I have been working as a machine operator for 10 years. Anyone who has never crashed a machine is either lying or working too slowly.

I work in a 50,000 sf building. I'm way up front in the office and our 2 Mori Seikis are at the complete opposite end - as far away as you can get from the offices. One day, one crashed so loud I heard it all the way up front. We have insurance for that. Donnie - your advice is spot on. Many of our machinists expect us to train them 100% but 1) our other machinists are not the best trainers and 2) OJT is slow when the priority is efficiency. I tell them they are welcome to any manual for any machine they want. In order to succeed in this industry you have to be willing to put in the effort, sometimes on your own time.

It's amazing to see how much, working for titan, has changed Donnie.

Early on in my career I was learning how to setup a Hurco, long story short I entered a .005 tool height adjustment in the wrong page, rapided the spindle straight down into the vise. Fortunately I was running plastic parts which absorbed all the impact but I learned a very valuable lesson that day about what I think I knew vs. what I know.

I would love to see a series where you go over breakdowns and what the cause was and how to avoid them.

As a retired manufacturing engineer who’s core of excellence was Swiss turning and multi-spindle screw machines I wholeheartedly agree with your advice. I mentored a number of people who are successful now in their own right. I how have my own VMC in my small shop and will spend the rest of my life learning how to do it better. ALWAYS KEEP LEARNING!

Having been a machinist for 30+ years now, and now managing a machine shop boy have I made my share of mistakes. Yes I've beat myself up over those challenge. Just like you Donnie, if one learns from those mistakes that's when you grow the most.

Just started at my new job programming and running a huuuuge Doosan VCF850LSR without knowing Doosan or the Fanuc controll. Fingers crossed boys

Always be kind to people who have done nothing to deserve otherwise, that's my motto.

I always told interns and young engineers to get a little black book and jot down observations and practical tips. I am a naval architect and marine engineer. Early on I was told propeller shafts, rudder stocks, and rudder pintles should always use acme threads to prevent cross-threading and because of the loads. 25 years later I walked up to a rudder stock sitting in the lathe. I happened to look at the drawing and found it was to be machined to a standard fine thread. Luckily the error was caught before the threads were cut. I also told the interns to watch people working. I told them to see how people worked, dressed, and conducted themselves in and out of meetings, how they spoke, and how they listened. I told them to try to emulate the good characteristics and to try not to pick up the bad.

As a pilot, you have to 'think ahead of the aircraft' because things can happen fast if you are not prepared or have not accomplished a checklist. I almost think CNCing is more complicated in some ways, as you MUST provide every instruction to the machine and that tends to be in a fairly rigid format. You REALLY have to think ahead in every aspect of CNC, to prevent bad things from happening. When something bad happens, it happens fast and is too late.

Great advice. Stay humble, keep the great attitude and pay it forward is the way to go in my book. And as always much love and gratitude. ❤💥

Wow.... Chocked full of positivity! Every trade needs a spokesperson like you and the others. Titan himself is the reason I began watching this channel. Super smart and humble at the same time.

Speaking of avoiding crashes in general good simulation and dry running can save you a lot of grief. It does take time but so does getting a spindle realigned. Also single block and turning the rapid override down on the first piece.

Holy heck I needed this.Worst crash ever yesterday, knuckled the x button while intending to rapid out in z. BONK! If I am looking for a job on Monday, I will definitely call people who are human. Love bro!

Cool Donnie! Big fan of your videos! Keep em coming!

I once broke a 1/8 HSS endmill. The shop I was at never financially recovered. We didnt even get pizza for christmas. And it didn't feel much like a family after that.

Great advice Donnie, I’m currently 25 years old and have been machining for 8, doing CNC for about 3-4, I am absolutely obsessed with it! So much so it actually annoys some managers and some older machinists for “showing them up” not my words lol. Knowledge is the most powerful tool in this industry! And taking chances when you can.

I've definitely burned bridges. I left a cushy shop I was the shift lead for because the CEO hired temps just to fire them 2 months later in a preplanned move. I had a new job and gave my 3 week notice within 2 weeks of it happening. So yeah, I still have that attitude most skilled machinists (not operators) have, and that ego, that knowledge that you could get a job in less than a week if you loosened your standards for pay, conditions, and location just a bit, and I've even walked out of places before without a notice because of usual shop BS. It's par for the course. The place I used to work at was about equal with Titan's shop in terms of techniques and modern fixturing and programming, and I set up and ran these old varaxises that were what I still believe to be the perfect machines. Leaving wasn't easy, but my ego convinced me that other shops were on that level AND had better overhead. Well, I work at an old fashioned shop now. Programs could be better as I could, and have fat fingered better ones on the control. I'm getting manual hours in too for the first time in about 10 years. The overhead is small, and they don't run recycled coolant there. The 3 axis has about .005 of spindle runout and it can't be stoned out, I tried. You know what? Despite the daily heat strokes? I think this is one of the best career moves I've made because sometimes you need to go back to basics and use your full toolkit on those so you don't end up an old, arrogant, and dated button pusher with the world's rustiest set of mental tools.

