Big day at Parallax: Haas SR-100 CNC Router arrived!

Ken Gracey

Hey all,

This is the machine we've been waiting for - a Haas SR-100 CNC Router. This particular tool will be used for manufacturing our solar products, robot bases and custom needs we have for other manufacturing processes (saw templates, for example). The SR-100 has 600 ipm rapid speeds, a vacuum table and an all-around nice design with a user interface that our machinists already know from the milling side of our business. This machine will be contained in its own room so nobody gets in its way during routing. Tools like this are purchased with long-term manufacturing goals in mind.

Haas is mostly known for their CNC milling machines and to my knowledge they are the only American-made CNC machine tools. Thanks to Arnold Schwarznegger for waiving the California sales tax for "green machinery". Considering we live in a self-declared ungovernable state he somehow managed to pass a sensible bill earlier this year. California will shine again!

The arrival of the truck brought several of us out to supervise David on the forklift. He's an awesome dude considering he manages to get the job done with a half-dozen people telling him how to pick up the machine.



David drove it down the street before he entered the Parallax parking lot.



Unpacking it was a project. I saved the tarp for future use as a UPEW sun shade - I imagine it's the only $200 tarp I've ever seen! The reflective mylar material was taken home by one of our staff who's into solar cooking. He should be able to cook a whole pig with this material.



Unpacking of this machine was really exciting, too! But the real task lies ahead tomorrow morning - moving it into the new CNC Router Room. We've got several 1/2" clearances between the roll-up doors and the CNC Router Room. Our crew stayed late to take doors off of hinges, to scout hardware stores for small dollies, and to make final electrical preparations to roll this 2,600 lb tool into its new home.



We hope to park the router by tomorrow and put it to use by next week. I was really proud of our team - they jumped all over this task. Thanks guys!

I'll get some more photos together as soon as possible.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Post Edited (Ken Gracey (Parallax)) : 6/8/2010 5:53:47 AM GMT

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Congrats, Ken! I know how much you've wanted to get one of those. But I don't know which I'm more envious of: the router or the clear skies and shirtsleeve weather! (It's "Junuary" up here in Washington.)

-Phil

Roy Eltham

That looks like an awesome machine. I'm hoping I might be able to see that new toy in operation during UPEW.

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Shawn Lowe

HAAS are awesome machines! A company I used to work for bought a 4 or maybe 5 axis CNC from them. Fun to watch in action! Technology rules!!

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Shawn Lowe


When all else fails.....procrastinate!

bill190

Before applying main power, get out your multimeter and personally double check the main electrical connections to be sure they are correct!

I've seen outlets and wiring for things like this·installed wrong, then the equipment electronics gets fried!

In one case I saw, there was a new $10,000.00 computer room tape drive being installed and it had a 30 amp plug, but there was no 30 amp outlet at that location. So a new tech - instead of calling an electrician to install the proper outlet - replaced the plug with a 15 amp plug. And·when doing this,·wired a hot wire to ground and the ground wire to a hot. Then this tape drive was connected to a couple of mini computers via data cables (and ground)...

So when plugged in, zap! About $30,000.00 worth of equipment fried...

People get "insulted" when I pull out my multimeter to double check these connections, but I don't care,·I do it anyway...
·

Ken Gracey

@bill190 - I couldn't agree more. The power supply system on the back of the router looks like enough to run a nuclear power plant.

The way it works with Haas is that they do the install and setup, including electrical connection. They also want to move the machines into position, but our crew is doing that without them today (we don't want them pushing the router across our floors).

We bought four 1,000-lb dollies from Harbor Freight for this job. Within the first 10 feet of rolling all four of them had exploded their bearings. Made in China. Total Smile. What are we doing moving an expensive router with such cheap dollies anyway? Nothing like stopping a crew of six guys so we can go to Lowes and get some of their Chinese dollies. . . I don't even think we can find some Made in the USA dollies locally.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

eod_punk

Very nice machine, so whats going to be the first project with it?

