I've been a machinist since I was 7, it seems to get in your blood, or is that just the machining fluid
. Anyway, I don't think you really need something like that, at work the only thing I use is notepad, auto cad, and virtual Gibbs (pretty complicated and expensive). I work on 11 axis swiss style lathes, and 3 axis cnc mills. The lathes cost almost as much as my car and use simple controls, but require extensive knowledge of G-code. I suggest just learning G-code, it's really simple. for most of the parts your going to probably make (IE. aluminum axles out of a solid bar, mounts, custom plates, drilled out sprockets + gears, etc..) you really only need to know a few commands. and the syntax is really simple too.
"G" is the command to tell the machine to go (duh)
"x" is the command for using the x-axis
"y" same thing only with the y axis
Z" same thing but with the z axis
"F" feed rate, it's followed by a number telling the machine how fast to move
"M" turns on and off the spindle, it's followed by either a 3 or a 5, 3 turns it on,5 turns it off.
thats about it for a 3 axis mill, if your putting on a rotary axis then instead of using X,Y, or Z you would use A.
so lets say i want to make an aluminum axle. the code would be as follows
(first zero off all Axis's)
"M3" <-- turns spindle on
"G0Z-.02" <-- put whatever the depth of the cut is, i suggest only cutting a maximum of .02 on each pass to increase life of machine and tooling
"G0X-5" <-- Put the length of your slot, make sure you know the travel of the Axis's or you'll prolly run the table off the track. And thats a negative sign next to the 5. it can also be positive.
"G0Z-.04"
"G0X0"
"G0Z-.06"
"G0X-5"
etc....
Don't put quotations around the commands and don't use the <-- thing , I just did it for demonstration purposes. If alot of people actually want to learn G-code maybe you can ask the moderators if we can get a topic on just Machining. When you start making curves and circles it gets a little more complicated. BTW my name is Phil. If you have any other questions feel free to PM me.