My physics professor's favorite words of encouragement: "Free Body Diagram!" the pins apply centripetal force only at the bottom of the tombstone. The centrifugal force is applied as if at the center of mass. The moment arm between the two forces results in torque and instead of sliding, it leans.

Every time my little lathe switches the turret I panic haha! Because there is no stopping it until it reaches the spot its headed to haha! I feel you bro haha!

I just crashed a machine recently and now you guys keep reminding me of it by uploading all those crash videos. xD

This video was super encouraging, I love it. I'll never forget my first crash. Haas VF-4, one of the senior guys wrote something in MDI, and I didn't think to check what I was doing when I went back to the main program. I was about a month in, and was still getting to know the machine. Well, it tried to send the tip of a 1.25" insert drill about 5 inches into a piece of titanium at full rapid. Luckily, it only broke the drive belts, which the boss made me replace. I learned a lot at that job.

ive almost done this when i first started but i smacked the E stop before it tipped over too far

Awesome story Donnie!

I'm not a machinist but did take some machining classes in HS. Thoroughly enjoy watching your videos and seeing the amazing work you all do. Thank you for sharing.

at my first job i ran a horizontal milling/grinding machine. One day the pump that provided pressure for the clamps failed and the spindle smacked down into it. the oil based coolant combusted and the machine went up in fire. the machine was down for weeks and i spent a ton of time helping other departments fix and improve the machine. i even had my program idea implemented.

Things I learned working with CNC for 19 years: Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer. Paranoia and OCD is not only an occupational diseases of a CNC machinist but actually a job requirement. Think ahead of the machine, check and double check everything - that's the only way to stay in the profession.

I've yet to crash a machine properly, but I have smashed a probe housing. Doing a Boss probing cycle on a large sleeve for some quarrying machinery, and the part was clamped down the centre of the bore, so I had to start high and come down about 100mm to get to the surface I wanted to probe off of. Long story short, I miscalculated the height and the body of the probe hit the top of the sleeve and smashed it. About £3000 for a new one. Where I work there are 2 Haas VF9s next to each other, whilst I was working one, I heard an unholy noise from the other machine, turns out the other operator had accidentally reset the Z value for the workpiece and had buried a 90deg Chamfer tool half way into the job.

Recently I finally got to use one of my new TSC drill bits. I was proofing the program. Ran the first two tools using 5% rapid and walked the tools in. I figured I can go ahead and just run the program at 100% for the rest of it. The next tool was the dill. It rapid straight into my part. I was cutting some aluminum so it made it through but ran the tool holder into the part. Freaked me out. I went back to look at my program. It was good to go. Then I realized that I had never set my tool offset for this tool. My mistake big time. Learned my lesson. I will never just trust that any program is good to go.

It is a fine line between too much caution and being reckless, both mean wasting money. I feel being paranoid brings security, looking at the machine and before starting what you intend to do, think about what could go wrong and mitigate the risks you found. If you take it a little slower with your new machine, you can get used to it without damage, but get into routines and habits. Then you can keep repeating the routine, getting faster and faster but safely.

Donnie if your not trying your not crashing 😂😂😂

Saludos desde Argentina .. muy buenos videos.. espero poder ver mas.. hacen cosas increibles

😂I seen this happen on a Mitsubishi. Had 2 four inch tombstones on it and they wanted to speed up the pallet change. Turned it up but got scared mid pallet change and hit e stop. Both tombstones fell in machine😂. This was 1993. I agree with you and pass as much knowledge as I can. help the new guys carry on the trade. Stay positive

In life, in work don't waste your time. Work the job, don't let the job work you. These guys have invested the time to be exceptional.

That intro made me think, what if you made a few different bowling balls and see how they work. Bowling balls have offset weights inside, so a steel core and aluminum shell/exterior might maybe work. At least it would be a cool challenge to make a bowling ball that can curve.

