CNC Control Memory: Go Big and Go Beyond

Have you ever said to yourself, “man I could use some more memory”? I’m not talking about additional gray matter either, I’m talking about CNC control memory! About 20 years ago I worked at another machine tool builder. Not as a control product specialist, but as a CNC machinist (though at the time, I was not quite the chipmaker!). The first production CNC machine I ran was a Cincinnati Milacron CNC 720. The CNC control cabinet was bigger than my workbench.

Ah, the (Not So Good) Old Days

I’ll never forget when I loaded my first program. No, it was not Copy and Paste, or Drag and Drop loading either. It was a paper tape! My trainer said, “whatever you do, do not tear this tape.” So I loaded it on what looked like a reel-to-reel music player. I advanced the tape to the coded % sign and began reading the tape. 5 -10 minutes later, my program was finally loaded, with no memory room to spare. As you know, % signs exist today in some CNC programs, left over from the paper tape days. They tell the CNC control where to begin and stop reading the program. Some old-school CNC control vendors still have trouble leaving this outdated technology behind. They still require the % sign and refer to terms such as “Punch and Read”, also left over from the paper tape days. The term “Meters of Tape” referred to exactly that, the length of tape the CNC control memory could hold. And if that amount of tape memory wasn’t enough, and you wanted to expand your CNC memory, it wasn’t hundreds of dollars, try thousands of dollars. And what about Program Storage?

Go Big and Go Beyond

Can you imagine, with today’s technology, still being limited by CNC control memory and storage? Now you can have memory buffer management and nearly limitless storage, meaning you don’t have to worry about the nonsense of obsolete hardware drip-feeding options any more. For example, on a new Okuma CNC machine, our THINC^®-OSP P300 CNC control is equipped with a whopping 160 GB of memory. Now if you want to be picky, we use about 30 GB for operating systems storage. That leaves 130 GB of available storage to allow your shop to Go Beyond!

Beyond Just Programs

What do I mean by Go Beyond? Let’s think beyond just NC programs. What about electronic copies of part prints, part routings, pictures of setups, part processing videos, and even custom Windows applications? All of these can be memory and storage hogs, and were therefore beyond the realm of possibility in the days of tape memory. But if you can load it onto a PC, you can certainly load it on the Okuma OSP P300 CNC Control.

Now We’re Talking Productivity

Let’s face it, when it comes to shop productivity, this is beyond just the ability to store an NC code program. Depending on the industry your shop serves, you may need to document all aspects of the job, maintain and store probe dimensions, access inspection documentation, etc. I think about the file cabinets full of setup documentation that I’d work from, full of greasy fingerprints, some not so legible. These can be loaded directly into the CNC control and easily viewed from the shop floor.

We have customers today who take advantage of our open architecture THINC-OSP CNC control to do just that. By associating process documentation on Ethernet network drives to job router barcodes, all the operator has to do is scan the barcode on the job sheet and BAM! - those part prints, tool lists, and process videos are automatically downloaded from a controlled network drive, along with the correct program version to ensure process control. The program can even be automatically loaded (in seconds, not 10 minutes!) and tool data registered with no button pushing. Reel-to-reel tape, DNC, and fat finger data no more.

When it comes to staying competitive, the latest CNC control computing technology enables big memory gains, and even better, big productivity gains.

What do wish your CNC control could do? Comment below, or contact us with your challenges. You may be surprised at what’s possible.

Tim Thornton is Regional Sales Manager, Okuma America Corporation