[stridharn]

Hello fellow Haas operators,

On our company, we've encountered a huge problem. Our VF-7 is "eating" spindles, we're on our fourth one right now.

All three have crashed over a six month period.

We've come to the conclusion that it must be something with the cooling of the spindle. Any thoughts about that?

It's always been when we're running a long program, at rather high spindle speeds.


We really love our Haas machines, and we really want to come up with a solution to keep running long programs in our machine. So please, help me figure out what's wrong.

P.S The spindles have all been changed by Haas themselves, we've never touched the spindle ourselves.

Cheers,
Tim

[Machiner1]

We had a VF5/50 cook a spindle the say way. running wide open for about 7 hrs without the coolant pump running. Haas cools thier spindles with the same coolant you use to cool the tooling. The coolant that comes out of the nozzle in the machine has come from the pump, circulated around the spindle, and then out of the nozzle. If you are not running your collant pump during a long High RPM program, you are not circulating any coolant around the spindle. Pretty Stupid design, because much of todays high speed tooling prefers air over coolant. Run the coolant and point the nozzle away from your work if need be, just make sure you are moving hot coolant out of the spindle head and circulating new cooant into it.

[stridharn]

Thanks for the feedback, i'll present this info to My boss on monday. Once again, thank you!

[CNC MI]

Adding to what Machiner1 replied with....instead of just running the coolant and pointing it away from your work, what we've done is install a bypass valve and run flexible braided stainless steel line (ice-maker line found at any home improvement store) from there back to the coolant pump...basically making a closed loop system. You can use the same bolts that hold the sheet metal on the spindle cover to secure the "ice-maker line" with tubing clamps. With this type of method all you have to do is throw the valve one way or the other and you're good to go with either the regular flood coolant system or the new and improved "bypass" system. Good luck to you.

[leix_99]

If you are not running your collant pump during a long High RPM program, you are not circulating any coolant around the spindle.

Seriously?

[CNC MI]

Correct. However, their spindles are actually cooled in 3 ways. In addition to being cooled by system coolant, the spindles are also cooled by circulating oil through the spindle and a heat exchanger, and further cooled by a vortex of air fed by a strategically placed fan.

[Huggorm]

seem to be many people who have problems with haas solution with cooked spindles
I think the only thing to do is to put external cooling.

[The Swede]

It always been when we´re running a long program, at rather high spindle speeds

How long time and what rpm ? Is this some special highspeed soindle ?

Seems strange that a spindle would cook just because of no circulating cooling. With other normal spindles circulating cooling is added to reduce thermal growth in Z but not to prevent cooking. But perhaps the spindles are not the best part on a Haas

Anyway if coolant on is a must someone should definetely have informed about this at installation. It´s nothing a customer should have to look up in manuals or find out on this forum

[leix_99]

How long time and what rpm ? Is this some special highspeed soindle ?

Seems strange that a spindle would cook just because of no circulating cooling. With other normal spindles circulating cooling is added to reduce thermal growth in Z but not to prevent cooking. But perhaps the spindles are not the best part on a Haas

Anyway if coolant on is a must someone should definetely have informed about this at installation. It´s nothing a customer should have to look up in manuals or find out on this forum

Totaly agree, anyway, that's a serious enough machine, i just can't figure out such a bad engineering decision...

[underthetire]

Wasn't the refrigerated spindle cooler an option? I seem to remember haas charging extra for that, although I don't know why you sell a 10krpm machine without one.

[stridharn]

Adding to what Machiner1 replied with....instead of just running the coolant and pointing it away from your work, what we've done is install a bypass valve and run flexible braided stainless steel line (ice-maker line found at any home improvement store) from there back to the coolant pump...basically making a closed loop system. You can use the same bolts that hold the sheet metal on the spindle cover to secure the "ice-maker line" with tubing clamps. With this type of method all you have to do is throw the valve one way or the other and you're good to go with either the regular flood coolant system or the new and improved "bypass" system. Good luck to you.

That's an awesome idea, any way you can perhaps sketch / snap a picture of it? It'd be pretty amazing to make a bypass system like that!

[Ydna]

The thing with Haas spindles and the coolant circulating is something of a blue herring I think. It's true that they use the coolant to diffuse some heat but I think it's hard to say whether or not that's the sole cause for any actual problems.

Reason I say this is because the smaller vertical mills don't use the cooling jacket (minimills, toolroom mills, possibly the DT machines). They only use the oil/mist lubrication and the aforementioned fan. I have a 2008 superminimill that's been running at 10Krpm for years so without the coolant playing a part as it does with the larger machines. The same goes for the shops I've worked that had production machines cutting dry since the day they were installed. Eventually something breaks on any machine used in production but in those cases it wasn't the spindle smoking itself from regular use.

I just think there might be more variables going on beside for the cooling jacket being to blame. Unfortunately there's no real way to know for sure from us guys on the internets...having said that, if it were my machine I would absolutely hook up a coolant circulating bypass hose like he mentioned above, but I think it's more of an insurance measure.

Thoughts?

[Machiner1]

It is true that Haas does use other methods to cool the spindle, and claim to have improved on this over the years, but I think the bottom line is this, The larger (50taper) mills that seem to have issues with overheating spindles, probably werent designed for 12 hr runs at 7k rpm. They arent the most expensive machines out there, so we take what we can get out of them, and for what they cost they are pretty hardcore. In my oppinion, Haas took a long time to get up to speed with decent coolant systems anyway. Our new ST-20 is the first Haas lathe I've ever seen with a good coolant tank.

