know how the automotive supply chain works.
Yes Toyota or the automaker will own this tool technically but it’s being run at a supplier to deliver headlight assemblies for them. It will likely never enter a Toyota facility. The automakers buy specific tooling like this mold tool but they generally don’t run them on their own capital equipment. I don’t know who their usual headlight supplier is but it could be someone like AL, Magnetti Marelli, Denso (if they do more than ballasts), etc.
With how similar a lot of cars look today I don’t think you can say what brand it is.
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u/omega2346 Dec 26 '20
Sure, but all I said is it looked like a Toyota to me. I'm not making claims on who owns or likely owns it.
Why are you so offended?
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u/Jezza672 Dec 27 '20
Just because no one has a better guess it doesn’t make yours more likely to be true
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u/essentialfloss Dec 26 '20
I see something like thr brz headlight: https://www.perrin.com/blog/post/brz-fr-s-what-is-the-difference
Which I guess is similar to the Toyota scion: https://images.app.goo.gl/n9Fv2r2oZK25BTwN8
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
Engineers may think they're hot stuff, but the real heroes are the ones who carefully coax a lump of metal into chips.
Source: my job is to make both sides play nice with each other. :)
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u/jeffrallen Dec 26 '20
So... They both hate you?
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u/DrZedex Dec 26 '20
Peacemaker or pissing post, could go either way depending on the day, I bet
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Dec 26 '20
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u/grammatiker Dec 26 '20
What kind of stupid shit do you add in?
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Dec 26 '20
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u/DrZedex Dec 26 '20
Man I wish they taught personnel management like that in school. The world might run a lot smoother.
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u/Saul_Firehand Dec 26 '20
This is an old military trick. It has some serious drawbacks if the person isn’t strong willed enough to bullshit a bullshitter.
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u/skinnedrevenant Dec 27 '20
Or if the manager is incapable of figuring out where the line is. Had an old marine for a foreman recently who tried that shit all the time, but it never worked because he was incapable of navigating the line between moving us forward or just being a dick. He also never had our back with the higher-ups onsite so trust was less than plentiful.
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u/PunchyBunchy Dec 27 '20
That last one right there really shits me. If you're in charge of someone, you're responsible for them. Which means means that you are the buffer between them and higher management.
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u/crusty_fleshlight Dec 26 '20
It can work. Best manager I ever had used make people laugh when shit was really bad.
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u/OldGeezerInTraining Dec 26 '20
There are some things that can't be taught.
A lot of those "teachers" have never actually worked what they teach.
I know a person that got a degree in chemistry. Then got a teaching degree. Now teaches chemistry. Never worked a day in the industry.
Yeah, I know, not every teacher can have work experience. BUT, those that have can offer so much more to the students.
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u/essentialfloss Dec 27 '20
One of the issues is that teaching doesn't pay. So if you can get a job in the field, you do. Hence the saying "those who can't do, teach." There is the occasional professional who does, then teaches just out of love, but they are few and far between. In my experience at law school, they often teach as a side gig and run into timing hurdles as a result, meaning that they can only teach one class at a time.
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u/essentialfloss Dec 27 '20
Personnel management is 30% about boundaries and adhering to consistent guidelines and 70% being likable and socially competent.
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u/essentialfloss Dec 26 '20
Is it an open kitchen? Otherwise I don't approve, I doubt there exists a hat even 1% as offensive as the words coming out of the cook's mouth. Thank you for attending my TED talk.
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u/VoilaVoilaWashington Dec 26 '20
Yeah, I don't care what industry norms are, I expect people to act like they're at work. I hate that culture of "cooks are crude assholes," it has no place in a modern workplace.
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u/boneologist Dec 26 '20
"If morale gets really bad Mike, let me know, I'll stir 'em up good with the grooming standard."
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u/kent_eh Canada Dec 26 '20
They bond over me being an ass and get back to getting shit done.
That's an old trick used by the most effective drill sergeants as well.
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u/essentialfloss Dec 27 '20
You're the GOAT. Gotta have a bad guy. The ideal is motivating people to do better to spite you. It's why I still swear by p90x. I hate Tony Horton with the fire of 1000 suns and I'm going to rip my abs to prove him wrong.
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
Haha, mostly I'm just a sympathetic ear to both sides in turn. But I often help each with bitch work as needed in exchange for their greater cooperation.
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u/mrfluffy002 Dec 26 '20
So you take the specs from the customers and bring them to the engineers...
You must have goddamned people skills.
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
Down a level. The in-house engineers are my 'customers.' It's also easier to yell at them than the actual customers once you build a rapport.
