[WOTDesigns]

I'm not sure exactly what you would like to hear, but I did exactly what you're referring to. Cut my teeth on an X3 I built. Then after learning while making fun stuff and starting to do production parts for a few companies via referrals I designed Omni-Cruise (OMNI-CRUISE: Universal Motorcycle Throttle Lock) and I made the first 1,500 of them (top, bottom, pivot nut and delrin slide) on the X3.

That paid for the Tormach 1100, March 2013, I had been dreaming about for almost 2 years! Sales continued to increase and a few customers grew as well and doing production for some of their parts and it was obvious I was losing $1500/mnth by not having time for all of their work. So April of this year I moved out of my one car garage, + chicken shed, +another small shed, + utility room in the house and into a 2,000 sq/ft shop with 3 phase, leased a Haas TM2P, an Epilog mini 24x12 Co2 laser, and hired a buddy on full time.

HAAS factory outlet gave me a 4 hour (paid) training session and I read the manual cover to cover. I had parts coming off that first day it was delivered so it's safe to say a lot transfered over. Really from my experience 90% of machining is programming /planning and work holding. The individual mill is just a matter of speed, accuracy and convenience. The HAAS control rocks! I absolutely love it. Very logical (to me) and we'll laid out.

I'm very happy with my purchase even though I practically had to fight the sales rep to convince him I didn't need a 30 HP spindle and much smaller work envelope for more money. They were sure I needed a VF series. I went TM2P added 20 station tool changer, chip auger, renishaw wireless probe and tool setter, 4th axis ready, high pressure pump, $1200 jog handle (waste of money) and a few other software options like rigid tapping. All total it was $57K. Best damn money I've spent next to the parts tumbler I bought last week.

Work holding is work holding. Doesn't matter if it's a drill press or a VMC the concepts transfer over. The big difference is work envelope, speed, HP (love having 7 HP), and surface finish. Tormach needed hand finishing or tumbling on most of my parts, but the HAAS sends parts out smooth as glass.

That said, I LOVE my Tormach. The tormach hasn't been powered down in 6 days until last night and has been running 18-24 hours a day the whole time, and the week before. I use the spindle speeder for production and another main part is roughed out using a 1/4" EM in 6061 and it creates 20 gallons of chips a day with a 1/4" em. That impresses me.

As far as transferring goes I can manipulate code from the Tormach and use it on the HAAS. Vises go back and forth, tooling goes back and forth. Heck the only big difference is the size and UI. I'd rather do manual jog machining on the Tormach because it's jog wheel beats the crap out of a "real" jog handle interface. The HAAS on the other hand can drill 8,000 letter H holes in 1.25" plate without stalling, pecking or a belt change which used to kill me on the TORMACH. even with a custom peck cycle it would slow and growl after a few hundred holes. On the HAAS I can run the same code without peck and get all 8,000 holes with one drill bit.

Not sure if any of that helps, but I tried.

To date I've made/sold 7,000 Omni-Cruises and just now finally signed with a distributor so we have to ramp production up, change packaging, start advertising finally and get ready to grow =)

Happy to answer any more specific question I can.

Brian
WOT Designs

[CadRhino]

Hi Brian,
Thanks for taking the time to lay out your success story and transition - I learned quite a bit.

That is very impressive and I remember seeing a video of your work a while back. Very cool. You are an innovator not to mention savvy business person and machinist. Congratulations on the new distribution. That is big-time.

Best,
Nathan

I'm not sure exactly what you would like to hear, but I did exactly what you're referring to. Cut my teeth on an X3 I built. Then after learning while making fun stuff and starting to do production parts for a few companies via referrals I designed Omni-Cruise (OMNI-CRUISE: Universal Motorcycle Throttle Lock) and I made the first 1,500 of them (top, bottom, pivot nut and delrin slide) on the X3.

That paid for the Tormach 1100, March 2013, I had been dreaming about for almost 2 years! Sales continued to increase and a few customers grew as well and doing production for some of their parts and it was obvious I was losing $1500/mnth by not having time for all of their work. So April of this year I moved out of my one car garage, + chicken shed, +another small shed, + utility room in the house and into a 2,000 sq/ft shop with 3 phase, leased a Haas TM2P, an Epilog mini 24x12 Co2 laser, and hired a buddy on full time.

HAAS factory outlet gave me a 4 hour (paid) training session and I read the manual cover to cover. I had parts coming off that first day it was delivered so it's safe to say a lot transfered over. Really from my experience 90% of machining is programming /planning and work holding. The individual mill is just a matter of speed, accuracy and convenience. The HAAS control rocks! I absolutely love it. Very logical (to me) and we'll laid out.

I'm very happy with my purchase even though I practically had to fight the sales rep to convince him I didn't need a 30 HP spindle and much smaller work envelope for more money. They were sure I needed a VF series. I went TM2P added 20 station tool changer, chip auger, renishaw wireless probe and tool setter, 4th axis ready, high pressure pump, $1200 jog handle (waste of money) and a few other software options like rigid tapping. All total it was $57K. Best damn money I've spent next to the parts tumbler I bought last week.

Work holding is work holding. Doesn't matter if it's a drill press or a VMC the concepts transfer over. The big difference is work envelope, speed, HP (love having 7 HP), and surface finish. Tormach needed hand finishing or tumbling on most of my parts, but the HAAS sends parts out smooth as glass.

That said, I LOVE my Tormach. The tormach hasn't been powered down in 6 days until last night and has been running 18-24 hours a day the whole time, and the week before. I use the spindle speeder for production and another main part is roughed out using a 1/4" EM in 6061 and it creates 20 gallons of chips a day with a 1/4" em. That impresses me.

