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Took me 8 hours to figure out a tool offset issue on a Haas VF-2

Everyone says tool setting is the easiest part, but I spent a whole shift chasing a 0.015 inch height error. Turns out the probe was loose by a hair and I redid my offsets 5 times before checking that. Has anyone else spent way too long on something that should have been simple?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_lee1mo ago

Probing issues are the worst time sucks in this trade. @simonp76 nailed it with the cleaning tip, coolant gunk gets ya every time. Always start with the dumbest possible cause first.

danielnelson1mo ago

Dumbest possible cause first" is basically my entire troubleshooting philosophy at this point. Half the time I'll spend an hour tearing down a machine only to find a chip the size of a grain of sand sitting on a contact. Makes you feel real smart when you finally spot it, like a genius detective who just figured out the murder weapon was a plastic spoon. At least the alcohol trick works, I've started keeping a little spray bottle of it on my cart like it's holy water for CNC demons.

simonp761mo ago

Blew a whole Saturday last year on a similar thing. Ended up being a half thou of coolant gunk under the probe tip holder. Cleaned it with a shop rag and a lick of alcohol and everything was dead nuts after that. Also started using a test indicator to check the probe repeatability at the start of every job now. Takes two minutes and saves me from chasing ghosts.