Creo Manufacturing vs. Mastercam

[BRENTMARINE]

I'm looking for anybody's input about which would be better, Creo Manufactoring or Mastercam. I am new to this end of the program. I am currently using Creo 2.0 but we are adding a CNC mill and a lathe will be in the not to distant future.

 

[moldman]

I can't speak from first hand experience, but I work for a company that uses both. Mastercam is used for basic 2D machining - pockets, holes, c'bores, etc. Creo manufacturing is used for complex 3D milling. I know that Mastercam can do a lot of what Creo does, but not with the same ease. My guess is that if you are just getting started then Mastercam would serve you well - especially if you won't be doing a lot of 3D contour milling.

Creo touts the ability to regenerate programs easily if the model changes. I have very rarely seen this be an advantage because smart people don't start building something until the design is finalized. The only time savings here is if you are in such a hurry that you don't have time to generate toolpaths after the design is finalized - then you could prepare the toolpaths in advance and then just regenerate when changes are made. It doesn't take that long to prepare enough programs to keep the machines busy while you are creating the rest of them so the real time savings are insignificant.

I don't know what the cost savings are, but I'll bet they are substantial. If I were you, I'd start with Mastercam and see how it does. In the future, if you find it doesn't meet all your needs, you could buy a seat of Creo Man and use them both in parallel. This would be a good approach since you are new.

 

[srieger]

Regenerating programs is great in Creo. The biggest thing is that you spend a lot of time up front setting up your configurations, machines, tools, etc. Next is to fine tune the post processor and set up rules for each machine. I like to build safety into the post to make life easier in the long run. Example, in a horizontal mill I like to retract the spindle to the farthest location before rotating the pallet to prevent any chance of the fixture hitting the tool.

All the problems people tend to have with Creo generally center around trying to do all the programming without putting the effort into implementing it in the first place. It can take time to get it all set up initially and configured. Then it's an ongoing process for a couple years of tweaking.

 

[BRENTMARINE]

I decided to go with Creo Manufacturing. So far, so good. Still learning, only been using for a couple of weeks. I really like that I can change the part and the program will change automatically.