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There is no problem that can't be solved with a suitable amount of explosives!

EOD Memorial

Ken Gracey

@eod_punk: the first project is to internalize the manufacturing of our 20W Solar Panel Kit. At present the polycarbonate is routed outside of Parallax. This is a low-volume kit, but it provides the ideal manufacturing process for learning how to use the vacuum table and fixture processes required for this particular machine. At the same time we'll be shaking down the new air cyclone mounted outside of the building. It will take some time to set up the venting, dampers and air flow out of the room. Once we get beyond this point we'll use it to build a smaller solar kit for the Boe-Bot.

After these two products are underway this machine should pretty much take on a life of its own at Parallax as new products find their way to the router table. Any mechanical items we build would simply compliment the electronics business, our main priority.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

schill

Why did you need the dollies? Couldn't you have just used a few sheets of plywood and a couple thousand BOE Bots? A prop chip and XBee for each one, a simple remote control, and you'd have been all set. Just drive it into place.

Ravenkallen

So you had four 1,000 lb capacity dollies for a total theoretical capacity of 4,000 lbs, if you spread the weight out evenly, And the dang things broke with something that was nearly half of the total capacity, a piece of junk indeed. You can't find American made stuff for the life of you. I would pay more and buy American then save some change and buy Smile from china. Looking forward to more cool products....Keep up the good work.

Ken Gracey

Exactly as Ravenkallen described it. We couldn't find American-made dollies. You should have seen the bearings pop out of these things.

What burns me the most is the energy our team spends dealing with inferior dollies. If I factor in their stalled time and opportunity cost in our production department then those $40 dollies now cost a thousand bucks.

I'll make a special trip back to Harbor Freight to return these dollies, burning another hour. I look forward to letting the manager know that they only meet about half of their rated load. Probably won't make a difference.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Oldbitcollector (Jeff)

Harbor Freight

Surely Ken you knew the limited quality of Harbor Freight tools..
Didn't we just have that discussion last month??! [noparse];)[/noparse]

OBC

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Ken Gracey

OBC - Lowe's also had only Chinese dollies.

And I didn't buy them from Harbor Freight - one of my staff did to save us some money. When I sent him out I said "no cheap Smile".

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Tiger

Ken - That kind of dolly would be a bad idea even if it was made in the USA. Simply the wrong tool for the job. You need to rent four real machinery dollies. If you want to own them, you can call McMaster. Almost all equipment places rent them. If you REALLY have to do this the hard way, buy four inexpensive floor jacks. At least they can handle the weight and are pretty easy to keep going in the right direction. Go SLOW no matter what you use!

...Tiger

HollyMinkowski

OMG, that thing is huge!
Must have cost a fortune.

I love to shop at Harbor Freight, but I don't think
I'd trust something as heavy and expensive as this
to a Harbor Freight dolly.... a Harbor Freight plastic tarp
might be OK to use as a cover for it

mctrivia

You must be describing something other then what i think you are when you talk about dollies. I am thinking of a floor jack that lifts up skids. smallest i have seen is 2000kg

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Chris_D

Dollies are fine for moving machinery, as long as they are rated for the load.· We use them at our company (we build machine tools) to move the machines into the loading dock area.· The last machine we moved with them weighed about 30,000 pounds. We put two dollies on one end of the machine and used a fork lift to lift the other end and pushed the machine into the dock area.·

I can post a picture of them if it will help



Chris

Chris_D

Attached are two photos, one showing the machinery dolly, the other showing the machine that was moved with it.· The machine is a high-precision ID/OD grinder capable of .00002" accuracy - yes, that is 20 millionths of an inch.



Opps, I named the photographs incorrectly

Oldbitcollector (Jeff)

Holy Parallax goats!, that's a DOLLY! That thing looks like you could move a tank with it!

A big difference from what is pictured on Harbor Freight's website for 1000lbs dolly.

