New Roughing Preview

January 8, 2009 · Filed Under MeshCAM Development 

Just to prove that I am working on new V3 features I’m posing a preview of the updated roughing algorithm.

New Roughing Algorithm

You can see that the cutter will now cut the area between two Z levels to leave an even skin of stock for the finishing algorithms.  This is something people have been requesting for a while so I made it the first major feature that will be released. 

 

I am also investigating code to dynamically vary the feedrate depending on how buried the tool is in the stock.  There’s no code for this part yet- it’s still in the design stage right now.

 

My real motivation to show this is to encourage feedback on the last release.  The quicker I get that one done the quicker I can move on to releasing V3.

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Comments

4 Responses to “New Roughing Preview”

  1. Randy on January 8th, 2009 6:10 pm

    Robert, you’ve never needed to prove anything to the user community. Your dedication to developing MeshCAM is unimpeachable. :) But thank you for the update, and another glimpse into your creative process. The “behind the scenes” is priceless…

    I really look forward to your “conformal roughing” (feel free to use that term if you want–I just thought it up) because it will save me a ton of work on my more finicky jobs.

    Dynamic feedrate! What can I say? That is putting MC into a whole ‘nuther level of sophistication.

    I need to get my mill updates done and give 7283 a proper workout!

    Randy

  2. Robert on January 8th, 2009 7:29 pm

    I may have a little to prove- my release date estimation record is pretty horrible.

    I think I’ll take your conformal roughing term. I was trying to figure out what to call it.

    I think the dynamic feedrates should be pretty good. I’ve been getting much more feedback from people lately- mostly bug reports- and I’m getting a better feel for what they’re using MC for. With that info I expect I’ll do well adding a couple of toolpath features that you’d normally have to add a zero or two on the price to get. (Dynamic feedrates also make it easier for a new user to find reasonable settings without snapping endmills after that initial plunge)

    I’m anxious to see your completed mill enclosure. I’m finally able to use mine again. The 48 degree temp in the shop caused the z axis to completely malfunction until this week. I was planning to call Tormach and complain ( I couldn’t figure it out) when my dad mentioned that his Bridgeport clone quit working with some kind of fault code because of the cold weather. Turned out to be the problem for me as well.

    Robert

  3. Jeff Demand on January 9th, 2009 12:04 pm

    Robert,

    Both are very good. I’m running a piece right now where the conformal roughing would sure help calm me. A 7283 roughing cut really looked scary with vertical steps which I didn’t understand, but not enough to abort. Finished fine though. No problems with 7283.

    The dynamic feed is welcome, I manually edit to slow the the first finish pass but some models have other lines buried (in megabytes of code) which should also go slow. I just don’t have the patience to find them nor stand with my finger on the feed rate over ride. I cringe a lot, some times even put off checking the finished piece :-)

    I can sympathise with your shop temperatures, mine will often dip below 10°C (old habit with C°, but you don’t need to buy as many degrees :-) A couple of small electric heaters help, as would a faster computer… my office is kept quite warm with my design box, although the summer AC is needed far sooner than expected.

    Jeff

  4. Ian Knight on January 12th, 2009 3:48 am

    Hello Robert
    No need to prove anything as you already have the best “Bang for your Buck” CAM software on the market anyway and this feature will really help.

    Many thanks

    Ian Knight