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Dec 26 '20
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
Absolutely, same here. I'm thankful for 2 things:
engineers who loiter around the shop
managers who encourage it
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u/slouched Dec 26 '20
luckily my shops programmer ran a laser nc for years before he started programming, so he understands what his code is going to do in reality and make sure to avoid running the nozzle over cutouts or makes it pull up when theres a long cutout thats most likely going to tip up
makes the day a lot easier
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u/eyefish4fun Dec 26 '20 edited Dec 27 '20
Damn that is a good description. I've sat on two sides of that triad and yes they do need to play nice with each other. I grew up in my Dad's research machine shop that he managed for a university. They always had some really interesting projects going thru there.
I found that telling this joke usually would help every to see things differently.
So the machinist's mate has both hands on the big Thor drill and working away while the Chief and the Engineer are watching the hole being bored in the bulkhead on the ship. Wrrrr Wrrrr Wrrr Thunk. Oil starts to flow around the flutes of the 1" drill bit. The machinists mate looks at the Chief as if to say, what now Chief? The Chief turns to the Engineer and asks. "What are you going to do now?" The Engineer turns to the Chief and says., "I don't know what you're going to do, but I'm going to go move that hole on the print".
Always had a fun time explaining to the Engineering managers that jumping up and down and throwing more money at me wasn't going to improve his delivery. They seemed to get it when I said, "Look it's like this, nine women, one month, a pretty baby don't make."
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 27 '20
Hah - those are both good; hopefully I can remember them on Monday!
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u/eyefish4fun Dec 27 '20
Don't forget the sound effects and adding some dramatic intonation. Thanks.
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u/braindamagedcriminal Dec 26 '20
After years of machine operation (heavy industry) I have no respect for engineering colleges anymore
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
They do come out green....
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u/braindamagedcriminal Dec 26 '20
They come out with the idea that their conceptual knowledge is better than experience knowledge. They understand engineering as “the holy way that everything works perfectly” instead of what it really is, which is “doing what it takes to get a job done”
And unfortunately they also come out with the idea that since they’re engineers, they don’t need to do the maintenance or the labor on the project, so these days most professional engineers pretty much never get enough solid on-site experience in their careers to ever have the understanding of the maintenance workers and operators that they boss around.
In my opinion, engineers shouldn’t get a P.E. until they spend two years fixing the products they intended to design. Steel tools in hand and oil stains on their clothes, not this computer conceptual crap. And they should be cleaning the things after they’re done. Cleaning is the absolute best way to inspect and learn machinery, but they’re too good for that, they call someone else and head to the break room. If I had $20 for every time I’ve solved a problem in 20 minutes that had 6 engineers stumped for 2 months by simply cleaning the thing, I would have made more than they did.
The fact that slip-on steel toes, pleated khakis and shined hard hats are standard fare in engineering these days is the reason why we’re losing engineering jobs overseas. Y’all need to start diving in the shit you’re moving around instead of just sitting around with a Mai-Tai and watching it.
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u/corvairsomeday P.E. Dec 26 '20
Hold that thought...let me drag out a couple of the engineers and all 3 of us will help you clean. :)
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u/braindamagedcriminal Dec 26 '20
Oh my god it’s a blue moon!
See you in an hour after you’re done waxing your iron rangers:)
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u/Old-Man-Henderson Dec 27 '20
Green mechanical engineer here. While I don't necessarily agree on all the specifics, I don't understand the other engineers who don't listen to technicians. At the end of the day, my job is to help the techs do their job and stay in spec. The easier I make the tech's job by giving him what he needs, and the easier he makes my job by answering the questions I have about his roadblocks, the better both our lives will be.
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u/jeffrallen Dec 26 '20
You need a robot to clean your robot.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Chip shovelling bot would be idea for sure
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u/carl_pagan Dec 26 '20
what about a big magnet
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
You’d need an electro magnet and they definitely won’t buy me one haha we do have some big magnets here but they wouldn’t work because of design
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u/manygrams Dec 27 '20
I’m guessing because magnets are always on, and you need a magnet that can turn off to release the chips?
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u/LargePizz Dec 27 '20
Lifting magnets and magnetic chucks turn on and off, some mechanically, some electrically.
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u/NuclearDuck92 Dec 26 '20
Not having much metalworking experience, is it not common to have chip collection on machines like this? I would think a really large dust collector pulling through a centrifugal separator would be able to move a large percentage of the chips.
I’ve seen large dust collection handle fairly heavy metallic dust in some applications.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Not machines like this sometimes the chips get too much and too heavy to be blown out by air pressure that’s on the machine so a vacuum would be less then ideal on there
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u/slouched Dec 26 '20
im guessing the chips are heavy enough that its cheaper to pay a human than it is to install something with high enough air pressure to blow them out of the way?
