software question

[johnnieb47]

Have recently purchased a shopbot 48x96. Have completed a couple different projects from some of the free projects available through shopbot. Have been asked to help a local furniture manufacturer dress up his current dresser line for an upcoming hotel project with some added flourishes. He is going to provide the material and all we will be cutting is the drawer fronts and adding some small decorative carvings to these drawer fronts.

My question is which software program is best suited for this type of project? Cabinet Parts Pro or E Cabinet systems. Since my first trial run will not be a paying project, I would like to use the basic cabinet parts pro program (the free version) until I have secured the project. Second question is how do I only cut the drawer fronts and not the rest of the dresser parts. Third question is what program do I use to add the decorative carvings to the drawer fronts. I have Art Cam Insignia, Visual Mill 5.0, Rhino 3, MetaCut Utilities and Vector Art which all came with the shopbot.

I have really enjoyed seeing all the great projects in the forums and find the forums a great source of information. Thanks in advance for your help.

[dlcw]

Partworks 2D and Partworks 3D that comes with the ShopBot.

[zeykr]

Of the programs you say you have, I'd use Insignia, otherwise I'd recommend vcarve or aspire. I don't see where you'd need CPP or Ecab just to cut drawer fronts, they are basically a rectangle and customer should supply sizes.

[bleeth]

The issue is not the cutouts that anything can handle, but rather the decorative carvings. Are they simply cutting some lines with a ballnose or v bit or are they true 2.5d carvings. If they are true carvings then you need the software to make that happen. If it is library carvings selected from Vector 3-d than you will have the right stuff in stock. If it is a custom designed file then you will need either a more robust software like Aspire or Artcam or someone to create it for you.

[gc3]

Spend some time learning what you have. More than enough ammo to do what you need.