Meet the Machine

Used Haas VF-9: The Envelope Is Bigger Than the Table

Haas publishes 84 inches of X travel on the VF-9. The table is 84 inches long. Those two numbers being identical is not a coincidence, and it is not good news.

If the spindle can traverse the entire length of the table, then at either end of that traverse it is over the edge. Put a vise, a stop or a clamp in the last few inches and the travel you paid for stops being reachable. The published envelope and the usable envelope are two different numbers, and the gap between them is filled with work holding.

That is the whole thing to understand about this machine. It is a good large VMC and there are a lot of them on the used market. You just have to measure the table rather than read the travel.

Eighty-Four Inches of X on an Eighty-Four Inch Table

Travel specifications describe where the spindle centerline can go. They say nothing about whether the part, the fixture and the tool can be there at the same time.

On the VF-9 the X travel and the table length are both 84 inches, so the theoretical maximum part length is the full table. In practice the part sits inside whatever holds it. A pair of six inch vises on the ends costs you a foot. Clamps at each end cost you whatever they stand proud by. A tombstone or an angle plate costs you its own footprint.

None of that is a defect. Every machine works this way. It matters more here because the reason a shop buys a VF-9 is almost always a specific long part, and the decision gets made by comparing that part length against the travel figure. If the part is 80 inches and the travel is 84, that looks like four inches of margin. Once the fixture is on the table it often is not. Measure the part, add the work holding, then compare.

Y Travel Is Table Width Plus Four

The second number worth staring at is Y. Haas publishes 40 inches of it. The table is 36 inches wide.

So the spindle moves four inches further in Y than the table extends, two inches of overhang at each side. That is deliberate. It lets the spindle reach past the table edge for fixtures that hang over, for tombstone faces, and for getting a tool clear of the work. It also means the last two inches of Y at each end are not over the table at all. If your part needs the full 40 inches of Y, something other than the table surface has to support it at the extremes.

This is not unique to the VF-9. The VF-7 publishes 32 inches of Y on a 28 inch wide table, the same four inch relationship. On both machines the table width, not the Y travel, is the number that decides whether a part can be clamped down flat.

What That Costs You in Fixturing

Put the two together and the practical working area of a VF-9 is an 84 by 36 inch rectangle, minus whatever the work holding occupies, inside a published envelope of 84 by 40.

For a single long part down the middle of the table that is plenty, and the machine does what you bought it for. It gets tight on the case shops plan for second: multiple parts across the table, or a part that is both long and wide. Thirty six inches sounds generous until it holds two rows of fixtures and a chip path between them, and the seven T-slots on 4.92 inch centers are what actually constrain where clamps can land.

Weight is the other constraint. Haas rates the table at 4,000 lb evenly distributed, the same rating as the VF-7 with its eight inch narrower table. A bigger table does not come with a bigger number, and on a long steel weldment plus a fixture that ceiling is real.

Resell CNC Take

Before you buy a VF-9 for a specific part, draw the fixture on the table, not the part. Eighty-four by thirty-six with seven T-slots on 4.92 inch centers is the real canvas, and a 4,000 lb ceiling sits over all of it. Most disappointment with this machine traces back to someone comparing a part length against a travel number and never drawing the thing that holds it.

The VF-9 Is a VF-7 With Eight More Inches

Set the two spec sheets side by side and the comparison is unusually clean.

Identical X, identical Z, identical spindle, identical torque, identical table length, identical table load, identical tool changer. The VF-9 buys you eight inches of Y travel, eight inches of table width and two more T-slots. That is the entire difference.

Which makes the decision simple and worth being honest about: if your parts are long and narrow, a VF-7 does the same work for less money and less floor. The VF-9 earns the premium when the part is long and wide, or when you need the width to run more than one fixture across it. Buying a 9 for a part that fits a 7 is paying for width you will not use, every month, in floor space.

The Numbers Underneath

Specifications vary by year and configuration, so pull the sheet for the exact machine and build in front of you. The figures below are what Haas currently publishes for the VF-9/40.

Two entries are worth dwelling on. The 12 lb maximum tool weight is a 40 taper limit that does not scale with the size of the machine, and a large face mill on a big arbor gets close to it faster than people expect. And spindle nose to table runs 4.0 to 34.0 inches, so subtract fixture height and tool stickout from 34 for your real part height. On a machine bought for big work, that is often the dimension that runs out first.

Forty Taper, Fifty Taper, and the Gearbox

Haas builds the VF-9 in four configurations, and the differences are about torque delivery rather than size. Every one of them has the same 84 by 40 by 30 envelope and the same 84 by 36 table.

The base VF-9/40 makes 90 ft-lbf, which is reasonable for a 40 taper machine and enough for aluminium, moderate steel work and small cutters. It is not much for pushing a four inch face mill through steel, and on a machine with an 84 inch table people tend to want exactly that.

The two ways out are the optional two speed gearbox, which trades top end access for 250 ft-lbf at 450 rpm, and the 50 taper machine, which comes with a gearbox as its drive system and publishes 340 ft-lbf at 700 rpm while giving up 600 rpm at the top.

On a used machine, whether the gearbox is fitted is one of the highest value things to establish, because it is not something you add later in any practical sense and it changes what the machine is for. Get it in writing.

Super Speed, and What It Actually Buys

The Super Speed VF-9 runs 12,000 rpm instead of 8,100, rapids of 1,200 ipm in X and Y against 600, and 833 ipm maximum cutting feed against 500.

What it does not buy, on the 40 taper machine, is any cutting power. Haas publishes the same 30 hp and the same 90 ft-lbf at 2,000 rpm for the VF-9SS as for the standard VF-9/40. Super Speed is a rapids and rpm package. If your cycle time is dominated by air moves and small high-rpm cutters, it is money well spent. If it is dominated by metal removal with a big tool, it changes nothing about the part of the cycle you care about.