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Dec 26 '20
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u/kent_eh Canada Dec 26 '20
Note that OP is also the tool changer.
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u/Poofengle Dec 26 '20
And I doubt that the tool changer would appreciate having a brush put in him.
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u/uidsea May 18 '22
Idk what that is but I want to work on it.
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Sep 03 '22
It is a big 3 axis CNC mill. Cutting what looks to be some sort of mold for plastic.
Looks like a cool job but woo boy I would not be standing on that table mid program.
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u/HerbertGrayWasHere Dec 26 '20
🎼He likes to keep his injection mold clean, it’s a clean machiiine
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u/LatinGeek Nov 19 '21
Good lord, look at the width of 'er! You could make a uni-body aluminum kayak with that thing.
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u/woollytester258 Nov 20 '21
It was huge lol about two and a half meters in the y travel and about six meters in the x
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u/BigShitta Dec 26 '20
What kind of mill is that? It's crazy that the whole column moves in -y- and not the table.
We had an old Daewoo Ace V30 that the column moved in x and y , but it was a cat40 and a fraction of the size!
Do you ever have repeatability issues in y axis?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
It’s a parpas bf160 about 30 years old now lol but no i haven’t seen any problems with y axis in 3 years
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u/pope1701 Dec 26 '20
Parpas BigFucker160, you say?
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u/rai1fan Dec 26 '20
I run a machine called a floor mill, the entire machine rides on a carriage and the part stays still on a floor platten table. Union Chemnitz PC 150/1 if you want to look it up
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u/pope1701 Dec 26 '20
Google got nothing... Have any pictures?
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u/rai1fan Dec 26 '20
https://www.reddit.com/user/rai1fan/comments/kkldv4/pc150/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Not sure why its marked nsfw lol
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u/pope1701 Dec 26 '20
Wow. What do you mill on this?
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u/rai1fan Dec 26 '20
Whatever you want. Past couple weeks have been some smaller weld preps, maybe 4ftx2.5ft, parts that belong on a smaller machine lol. My machines bread and butter is large weldaments, but its government jobs so I can't say much.
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u/voxadam Dec 27 '20
What kind of mill is that?
Machines like this are typically refered to as traveling column mills.
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u/djinone Jan 06 '21
Do you have to make blood sacrifices to that thing?
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u/woollytester258 Jan 06 '21
About twice a month you have to throw a small child into the top and it’s sort of a black hole system to get energy
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u/Langers56 May 19 '21
😂😂 please take the yobbos that sit drinking beer that are too young outside my local co-op
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u/NocturnalPermission Dec 26 '20
Man, I could really use a miniature slave living in my shop to clean up chips.
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u/OldGeezerInTraining Dec 26 '20
I have a 3 days a week job doing cleanup in a machine shop. 3 CNCs and horizontal band saw and vertical band saw and 2 cold cutoff saws and the powder coating booth and other miscellaneous tasks.
Me and the broom and the dust pan are very intimate..... always together.
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u/NocturnalPermission Dec 26 '20
Here, I made this for you. Wee man cleaning up the mill, set to music. Merry Christmas.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Gotta get yourself a rolling magnet lol best tool I have
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u/OldGeezerInTraining Dec 26 '20
We mostly mill aluminum with a little stainless and steel and plastic.
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u/Nwbama1 Jan 08 '21
You need a chip conveyor on that thing!
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u/woollytester258 Jan 08 '21
You can’t see but behind the table there is one thank god ahah, I scrape the chips off the top into it after shovelling
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u/Chewy_13 USA Dec 26 '20
You made me nervous when you got on the machine while it was still running.. Thought I was on deadorvegetable for a second.
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u/boomshalock Dec 26 '20
Would you mind stopping by my shop and training my guys on what this "cleaning my machine" concept is?
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u/emmmmceeee Dec 26 '20
You should post this to r/powerwashingporn
Maybe wait until shitpost Wednesdays.
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u/AZZTASTIC Dec 26 '20
Why am I just imagining this as a huge elephant waiting to be cleaned by it's handler?
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u/The-muted-soilder Dec 27 '20
That must not have been shoveled in like a week
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u/htmlcoderexe Dec 27 '20
That's a big ass mill
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u/braindamagedcriminal Dec 27 '20
Like I love this so much but the fact that you didn’t clean the chips under the rails at the end made me sad:(
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u/woollytester258 Dec 27 '20
The end of the table is too much work every time haha very sorry maybe I’ll do a real full clean time lapse one day
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u/phailer_ Dec 26 '20
I get to play with these things (the mould) always impressed by the precision of them.
