Thanks for the video! I'm really looking forward to the conversational programming. Like you, I never messed with the MACH 3 wizards. Partly because I always felt doing it via MDI was easier for me than figuring out how those wizards worked. Also I felt that there was less chance of doing something bad. I'm also guilty of just jogging around manually too.

Very cool

Good little controller for jobbing type work. Engraving wizard is an awesome function! If you can do accurate circular pocketing that can be useful too (think you could by setting x & y at pocket limits on the centre line of your circle and setting the correct radius)

Cool video. Looking forward to see PP in action at your open house.

Out of curiosity: how come you didn't use the superfly cutter for doing this face as well?

Two things my friend: 1. We need to buy you a nice 2 or 2.5" face mill! Oxtoolco showed one off a while ago that just ripped through some beefy steel on his Acra (of course, insert choices make all the difference, but it was a neat tool that you would probably love). 2. Boring video, but could you shows us all your tips and tricks for cleaning chips out of your Tormach? Are you running a shopvac? Scooping them out? Magical chip pixies? All the machining videos we watch, and I'm always curious to see if anyone has trickery for cleaning up all the chips!

Hi John Great video. Hope you plan to show all of the Conversational tasks? Question - Could you just enter the Tool diameter into the Tool Window or do you always have to have the Cutting Tool set up in the Tool Library? Cheers Willy

I just made a very short modular Gcode for linuxCNC to make this kind of stuff. Just put the size of the stock and click start.

to square a part you cut the top and then put that cut face against the back jaw. when you put an uncut side against the back jaw you can get out of square. it may work once in a while but it will bite you in the future. I am one of the tool and die maker - cnc programmer with 33 years of experience that I have heard you talk about

The key is that you didnt have to "waste" any time jogging things. Click, set, run, and do something else. That plunge though... I almost got a bit concerned there! I broke my 1/2" rougher a little while ago on a plunge... IMHO, they need a lead in. Say, X start of 0, and lead of -.5 or something, on both X and Y to help keep a smooth entry. Simple and quick tutorial though, and its the right way to show off "smart machining". Doing the least work to get the most results.

I have a question about tool offsets. is it you only have to set them once or do you have to do it for each job prior to running?

What kind of tap did you say, jolt tap 4:43? And stant widget 4:50?

I do the same thing with the keyboard for squaring. I guess its a byproduct that Tormach machines are more approachable like a manual mill than say a Haas machine. I guess the graphic is general, you can put the Superfly or Tormach modular in there and give it a larger stepover. The conversational looks cool, looking forward for a treadmill video! Do you have a Passive or active probe, I'd love to see the new menus. From what I hear they added more options!

I'd have probably done that job full width with the SuperFly in a few passes, but I've also used a rectangular pocketing Python wizard in LinuxCNC to face a part (or level the MDF sacrificial table on the CNC router which is a very tedious job by hand). I've also faced parts by jogging, and by scrolling through a few lines of G code in MDI mode with edits to the values. I like the conversational wizards. I know a lot of machinists like manual machining, but even for the menial stuff like this, I generally prefer CNC wizards to turn the wheels for me. I suppose pre-CNC machinists will often prefer turning the handles themselves, but Tormach's customers are often people with no machining background so they'll learn things the CNC way.

Man, I need that engraving wizard. Serializing parts takes a long time when I have to post the code for every single one.

What's your secret to clamping off center like that without pulling the work out of the jaws with tool pressure?

a little bit easier than the one`s in mach another good quick vid

John, Do you think tormach will sell a standalone version of PathPilot to compete with Mach? I like the look and feel.. thx

Excellent video. I see below that you found out that the diameter needed to be in the offsets. The tools used in a video would be great information to include in the text description for those that may find it interesting. What was your tool diameter in this video, out of curiosity? My main question that I'd really like to know: If I wanted to only face something off in the Y direction (X start = X end = some value that will only take off one layer in the Y direction, is this reasonable for this GUI? Example: I want to take 0.3" off along the Y direction at a depth of cut of 0.1". My Y start is 0 and Y end is 6". So to visualize this, I just want to take off 0.1" at a time, three times, from z = 0 to z = -0.3 going along the y axis, holding X fixed. Is this a reasonable use of this screen or am I hitting a foul ball here? :) (This question could be extended to facing something off in the X direction and holding Y fixed?) Sorry if these are obvious to some. I'm new to CNC and PathPilot is so new, I'd like to make sure I understand it. Thanks!

Try plunge like that in tool steel :D It looks good compared to tipical g-code input but still needs some polishing. Google Siemens Sinumerik, Fanuc Manual Guide. Don't get me wrong for this kind of machine this is great but it is still miles away. Same for Haas, I work on VF2 and conversational mode is waste of money for some serious work. But still this looks better than Haas, at least you can set DOC and Z end compared to Haas that thinks that you can remove 20mm of material in only one pass. And you end up with looping your code for x times for every step down. Conversational my ass

I suspect their software is only available to tormach owners..? They've got some pretty cool tools.

Why wouldn't you just run a face mill operation with the supper fly? It would be just as fast and should give you a better surface finish.