CNC turning centers are very popular in manufacturing companies. Most companies that performs metal-cutting operations has at least one. Since they are so popular, people beginning their CNC careers are often exposed to turning centers early in the learning process.

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In this text, we assume you have very little or no previous experience in a manufacturing environment. Indeed, the first one-hundred-thirty pages are devoted to basic machining practices, and get you ready to learn about CNC. Topics here include shop safety, shop math, blueprint reading, tolerance interpretation, measuring devices, and machining operations performed on turning centers.

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While these topics are often considered prerequisite to learning about CNC, more and more people are entering the field of CNC with little or no shop experience – so we include this important prerequisite information.

We use a Key Concepts approach to teaching you about CNC. This proven tutorial method allows us to stress the reasons why things are done as importantly as how they’re done. It provides a building blocks approach to learning. And it limits the number of things you must master in order to become proficient.  There are four key concepts related to setting up and operating CNC turning centers.

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The Key Concepts are further divided into twelve lessons. Most lessons include quizzes and practice right in the text (answers provided close by) and every lesson ends with a test to confirm your understanding of presented material (answers are provided at the end of the text). This combination of tutorial text, explanatory illustrations, and lots of practice truly turns this text a self-study course that will teach you what you need to know in order to become a proficient CNC turning center setup person or operator.

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Here are the four Key Concepts and twelve lessons:

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• Key Concept number one: Get ready to learn about CNC turning centers

  • ​Lesson One: Basic machining practices required for turning centers

  • Lesson Two: What does a CNC turning center do?

• Key Concept number two: Know your machine from a setup person’s or operator’s viewpoint

  • Lesson Three: General flow of CNC process

  • Lesson Four: Machine configurations

  • Lesson Five: Understanding the control panels

  • Lesson Six: Important procedures needed to run the machine

• Key Concept number three: Know the three compensation types

  • Lesson Seven: Understanding compensation

  • Lesson Eight: Geometry offsets and assigning program zero

  • Lesson Nine: Wear offsets 

  • Lesson Ten: Tool nose radius compensation

• Key Concept number four: Master the tasks to run a CNC turning center

  • Lesson Eleven: Tasks related to making setups

  • Lesson Twelve: Tasks related to completing a production run

 

When you finish reading this text and doing the exercises, you will have a firm understanding of what it takes to setup and run a CNC turning center. However, we must point out that there’s more to learning how to setup and run a CNC turning center than you can read in a book – regardless of how good the book is. You will need practice on an actual CNC turning center in order to fully master its use. If you are enrolled in a technical school’s CNC course – your instructor will provide the necessary practice.

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If you are not enrolled in a CNC course, you will need on-the-job training to complete your education. Unfortunately, no text can provide hands-on training. But we can provide classroom-type training and the theory you must understand before you can spend any meaningful time at a CNC turning center.