Sounds like Parallax was stuck using what they could get. Living in a small town in NE Ohio,
I can completely understand and sympathize.

OBC

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mctrivia

ah. I was thinking of 1 of these:


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Lots of propeller based products in stock at affordable prices.

BradC

Chris_D said...
Attached are two photos, one showing the machinery dolly....

Now that's a real *mans* dolly! Does it come with matching shoes and bag?

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"I mean, if I went around sayin' I was an emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me they'd put me away!"

Ken Gracey

The router was moved with the floor pallet jacks shown by mctrivia. These worked well for the job even though we didn't have machine dollies. It's in position now and being hooked up.

Now we will install the cyclone outside.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Ken Gracey

The router was moved with the floor pallet jacks shown by mctrivia. These worked well for the job even though we didn't have machine dollies. It's in position now and being hooked up.

Now we will install the cyclone outside.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Ken Gracey

The router was moved with the floor pallet jacks shown by mctrivia. These worked well for the job even though we didn't have machine dollies. It's in position now and being hooked up.

Now we will install the cyclone outside.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

John R.

Ken;

Will you be installing the cyclone outside now that the router is in position and being hooked up?

(stupid reference to triplicate posts by Ken...)

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John R.
Click here to see my Nomad Build Log

Ken Gracey

Hey John,

it's almost funny so I'll just leave my posts in tact. Learning how to use an IPad right now.

Now, back to that cyclone! The way things are going I'll probably get sucked up by that machine before the end of the day.

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Ken Gracey
Parallax Inc.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/ParallaxKen for some insider news.

Martin Hodge

Here's a video of what happened to Ken just moments ago. (not really [noparse];)[/noparse]

HollyMinkowski

@Chris_D

That thing looks like a roller skate for King Kong

Chris_D

Yes, King Kong would have some fun with those things ;-)

Ken's job of moving any of his machines would be much easier too !

Interestingly, we also have an air lift system which uses air bags that are placed under the machine.· These work like a hover craft and allow us to float the machine around.· Our system isn't rated with enough load capacity to move the big machine in the photo, but it works good for our smaller machines.

Chris

Tiger

Hey... All this is starting to sound confusing so lets sort out our tools. The toy from Harbor Freight was definitely a furniture dolly (intended to move things like file cabinets or maybe a desk - definitely not machines). What was really called for here is what is normally called a "machinery skate" )sometimes referred to as a machinery dolly). You can see these at McMaster Carr: http://www.mcmaster.com/#machine-skates/=7grwtv You can almost move your house with these. They are seriously heavy duty! Now the thing that the guys finally used is not a dolly at all. It's a pallet jack (pictured by mctrivia). Finally, the thing I suggested as the choice of last resort was a floor jack (used to jack up cars). Floor jacks are less than elegant, but they are very inexpensive, easy to steer, and can all handle a lot of weight. I'd guess that the pallet jacks worked out really well. That's what I use to move my CNC's into place after unloading with a forklift. Most pallet jacks are rated at two to three tons and they have nice big wheels and good bearings. Good choice for sure if you have that option.

So now I'm waiting to see this rig in its final resting place with lights flashing and chips flying. This is going to be an awesome addition to the Parallax bag of tricks. Did Ken mention that they are also getting a laser? Another totally cool tool! It must be Christmas in California. Congratulations on all the new goodies guys!

Waiting for more pictures and video! ...Tiger

RichK

Found another model. http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200381643_200381643 20 ton, could move a house. Lesser models for as little as 50 bucks. Northern Tool is a better quality Harbor Freight. If you keep getting equipment in like this, you may need to get a set, or hire some bigger guys to work in manufacturing. The fork lift looked pretty stressed too, must have been like driving with power steering. Hang those bigger guys off the back to hold it down.

Congratulations Ken. Between this and the other equipment you've laid in lately, better times look to be ahead or are they just on-going. Well, at least until CA breaks off and falls into the ocean from all that equipment. Now I hold my breath waiting for the price increases.