I should warn that this post is not primarily about Mach3 although it references a pirated copy of Mach3 supplied with my machine. I recently posted about that issue under this same heading. However, I have previously noticed that there are a lot of threads about Chinese machines and, in particular, about Roger Webb/Pacific Tooling on various forums. So, having actually bought a Chinese CNC Router from Pacific Tooling, it seems like a good idea to share my experience. I should point out that this will be a somewhat lengthy post. Not necessarily of general interest to everyone but more for those who are planning to get a Chinese machine and very specifically for those interested in one from Roger Webb/Pacific Tooling.
I have just bought a PT6012 CNC Router from Pacific Tooling. I say Pacific Tooling and not Roger because although Roger has confirmed to me that he and his wife Maria own Pacific Tooling, Pacific Tooling is not registered in Australia. This matters, as I will demonstrate later.
On the sales invoice, the payee is a 3rd party called Boost International Company Ltd. Roger has advised me that Boost Intl is the Chinese trading name for Pacific Tooling.
In terms of delivery times, the machine arrived pretty much on time. I chose to use my own shipping agent and this proved a good choice. I am based in Melbourne and I used Seaway Logistics. The staff there were very helpful and professional. I chose them because a good friend of mine who does plenty of importing recommended them. He had had bad experiences with a previous agent but since moving his business to Seaway all had been sweet. Anyway, they kept me informed as to what was going on and didn’t mind any of my questions no matter how obvious the answers were (I’d never done this before). They also have their own agent in China. Further, they saved me $472- in import duty and GST, something that Roger Webb apparently knew nothing about. Maria was very annoyed that she had to provide this, saying repeatedly that no-one else had ever asked for this. I now have the certificate and my refund. It strikes me as odd that Roger and the shipping agent that he recommended “did not know about” the China/Australia free trade agreement that entitled me to exemption from the Import Duty. You may draw your own conclusions from that.
Before I move on, I should mention right from the get go, do your homework regarding price. Roger advertises his price in USD which is fine but he constantly emphasises how cheap his machines are for the spec and, on face value, he seems right. However, you must factor in a few extras.
Firstly, of course, there is the exchange rate. That’s simple and straight forward but is, of course, subject to the exchange rate at the time of payment. My machine had an advertised price of USD4175-. I also upgraded to the 2.2kw spindle, gantry extension, and the 4th axis with the Mach3 4th axis port and USB connection. This brought the total to USD5990-. After conversion to the Aussie dollar, this became approx AUD7500-. So far still ok but add to this the freight, shipping agent’s fees and GST as well as all the misc charges such as Port service fees, terminal handling charges, Melb port license fees, customs clearance fees, quarantine processing fees, origin charges etc, etc, etc, the final cost to me was approx AUD11,000-. This was a bit of a shock to me but that’s my fault for not doing enough homework to ascertain the full costs. I still don’t know if I could have done better overall and I’m not sure that I want to know. Anyway, do your homework!!
Now we can move on to picking up the machine and unpacking. I asked Roger how big the crate was so I could be sure that it would fit in my trailer. He didn’t know. Could he please ask the factory? No, he said, it’s already left the factory. But, he said, the crate is very big and you’ll need a full size 10 x 6 car trailer. That, he said, is what he used and “it only just fit”. Well, I’m thinking that the machine is only 1200mm (just under 4’) wide and crates are always a snug fit to save on freight. Length and height were no problem on the trailer so I took a risk and used an 8’ x 5’ tandem trailer. And by risk, I mean it’s a long drive to the shipper’s warehouse and I didn’t want to arrive with a trailer that was too small. Well it fit with room to spare as the photo shows but I wouldn’t use a 6’ x 4’. The crate was exactly 4’ wide and whilst you might squeeze it in, there’s absolutely no margin if that crate were a few mm wider.
As the attached photos show, the crate was undamaged and upon opening, it was clear to see that there was no ‘in transit’ damage. The machine was well bolted down through the timber base and in to a steel subframe under the crate. However, as I unwrapped the machine, several things were evident.
