Inlay toolpath

[Kyle Stapleton]

We have had some problems with the inlay toolpath with more complex shapes where the pocket it too big or too small in some areas.

Picture shows the pocket and the male over the top and you can see they are not lining up. Numbers, letters and simpler shapes work all the time (knock on wood).
Anyone know why?

[adrianm]

Try turning on the Solid Preview option on the toolpaths to see if anything obvious comes to light.

[srwtlc]

Are you using the 'Inlay' toolpath and not just a normal pocket/profile pair. The male part generated with the inlay tool will allow for tool radius compensation and round off the corners where you see points.

[Kyle Stapleton]

Yes, we are using the "Inlay toolpath"
In the 2d mode you can see that it will cut the wrong part.

[srwtlc]

Hmmm, are you using it for both the pocket inlay and male inlay? The male part looks like it's a standard profile toolpath because it's not rounding the corners according to the tool radius.

Post the file with your settings.

[Kyle Stapleton]

Wrong picture.
Here is the right one

[maverickx50]

I've not yet received or used a ShopBot but will be soon. So take what I'm saying with a grain of salt. I do have extensive experience with CNC machining of metals with both vertical CNC's and WEDM. This is with a much different scale and tolerance then what a shopBot will achieve in wood. All CNC's tend to undercut or over cut at the corners. Newer high end software now available does some compensating for this buy reducing the forward speed and actually adjusting the path but the tighter the corner radius the more you will see inside and outside corner cutting error. May require a manual cut path adjustment with smaller inside corner radii and larger outside corner radii to get the fit your looking for.

[srwtlc]

I think we're gonna need a look at the vectors on this one. If you zoom in on that sharp inside corner in node edit, is there possibly an overlap/crisscross there?

Fredrick, welcome. There's getting to be quite a few WI Botters now! I know what you're talking about, corner rounding, and that is something you don't need to worry about with a ShopBot. No need to be concerned with constant velocity and the related corner rounding issues and remembering to do G61 G64.