Overheard a guy at the shop say he never sets tool offsets the same way twice...

I was grabbing some end mills from the supply room last Tuesday and heard two older machinists arguing about tool offset methods. One guy swore he changes his approach every shift to "keep the machine guessing" or something like that. Has anyone else run into this kind of thinking, or is it just me?

3 comments

3 Comments

fisher.charlie2mo ago

Heard a guy at my old shop say the same thing and honestly I just laughed it off at first. But then I noticed he was always chasing scrap parts or fighting with his inserts, never could get consistent finishes. Tbh I just stick with one solid routine every time, zero everything off the same reference point, and my parts come out fine shift after shift. Ngl, changing your offsets randomly is just asking for trouble, especially if you're running tight tolerances.

terry_barnes2mo ago

Depends on the part honestly. If you're running +/-.005 on a manual mill, who cares if you're off a thou from your zero point (it'll probably still hold tolerance), but once you're into the tenths stuff like an EDM or a jig grinder, yeah, that's where you gotta be religious about your reference. Some guys get away with sloppy habits because their machines are forgiving and their prints aren't screaming, you know?

karen_hart19d ago

Yeah, that guy Terry is spot on about forgiving machines. I've seen guys run a Bridgeport sloppy for years and never have an issue, then they get on a wire EDM and suddenly they're pulling their hair out. The old reference point routine is everything when you're splitting tenths, no way around it. Honest, most of the time it's not even the machine's fault, it's just bad habits catching up with you.