The 50 taper Super Speed is a different proposition. Haas publishes 60 hp and 140 ft-lbf at 2,200 rpm for the VF-9SS/50, so that one is genuinely a bigger spindle rather than a faster one. It is also the rarest of the four on the used market, so do not build a purchase plan around finding one quickly.

What It Takes to Put One In

This is the part that gets skipped until the machine is on a truck. A VF-9 is a facilities decision before it is a machining decision.

Haas publishes an overall footprint of roughly 201 inches deep by 185 inches wide for the VF-9/40. That is about 16 feet 9 inches by 15 feet 5 inches, and it is the machine alone, before service clearance, before the chip conveyor discharge, before anywhere for the operator to stand with a part in his hands.

Height is 137 inches standard, about 11 feet 5 inches, and 145 inches with the extended Z axis clearance option. Measure your roll-up door and your lowest ceiling obstruction before you measure anything else. Lights, sprinkler heads, ductwork and crane rails have all stopped a large VMC at the door.

Power is three phase, either 220 VAC at 70 amps or 440 VAC at 35 amps full load. Air is 4 scfm at 100 psi with a minimum of 80 psi through a 3/8 inch line. Neither is exotic, but the amperage is enough that an existing panel with one spare breaker is not automatically the answer.

Two more notes. The machine ships with a two step operator platform of roughly 72 by 24 inches, which needs its own floor space and is not optional in practice on a table this high. And Haas specifies a foundation extending at least a foot past the bored holes, so a questionable slab is a conversation to have with a rigger before the deal closes. Rigging on a machine this size is real money and it varies with access, so have someone look at the route, not just the destination.

The Control, and Which Generation You Are Getting

Haas has used its own control since the company started building machines in 1983. The important boundary for a used buyer is the move to the Next Generation Control, which arrived around 2014 and brought a larger screen, Ethernet connectivity and a different interface.

A pre-NGC VF-9 is not a bad machine and plenty are still cutting. What you are buying into is an older interface, an older networking story and a different support picture over time. A post-NGC machine is closer to what a new operator trained on. Either way, get the control generation in writing along with the year and the full model designation, because on a machine built for decades under one name the model number alone does not tell you what is in front of you.

We have written about the wider VF line and how the model numbers work in our Haas VF series breakdown, and about the company itself in our Haas brand profile.

U.S. Parts and Service

Haas Automation was founded by Gene Haas in 1983 in Sun Valley, California, and moved to Oxnard in 1997, where it builds machines on a campus of roughly one million square feet. It is the largest machine tool builder in the Western world.

For a used buyer that matters in a specific way: parts are domestic, the Haas Factory Outlet network is dense across the United States, and a large pool of American machinists already knows the control. On a machine that may be fifteen years old when you buy it, being able to get a spindle, a drive or a control board is worth more than a spec sheet advantage.

Resell CNC currently carries 125 Haas machines. That is the reason we can be specific about this brand rather than general.

Used-Market Value

Four things move the number on a used VF-9.

The configuration. A 50 taper machine, or a 40 taper with the gearbox, is a different asset from a base VF-9/40, and the gap is larger than a few model years. Establish which one you are looking at before you compare prices.

The control generation. NGC or pre-NGC is the single clearest dividing line in the used Haas market, and it shows up in the price.

What comes with it. On a machine this size the extras are a meaningful share of the value: through spindle coolant, a chip conveyor, a fourth axis, probing, the tooling package, the operator platform. Get the list in writing. A VF-9 with tooling and one without are two different purchases at the same headline number.

Where it is and what it takes to move it. Buyers underweight this one. A machine with a 201 by 185 inch footprint and an 11 foot 5 inch height in a building with poor access carries a rigging bill that changes the economics. Two identical machines in different buildings are not worth the same money to you. For an anchor at the top, Haas currently lists a starting price of US$233,995 for a new VF-9/40.

What to Check on a Used VF-9

Start with the model plate rather than the listing. Confirm /40 or /50, whether it is SS, the year and the serial number.

Then run the X axis end to end and listen at both extremes. Eighty-four inches is a long way for a ballscrew and the ends of a heavily used X are where wear shows first. Check backlash at reversal at both ends, not just in the middle.

Get on the table with a straightedge and an indicator. A large table loaded hard, or loaded unevenly against a 4,000 lb rating, can show it. Check the T-slots for spread and damage around the ones people actually used, usually the middle three. Then cycle the tool changer through every pocket rather than a sample, paying attention to any heavier tools still in it.

Run the spindle through its full speed range and check for noise and heat at the top end. If the machine has the gearbox, shift it under power in both ranges rather than taking the seller at his word.

Confirm the control boots clean, holds parameters and that the axes home reliably. Ask for machine hours and spindle hours separately if the control reports them, and treat both as one input rather than the answer.

Cut and measure a test part if the seller will allow it. On a machine with this much travel, a part that checks at one end of X and not the other tells you more in ten minutes than an hour of inspection.

Who Runs One

The VF-9 is a long-part machine in a job shop or a contract manufacturer. It shows up in weldment machining, machine frames and bases, structural and bracket work, mold and die plate work, energy and heavy equipment components, and anywhere a shop has decided to stop splitting long parts across two setups.

It also shows up as a second machine rather than a first. The shop buying one usually already runs smaller VMCs and has hit the same size wall enough times to justify the floor space.

If your longest part is comfortably inside 60 inches, this is more machine and more floor than the work requires, and a VF-5 or a VF-6 will be cheaper to buy, cheaper to house and easier to sell later.

Frequently Asked Questions

About the Author