As far as transferring goes I can manipulate code from the Tormach and use it on the HAAS. Vises go back and forth, tooling goes back and forth. Heck the only big difference is the size and UI. I'd rather do manual jog machining on the Tormach because it's jog wheel beats the crap out of a "real" jog handle interface. The HAAS on the other hand can drill 8,000 letter H holes in 1.25" plate without stalling, pecking or a belt change which used to kill me on the TORMACH. even with a custom peck cycle it would slow and growl after a few hundred holes. On the HAAS I can run the same code without peck and get all 8,000 holes with one drill bit.

Not sure if any of that helps, but I tried.

To date I've made/sold 7,000 Omni-Cruises and just now finally signed with a distributor so we have to ramp production up, change packaging, start advertising finally and get ready to grow =)

Happy to answer any more specific question I can.

Brian
WOT Designs

[WOTDesigns]

Hi Brian,
Thanks for taking the time to lay out your success story and transition - I learned quite a bit.

That is very impressive and I remember seeing a video of your work a while back. Very cool. You are an innovator not to mention savvy business person and machinist. Congratulations on the new distribution. That is big-time.

Best,
Nathan

Thank you, but I'm a terrible business man. I am about as big now as I ever want to be with the exception of hiring someone I can trust to do the books and paperwork garbage I hate/suck at.

Regarding doing what u love and never work a day in your life... I just slept for 4 hours which was my first sleep over an hour in 96 hours. I absolutely freaking love it! I love making things, designing new fixtures and working out inefficiencies. Plus... I like toys =) just bought a BurBench 2016 that has been a dream come true!

Just overcame the whole no-double-station-vises fit the Tormach table in Y problem too. I'll post a pic in a new thread.

I get to design and make new parts and toys while my employee stands at the machine and does the crap I don't want to. What more can I ask for!?

Brian
WOT Designs

[tmarks11]

I'm not sure exactly what you would like to hear, but I did exactly what you're referring to. Cut my teeth on an X3 I built. ...To date I've made/sold 7,000 Omni-Cruises and just now finally signed with a distributor so we have to ramp production up, change packaging, start advertising finally and get ready to grow =)

Thanks Bryan. That is an inspiring story.

[keen]

I'm not sure exactly what you would like to hear, but I did exactly what you're referring to. Cut my teeth on an X3 I built. Then after learning while making fun stuff and starting to do production parts for a few companies via referrals I designed Omni-Cruise (OMNI-CRUISE: Universal Motorcycle Throttle Lock) and I made the first 1,500 of them (top, bottom, pivot nut and delrin slide) on the X3.

That paid for the Tormach 1100, March 2013, I had been dreaming about for almost 2 years! Sales continued to increase and a few customers grew as well and doing production for some of their parts and it was obvious I was losing $1500/mnth by not having time for all of their work. So April of this year I moved out of my one car garage, + chicken shed, +another small shed, + utility room in the house and into a 2,000 sq/ft shop with 3 phase, leased a Haas TM2P, an Epilog mini 24x12 Co2 laser, and hired a buddy on full time.

HAAS factory outlet gave me a 4 hour (paid) training session and I read the manual cover to cover. I had parts coming off that first day it was delivered so it's safe to say a lot transfered over. Really from my experience 90% of machining is programming /planning and work holding. The individual mill is just a matter of speed, accuracy and convenience. The HAAS control rocks! I absolutely love it. Very logical (to me) and we'll laid out.

I'm very happy with my purchase even though I practically had to fight the sales rep to convince him I didn't need a 30 HP spindle and much smaller work envelope for more money. They were sure I needed a VF series. I went TM2P added 20 station tool changer, chip auger, renishaw wireless probe and tool setter, 4th axis ready, high pressure pump, $1200 jog handle (waste of money) and a few other software options like rigid tapping. All total it was $57K. Best damn money I've spent next to the parts tumbler I bought last week.

Work holding is work holding. Doesn't matter if it's a drill press or a VMC the concepts transfer over. The big difference is work envelope, speed, HP (love having 7 HP), and surface finish. Tormach needed hand finishing or tumbling on most of my parts, but the HAAS sends parts out smooth as glass.

That said, I LOVE my Tormach. The tormach hasn't been powered down in 6 days until last night and has been running 18-24 hours a day the whole time, and the week before. I use the spindle speeder for production and another main part is roughed out using a 1/4" EM in 6061 and it creates 20 gallons of chips a day with a 1/4" em. That impresses me.

As far as transferring goes I can manipulate code from the Tormach and use it on the HAAS. Vises go back and forth, tooling goes back and forth. Heck the only big difference is the size and UI. I'd rather do manual jog machining on the Tormach because it's jog wheel beats the crap out of a "real" jog handle interface. The HAAS on the other hand can drill 8,000 letter H holes in 1.25" plate without stalling, pecking or a belt change which used to kill me on the TORMACH. even with a custom peck cycle it would slow and growl after a few hundred holes. On the HAAS I can run the same code without peck and get all 8,000 holes with one drill bit.

Not sure if any of that helps, but I tried.

To date I've made/sold 7,000 Omni-Cruises and just now finally signed with a distributor so we have to ramp production up, change packaging, start advertising finally and get ready to grow =)

Happy to answer any more specific question I can.

Brian
WOT Designs

Hi Brian. Inspiring stuff... thanks.

Please see my question on the Speeder new thread.

keen