You were lucky. I’d worked at a job where I thought I was well respected, and could claim a record of no serious machine crashes in a 30yr career with nearly 20 with cnc machines. One programming error that tore the tool out of the spindle and caused 60k damage- and I was out the door 20 minutes later…….

Everyone in this trade produces Sparks and colision noises at the begining , absolutely everyone and If Not so :"maybe You are afraid of proving yourself and your machining skills,in that Case You are in the wrong bussiness,I believe that mistakes make the best pros as Long You dont do everytime the Same mistakes" "Nobody Said IT IS easy and If IT was easy everybody could do IT,how boring would that be ?"❤

For the first part of my career I worked at a production shop so and I didn’t do any setups so the only crash I’ve had in the industry was on an old Mori Seiki. We had these really long skinny parts so we had to face them off and flip them over and then you could run the rest of the program. Because it was a vacuum fixture and it was a hassle to take the gasket in and out over and over so we would face off a bunch of stock then put the gasket back in and just run like normal but the problem was that the machine would alarm out if you called up the tool that was in the spindle. So I finished up the program and had to face more stock off and forgot to start it at the tool change and just hit the button and wham. It buried a tap about a half inch into the fixture. That’s the only crash I’ve had in the industry. I had a few crashes in tech school nothing too major though

I never wrecked my machine center, but have crashed it on rare occasions. It can be unsettling with no closures.

I've done something so similar to you Donny. I was running an old Mori Seiki with a 1500mm pallet. I was trying to get a part to fit into the fixture but it just wasn't working out (I forgot to change out some very useful pins). I decided to swap the pallets, with the intention to get the other pallet running so I could still be working while figuring out this fixture. I forgot to set the pallet back to B0 at the work station... there's suppose to be a safety feature to prevent it from picking the pallet up. It failed. Everything was fine until it went inside the machine and the most god awful rumbling became slamming around. This fixture was at least 10' tall on top of talking up almost all of the 1500mm pallet space. Thankfully, it didn't fall over and cause extra damage it just locked up the entire machine. Maintenace had to cut a hole in the top of the machine to get the crane in there to pick up the pallet and set it correctly. I wish I would've taken some pictures of it but was well too far into panic mode trying to figure out what I did wrong.

Challenging yourself early on is key. I took any problem they threw at me. I changed shops many times and always went for a harder position. 15 years in and I’m very well rounded and making 6 figures.

Dwelling on the moment can be a jugular process, Own up & get bk on never do that again , Titan 750k sooon BOOM

My first day on a CNC lathe (about two months ago) I crashed the turret right into the probe. took that sucket out. thankfully only a $2500 mistake including having a millwright come out.

For sure more stories. But this had photos which was great!

Thats interesting I didn't realise you could do a slow or fast pallet chnage. I run a Matsurra HP630 horizonta and it uses M61. I did manage to topple a pallet duting a pallet chnage...we had two rather tall pallets and if you forget to remove the eye bolt that is used to lift them in and out..........yep, they are slight too tall to clear the top of the opening durng said pallet change. We had to cut a hole in the roof of the machine so we could get out overhead crane in............ A bit of sheetmetal damage but hey, thats what hammers are for right? 🙂

Anyone who's worked in CNC long enough has crashed something in some way or another. With the main work in my area being manufacturing it made total sense that I got a degree in Basic Machinist Technology. After graduation though, I ended up in the powdered metal secondaries field instead. Fast forward 22 years and I'm now shift lead and setup in the secondaries department. My very first solo lathe setup I forgot to turn the rapid down and wham-o! Sent the tool full speed into an about 1000 RPM 3 jaw....That sounded expensive! And it was, but thankfully not as bad as I thought it would be. Department head just kinda chuckled and said "welcome to the club" I've piled my share of shit up since then but that's the one that always sticks with me. I thought for sure I was fired

Tech School training ,Work in a job shop & move around in shop & aline yourself with the top guys.Also changing a Job if you're not leaning will give you confidence and experience in trade..

i slamed threading tool into the chuck doing lefty threads on a conventional lathe.