1. A significant amount of metal drillings were caught between the packing wrap and the gantry at both ends. Later, when I investigated, I removed the two ventilated boxes at each end of the gantry. One, of course, houses the X-axis stepper motor and the other one….well it just looks balanced at the other end and covers the bearing at the end of the ball screw. Having removed them, I found more drillings inside the boxes and I can only assume that through some slip up, drilling needed to be done after the wrapping started. It’s an odd thing to happen but I can’t think of any other reason. When I showed the photos to Roger, he declined to even comment.
2. One of the aluminium T-slot panels that form the table was bent in at the corner and slightly bent down as well. I’m being a pit picky here but when I buy something brand new, I like it to be straight and true. Roger sent me some pre-delivery photos of my machine before it was boxed for shipping and the bent panel could clearly be seen once you knew where to look. When I raised this item with Roger and pointed out that the damage was clear in his pre-delivery photo, he denied that any damage could be seen and that “my shipper must have trodden on the machine”. What a ridiculous response!
3. The last item was a bent dust seal on one of the linear rail bearings for the gantry. It would not press back into position and was going to allow dust and grit to build up against the actual bearing. I certainly wasn’t happy with this and it is a simple matter of three retaining screws to remove and replace it. When I sent photos of this to Roger, asking him to send a replacement, his response was “We see no evidence that this was a result of our factory processes”. How else could it have happened? I'd only just opened the crate and it is well shielded from damage by the gantry itself. It could only have happened during installation of the part.
Roger seems to have a real problem with admitting his product might not be perfect.
A little while later, I discovered that the X-axis slideway cover has several small tears in it. This, although easily repaired with a little cloth and some adhesive, is very annoying. I have not broached this with Roger as I am now quite confident that his reply will be as per 3. above.
Later on, when I removed the slideway cover to repair it, I found more drillings and so I decided to remove the Z-axis slideway cover as well. Sure enough, there were even more drillings and they were sitting on the bearing seals. Given that they were sitting loose and not forced up against the bearings or rails, probably there would be no harm in leaving them there. I did, of course, clean them up. Just another thing that was easily sorted but which I shouldn’t have had to do myself.
I ordered the accessory dust boot and this seems fairly well designed and quite robust. Unfortunately, the bristles are only glued on to the painted metal housing with what looks like hot glue gun glue. This has not bonded well with the gloss paint and the bristles across the rear have already fallen off. Once again, this will be an easy repair but I’m getting very frustrated at the amount of time I am having to spend sorting out these little issues. (Note: It’s now a couple of weeks down the track and I have just had the bristles on the front fall off as well. I think I will need to pull the remaining bristles off and fix them to the boot properly before one of them gets sucked into the dust extractor hose.)
During my commissioning of this machine, time came for installing the coolant pump. Pacific Tooling provide a 20 litre tub which serves the dual purpose of being a container for the various extras that ship with the machine and being a reservoir for the coolant pump. I quickly discovered that there was no way I would be able to install the tub through the rear opening of the machine because I had placed the machine with the rear facing a wall. However, with some minor body contortions (actually major contortions at my age), I was able to remove a side panel (screwed in from behind) which I have since refitted with hinges. This gave me the access I needed.
Another thing worth noting is that Roger says he gives you Artcam Software and, indeed he does. However, it’s a 2008 version. I use Vectric Aspire (the latest version) so this doesn’t matter to me…..I’ll probably never use Artcam. I also don’t know if it will matter to anyone who does want to use Artcam but if they do, it’s worth noting that this is 10yr old software.
Post Script: Roger has just told me that Artcam is no longer available from Autodesk. Period. A quick google search confirms this…
https://www.autodesk.com/products/artcam/overview On the same note, I already have a registered copy of Mach3 and thought I would be able to set things up using my copy. However, Roger informed me, after I had some issues with the software on the provided USB drive, that I would need to use the version of Mach3 that he provided (an older version than my registered copy) because “my engineers have set it up as a plug and play with all the settings done for me”. He provides a Mach1Lic.dat file which licences the software to “MaoA~A↑ -Dtonar” rather than to me. I’m not particularly happy about this. It turns out that this is a pirated copy of Mach3 and will almost certainly be an issue when I need Mach3 support from Artsoft.