[leix_99]

It is true that Haas does use other methods to cool the spindle, and claim to have improved on this over the years, but I think the bottom line is this, The larger (50taper) mills that seem to have issues with overheating spindles, probably werent designed for 12 hr runs at 7k rpm. They arent the most expensive machines out there, so we take what we can get out of them, and for what they cost they are pretty hardcore. In my oppinion, Haas took a long time to get up to speed with decent coolant systems anyway. Our new ST-20 is the first Haas lathe I've ever seen with a good coolant tank.

IMHO it's not that hard for a $150.000+ machine to include a safety system that triggers an alarm or something when spindle is overheating, haas has great products with an affordable price tag, however, this just feels wrong.

[The Swede]

Would anyone know if the VM-machine models that are supposed to be used long time at high rpm has some kind of warning for overheating spindle ?

Otherwise Haas looks a bit hazard for mould works

Would be interesting to know if Stridharns VF7 is with 40- or 50-taper and with what spindle ? Also as written earlier how long time and at what rpm the spindle was running when cooking ?

[haastec]

Hello fellow Haas operators,

On our company, we've encountered a huge problem. Our VF-7 is "eating" spindles, we're on our fourth one right now.

All three have crashed over a six month period.

We've come to the conclusion that it must be something with the cooling of the spindle. Any thoughts about that?

It's always been when we're running a long program, at rather high spindle speeds.


We really love our Haas machines, and we really want to come up with a solution to keep running long programs in our machine. So please, help me figure out what's wrong.

P.S The spindles have all been changed by Haas themselves, we've never touched the spindle ourselves.

Cheers,
Tim

You stated that all three spindles have "Crashed" over a 6 month period and have all been changed by Haas service. I have some questions.

1. By "Crash", what do you mean? To me, that means a collision of some sort. If it is a collision, then that is the problem. If not a collision, then read on.

2. Since Haas is replacing the spindles, what have the service techs indicated as a possible problem?

3. Since Haas replaced the spindles, are they being replaced under the machine or replacement part warranty?

4. Specifically, what has been done so far to troubleshoot the problem?

5. Has the spindle air/oil system been tested?

Many replies have discussed running the coolant and/or returning the coolant back to the tank. (All good ideas) However, you have not indicated if you are using the coolant during the cutting procedure or not.


Much more information is required to help you out.

[Machiner1]

Haastec is right, we dont have all the details, and as far as Haas machines and mold making, they do offer High Speed Mold VMCs that are designed for these long, High RPM jobs. I just dont think that their 30HP 50taper Gearbox spindle was designed for it. At least not everyday.

[stridharn]

It's not a crash, it's due to overheating.

We've had a Haas-service guy here for a few days now, there's something wrong with the machine itself apparently, the lubrication system had a huge flaw in it.

[stridharn]

Note: I sent this email to HAAS USA.

"Hello, we're planning on doing a rather long run in one of our haas machines, it's a vf-7 2011. We're looking at a spindle speed of 6900rpm and a feedrate of about 3000. We've heard from a toolsalesman that we should really use coolant, if not on the tool, just running the pump. He said that otherwise we would ruin the spindle via overheating, is this true? Please, get back to me on this one. Will we damage the spindle if we don't use coolant, or not? Runtime of the program would be about 5 hours."

I got this answer:

"Hi Tim.

This is not true. The spindle cools down with the air and oil lubricating system that is being sent by the lube pump assembly. If you need any more information let me know.

Thanks.
Sal Martinez.
Service Engineer.
Hass Automation inc.
Office: 1-805-278-1800 x7165"



After all of this is over, we're finally getting a 10K RPM "Classed" spindle that -MIGHT- be able to keep up with our production.



All in all, cooling is a big issue on the Haas 50-taper spindles.

[stridharn]

You stated that all three spindles have "Crashed" over a 6 month period and have all been changed by Haas service. I have some questions.

1. By "Crash", what do you mean? To me, that means a collision of some sort. If it is a collision, then that is the problem. If not a collision, then read on.

2. Since Haas is replacing the spindles, what have the service techs indicated as a possible problem?

3. Since Haas replaced the spindles, are they being replaced under the machine or replacement part warranty?

4. Specifically, what has been done so far to troubleshoot the problem?

5. Has the spindle air/oil system been tested?

Many replies have discussed running the coolant and/or returning the coolant back to the tank. (All good ideas) However, you have not indicated if you are using the coolant during the cutting procedure or not.


Much more information is required to help you out.

As i stated, overheating.

We've had HAAS here for about 3 days now, he's been having a really hard time figuring out what the heck was wrong with the machine.

He's been in constant contact with other technichans from Belgium, they too couldn't figure out what the heck was wrong.

He's done every single test, possible, everything from temperature to vibration tests. Both on the spindle, motor and gearbox.

We didn't run the spindle with coolant, during the job, however we're obviously going to do that on our next jobs.


Note to add:
The spindle that the HAAS-tech guy put in, had way too much vibrations from start. Renovated spindle, obviously.

He also recieved a phonecall from the VD back in Belgium. He asked why we had bought a machine with the 7500RPM spindle, when we were going to perform such machining tasks.

Right after pointing that out, he told us that our spindle couldn't handle such high RPMs. (What the hell?) Shouldn't we be able to use the whole register of the spindle speeds if we buy a 7500RPM spindle?

Obviously, not.

They're installing a 10000 RPM spindle in our machine, though.

Hooray!