Control of direction of cutting along a path?

[shoeshine]

OK for various reasons including elements I need to avoid and the geometry of the bit I'm using, I need to create a very specific motion along a toolpath. (profile "on")


4150

having a hard time creating a toolpath in partworks that does this. every time I try to path this it wants to go to the end of the segment and plunge, cut that segment and raise up to go to the next.


4151

any ideas on how to accomplish this?

Thanks in advance
Chris

[tmerrill]

Chris,

You would have to do an individual toolpath for each segment you want. You can control the start/stop points by using node edit and changing the Start Node as appropriate.

Then you select the toolpaths in the order you want them cut and save them all to your hard drive as one file.

Tim

[shoeshine]

I am hoping to do this with a "T" slot cutter so I have to enter from the edge of the material. I cant plunge. can I edit the start node so as not to raise up to a safe Z between cuts?

[tmerrill]

Chris,

You should be able to do this with your lead in/out tool. Let me work on an example and I'll be back. I'm assuming the edge of your work would be on either side of the large arc?

Tim

[shoeshine]

yup... (really this is a simplified drawing, the actual toolpath wanders all over and has 30 of these little T's sticking off of it) but for all intents and purposes... yup

Thanks for the help

[Brian Moran]

Chris,

The only way to achieve this reliably with PartWorks is to draw the complete path (going back over itself on the exit sections) as one unbroken vector and then use the profile toolpath with the 'On' option. The toolpath will then follow the vector exactly.

If you break the vector up into pieces you will get retracts between the segments.

Brian

[tmerrill]

Chris,

First, you can't join simple vectors like your example shows. So I got around that by creating parallel lines very close together (0.01" using rectangles and deleting the small spans), then combined. This took using the node edit feature, not sure how comfortable you are with that. Then all vectors were joined and a Profile ON toolpath generated using a Lead IN/Lead OUT. Attached pictures show how the bit will plunge outside the material, follow the vectors at depth, and exit on the other side of the material.

Hope this helps,

Tim


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[shoeshine]

Ahhh... OK, the little bulb just went on over my head (rather dimly, but on ;-)

I will go back to the original drawing and create it as a single vector, a pain in the proverbial butt, but I see now how that would work.

Thanks Brian (and Tim)