A couple of weeks ago while setting up my machine for a new job I opened up the movable jaw on the vice to adjust for the new part and left it sticking out so I can clean the vice. Any way I told the machine to g28 x axis in rapid with out even looking at the table moving, the next thing I heard behind me was the vice catching the door and ripping it of the rail and bending the side sheet metal encloser 🤦🏼‍♂️🤦🏼‍♂️🤦🏼‍♂️

I never worked for anyone more than 3 years until I went to work for machine builders. I love projects after the project is done I may hang out a little bit but I'm so out of there. Machine builders get new projects every few weeks every project is more grandiose than the ones before. Imagine something like a lathe based machining center with 4 tool changers and a boring bar tool changer with hydraulics servos and backup pads that adjust with the cut so you can bore shapes and hold five microns. We built that twenty years ago. You're imagining God what company in America has that machine not one it went to China. There are machines that make parts here in America that are so productive there really is no operator for instance across America there are powertrain facilities turning out crankshafts at a rate of 2400 crankshaft in a 24-hour period everyday that's each facility and if a facility has four production lines that means 9600 parts in 24 hours Most operations on a crankshaft happened in under a minute and a half on less than thirty machines almost exclusively without human intervention. So that leads to these multi-acre facilities they only employ 20 or 30 people. Yes it takes many many more outside support people within a given industry still just a handful of people most of which are striving to be the very best in the industry otherwise you're out of a job very quickly. When I think back people used to tell me I was the baddest machinist fabricator computer guy around it scares me when I see what Donnie is doing seems so far beyond anything I can imagine I just grew up with it from day one. When I see what is being done today gives me such hope and Titan like excitement and energy next thing you know I step outside and feel as if everyday of my existence has been a waste time money and effort while being assaulted and insulted by what I consider the most evil dangerous people there are that is the administrative state. Some call it the deep state people that can't seem to be fired people that seem to be accountable to no one that can Levy fines and even Jail people even though they're not elected officials. People that are willing to go to any lengths to justify they're outrageous criminal behaviors. I'm so tired of being lied right to my face about not a few things about everything. And now they have AI where I can't even believe reality is realy happening. And how many people are so completely lost yet so completely sure of themselves completely over running all of us and the worst thing is none of these people are capable of doing a damn thing for themselves yet they are very certain that we are the reason that everything around them is wrong. It's Communism This is America there is no time or place for this Socialist Commie Rot in our society it is destructive to the core and it must be stamped out at all costs. A one thing I love the most about Titan he can relate people at the top all the way to the bottom and back and we can all still thank GOD living his country and for our very lives that can change overnight If we don't pay attention and do our part like we don't already have enough on our plate.

This has less to do with machining and more to do with work ethic in general. Always being open to learning, respect and be curious and know there are others that know more. Then just in general being nice and open to helping others out goes so far in a lot of different industries. Because you have no idea when or where you will run into a specific person again. It might be a future colleague, or a future customer. Mistakes will happen to anyone at some point, that is not an issue, the issue is how those mistakes are handled, because that says a lot more then a mistake never happening. Because at some point it will, even if you are careful in preparations, at some point it will happen something. The best you can be is being prepared for it happening so its easy to fix, and be humble about it.

Ive only had a year in the cnc field, and so far the only time ive crashed a machine (so far) was when I was still on school, machine was in jog, spindle off. I went to go job the z positive off the part instead I fuckin launched the 5 inch face mill into my stock.

Running a huge cat 50 auto die bridge mill. Crashed a 150mm drill one day. Moved the 3 tonne die base 50mm out of position. Luckily, it was on the night shift, so 😂 minimal abuse from others

The pain of smashing a machine is equal to the pain of giving birth🤣

One important thing to realize is if you take a step back and not rush the job you will have error-free results and save more time. I have worked with clumsy people who are just high on adrenaline and fumble continuously and cannot see themselves as I see them. Those people will never succeed. Just slow down.

Everytime Donnie comes on camera, I feel like I have TTM on in the background.

Seen the whole atc get ripped out of a Hass. all 64 tools, the belt, all the slots, the change arm, it was bad. Guy didn't even say anything he just walked out and never came back

Wise words.