All of which brings me to the USB drive containing all the software, additional files and instructional PDFs. Mach3 wouldn’t load and one of the PDFs wouldn’t either. I tried them on three different computers with different OS’s and all had the same issues. After much frustrating time and angst, I called Roger who said that I needed winzip because the files were compressed. Not the case! None of the files were compressed and certainly didn’t respond to unzip commands. After even more wasted time and argument with Roger, he reluctantly agreed to send me a replacement USB drive with the necessary files. I have since received that USB drive and all the files on the new drive open easily and as they should. In my mind, this confirms that the original USB drive was faulty/corrupt in spite of Roger’s insistence that it wasn’t.
I noticed, while looking at all the components in the control box, that the machine is not earthed. I’m not an electrician but I do know that there are two types of electrical machines/tools/appliances with regard to earthing.
1. Double insulated. These items bear an international symbol of two squares, one inside the other. If you don’t understand, go check the label on you corded electric drill or almost any other corded electrical tool. This machine has no such designation and I didn’t expect one. Double insulated tools have all the dangerous stuff wrapped in a plastic shell (the body of the tool which can’t conduct).
2. Earthed machines. These have a full metal construction. If there is a short circuit and a live wire touches part of the body of the machine, that body becomes electrically live and very dangerous. Hence the green and yellow wire that we all know as the earth wire. Your wall socket is earthed and the cord from the socket has an earth wire as well. Where it enters the machine, the earth terminal behind the machine’s socket MUST be attached to the main body of the machine. In this way, if there is a short to the body, it should earth through the power cord to the building’s earth rather than through you. An alternative is to drill a hole in your workshop floor and drive a copper bar into the ground. Attach the bar via earth wire to the machine chassis. But who wants to go through that process and what if I need to rearrange the workshop? More holes in the concrete floor. Add to that that I happen to know that the local earth (dirt) is quite non conductive and therefore needs a very substantial and long copper earth bar.
As a result of this, I contacted Energy Safe Victoria with my concerns. I sent them photos and they confirmed my suspicions. Remember when I said earlier that it mattered that Pacific Tooling is not registered in Australia? And also that the invoice was to a 3rd party? This means that I am the importer and therefore hold the sole responsibility for this matter as far as Energy Safe is concerned. ESV may be unable to pursue Roger Webb over this electrical safety matter although they did say that they would have their Tasmanian counterparts talk to him.
Going back to the torn slipway cover, when I removed the damaged ones to repair them I discovered that the X-axis has a hard limit switch at one end only. On further inspection, I noticed that each axis is the same…..only one hard limit switch per axis. I had asked Roger during the initial discussions if this machine would be equipped with those switches and he assured me that it would be. Since I didn’t specify how many or where they would be fitted, I can’t say that he was dishonest. It does indeed come with the switches. It just seems to me that they should be fitted at both ends of each axis. I raised this with Roger and his response was
“You do not seem to understand the rudimentary operation of your CNC or the operating program of MACH3” and that “Limit switches are only required ONE per AXIS.”
I may be wrong (please correct me – I’m not an expert) but even though the software should protect from crashes, hard limit switches are there as a back up against software failure and therefore should be at each end of each axis.
I have now started using the machine and it is as good as I had hoped and way better than my old home made (not by me – I bought it second hand) machine. It is very heavy, very rigid and, so far, powerful enough for the work I do. I say that with the qualification that I have only used it on wood at this point. I intend to use it on brass and aluminium in the near future. Roger, in his Youtube videos, assures me that this machine will easily cope with those materials.
One of the first things I noticed when preparing for the first run was when fitting the cutter. The accessories supplied with the machine included two double ended open ended spanners…one 19mm/22mm and one 27mm/30mm. Now the 30mm spanner fits the collet nut quite nicely. However, the spindle needs a 21mm spanner. The 22mm spanner is way too sloppy and even if you ignore the rounding off possibilities, it is just annoying to have so much slop when the right spanner in the first place should have been supplied.
*****As this post exceeds the max characters, see below for the remainder*******
Guest
Show Posts
It also comes with a licence file that needs to be copied in to the Mach3 folder and which licences the software to “MaoA~A↑ -Dtonar” rather than to me.