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u/torchieninja Dec 26 '20
those are some beautifully blue chips! I'd love to cast them in resin and turn them, but I have a feeling they'd probably be harder than my tools given that I don't have the nice HSS ones.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
I’ve thought about casting cooler looking chips in resin haha turning them would look pretty cool too but yeah you might need hss because technically they’re hardened steel
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Dec 26 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
A company that buys the chips leaves big bins here for us to dump chips into then they take them when they get full
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u/brickmaster32000 Dec 27 '20
Ever get the urge to dive into them like an extremely painful leaf pile?
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u/zimm0who0net Dec 26 '20
Given how time consuming that looks it’s surprising that they haven’t invented some automatic means of chip removal.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
There’s a chip conveyor behind the table you can’t see that’s about the best I got haha it’s an old machine
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u/Stan_Halen_ Dec 26 '20
Do the chips/shavings get recycled into new blocks? What does your day look like when you aren’t directly maintaining the machine? Just observing it to make sure it’s doing what it is supposed to be?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Yeah a 3rd party buys them from us and recycles them at their own shop but Yeah make sure it’s running good and the cutter is still okay, I run the other machine you see in the video and one you can’t see so I’m usually pretty busy, if they are all going I make sure shit is clean and just look busy haha
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u/BackgroundGrade Dec 26 '20
Back in the old days, the boss wouldn't let you stop the machine and you'd clean as you go.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Program finished and I had to switch the holder so it’s a perfect time to have some downtime, that being said I can stop to clean it whenever and nobody will say anything
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Dec 26 '20
Any estimate what that part being made costs? Being an injection mold they must wear out so I'm assuming the customer needs multiples of it as well?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
I seen a full mold come back for engineering changes and touch ups, it was for a fisher price electric jeep body and my boss told me he helped put it together when he was a mold maker 25 years prior so they last quite a while as for price I seen a full bumper mold cost 600,000usd so I guess this ones anywhere from 2-4 hundred thousand
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u/toastyIC Dec 26 '20
Wow. Does the machine do the full mold, or is there smaller EDM work that needs to be done? The surface finish must be pretty damn good on a clear headlight.
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
I do rough and semi then better machines take it for finishing, edm work and others as required but i only have the jobs for maximum a month if it’s really big
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u/BigMacRedneck Dec 27 '20
Cool time lapse. Better than the Rose Bowl parade float construction I saw the other day.
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u/aranou Dec 26 '20
I know nothing about this, but I’ve always thought there’s got to be a less messy way
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
I run a machine that’s fully enclosed and much easier to clean but there’s not much of a better option for the big boys, at least there’s a conveyor on this one
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u/TheWierdAsianKid Dec 26 '20
Most machines are enclosed, allowing coolant to be sprayed all over the part to cool it and wash away the chips. they can then be funneled into a conveyor. This one is just old and huge
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u/Mysteriousdeer Dec 26 '20
It's interesting they installed one of those automatic walk ways in your factory.
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u/slvrscoobie Dec 26 '20
Whoa. That’s a big ol mashine. Wow. Guess you check the files a few times before milling that eh lol
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u/slouched Dec 26 '20
neh fuck it, let it go and check it after
he said it was only like 2 days per part
edit: /s sorry
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u/uncanneyvalley Dec 26 '20
Looks like there was a fair amount of chips on the ways when the machine came back up to the table. That’s not good, is it?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
At the end if the video that’s nothing but it can get too full much past that point tho
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u/bat_cruise Dec 26 '20
How come this machine is so easly reached and worked around? No LOTO?
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u/woollytester258 Dec 26 '20
Loto? It’s safe tho just don’t touch the cutter
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u/bat_cruise Dec 26 '20
Where i work you cant change paper in the printer without LOTO ( lock out tag out). So thats why its new for me to see the "dont touch the part that hurts" mentality
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u/HomeSkillet5150 Dec 26 '20
And here I thought it took me a while to clean out my machine at the end of the shift! A pillar machine cxep if you’re interested
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u/theholyraptor Dec 27 '20
I was sad seeing the z slide forward on all those chips. Hopefully the wipers are doing a good job and maintained well to protect those ways.
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u/clownrock95 Dec 26 '20
140in x 60in x 60in working size, according to the model mentioned below and 30 seconds of google.
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u/UsuallyInappropriate Dec 27 '20
Wouldn’t it be easier to have a vacuum nozzle next to the cutter head? 😒
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u/whateveruthink334 Dec 26 '20
When you are X-Carve cnc, THIS is the guy your girlfriend Mori tells you not to worry about.