The feed rotary potentiometer ( poti is an absolute must for me, since I absolutely abhor rapidfeedrate-button layouts (1-10-50-100% and stuff like that) is absolutely awesome when it is directly coupled to your rapid feedrate :) Makes supervising your approaches and remaining distances very easy compared to always having a fixed rapid feedrate when you open that feedrate-potentiometer just to 1% . Big remaining distance ? Wheeeee, full tilt until you come closer Small remaining distance ? 1% feedrate or blipping it up to 10% and then quickly going down to zero to halting it again to keep up a maximum of safety net and reaction-time, (use 0% to check remaining distances by eyeball, if it looks sketchy, MEASURE IT !!! BETTER INVEST 30 SECONDS FOR A SECURITY DISTANCE/CLEARANCE CHECK THAN INVEST 30K Dollars/Euros IN A REPAIR !!!! ) Last year I destroyed a DMG CTX 2000 TC Beta in less than 2 seconds by being too late to react to my fading and crumpling insert which then pulled out the part from the jaws ( approx. 70kg going at about 450 rpm), made it rotate a few times around my toolholder that was angled at 45°´s , then fall down in front of me on the downward chip-guiding sheetmetal below the door, rebound across the chipchannel and then finally impact on the gliding cover which is over the Z-Axis´s guides (which are close to 5 meters long in this machine) and denting them 0,18mm in X and 0,12 in Y over a length of about 220mms ... 120k € damage all in all , but I learned something valuable out of it : if it looks too kinky/risky to me as a milling-guy (20+ years of Exp), then it it WAY TOO KINKY/RISKY when I´m on a TC (3+ years Exp) :) 15mm clamping depth/height is just not enough when youre faceturning a part with around 75kgs of mass with a Vc of 290m/min, 6mm depth of cut and 0,4mm feed per rev ... especially when there is drill-holes reaching through the whole part and coming to the fore when you faceturn the 2nd side ... those holes LOVE to kill your inserts edges, so make sure your insert is in tiptop shape when starting such actions ;) Greetings from Austria

And to add, never neglect how quickly people will take advantage of you. Unless you hit the employment lottery, your boss is not your friend.

one day my boss says I need a tool out of your carrsel ok I step aside and he calls up the tool and the whole tool changer broke off and hit the table, we bolth just looked at eachother like what the eff

We still have that Kurt vice at dynamic 😂

Funny seeing this today, i just came home after crashing a machine as well 😅. Nothing bad happened tho, just ended up making the fattest chip i ever made.

Good story! Newbies always go overboard trying to impress the boss...... 😊

eyyyy young donnie's in front of an L 32, we got one of those

I did something similar on a makino Donnie we all learn.

Don't think you're too special to do certain jobs. Take on every opportunity afforded to you. I was hired for fixturing, deburring and other overhead for a 6 axis ganrty mill so the machinist could focus on running it. 5 years later I'm training to run it having learned every other 3-4 axis mill in the shop. Be hungry for more and more will come.

Never made a mistake? Never done anything. Just keep your fingers safe. 🙂

So 25,000 in just that sheet metal damage? Someone is obviously gouging the hell out of you

What is the difference between breake things and learn from it or getting fired?

Dude. I hammered a Hermle 5 axis on time… 40k spindle

I really liked the tonne of this video. I like the joking around but some of the "over the top " stuff wears on me. It is a production comment not a comment on anyone in particular. Keep up the good work

Overconfidence is our enemy in this job. The one thing you didn't check..... Goes wrong🤦‍♂️

Well, i really hope that the ceo of this enterprise has a good insurance for any event like this

Thats why i always run with low feedrate first and watch every toolswap. breaking a tool is one thing but destroying a vice or a spindel is really bad. and ANYONE can take those 5min to check if somethings run correctle and thats mandatory. have fun explaining a crash when you say you just pressed cycle start without watching. Everyone fuck up something but learn from it. ask someone else to look over your programm or finished work.

Let's break stuff!! Ray Stormont

Работа мечты😊👍

"I know I don't really need to check up on you anymore, but not only did I hear that all the way to the office, but my chair actually shook too..." Oops 😅

Looks like an OKK HMC400 / SMART SX4000

Misstake was leaving the L32 😉

do none of these mashines have potentiometers? thats what confuses me. when barry crashed the drill, that could have easily been prevented if you just aproached Z0 slowly instead of full rapid... not tryna be a smartass, and of couse i have crashed tools as well, but i would never ever let a freshly measured tool approach a new setup at full rapid

Not the Mrok crash again, it hurts

And your boss has written off the damages like that?

I did the same thing 😂

you are giving us great content on machining...........i have so much confustion about 4 axis trunnion parts that is not in center of rotary 4th axis. what to do then my part is off center from rotary axis?? what and how to take offsets of xy and Z..... we uses nx cam for programming..... programming is not issue ....setup is difficult..... kzfaq.info/get/bejne/jruGg9BosM-6gZ8.html .......we are planning this type of setup but we got confused to ho to take z ooset and xy offsets ......which codes for dynamic offsets in 4th axisgramming is not issue ....setup is difficult

Yes we do 😂😂❤❤🎉

I thought he was still in his teens

чувака уволили сразу

You lie! You remembered all of it

I bet I could crash it WAAAYYYYY worse than that ;) .

😴

CNC…. Christ No Cranks…. Manual machinist make better CNC set up and operators. Also.. you can’t learn a damn thing while your lips are moving.. yours are moving pretty fast.