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Looking at using Cadkey99 w/ Mastercam


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Hello:

I am new here also. My company is located in Portland, Maine. USA. We manufacture Industrial Brakes and Controls for the Converting Industry.

We are in the process of evaluating CNC-Cam programs.

Where I am the Cad [Cadkey99] Guru here I was elected to help evaluate what's available. However; my area of expertise is Cad and not Cam so this is also a learning process for me.

I am impressed with what I have seen of Mastercam to date; having seen a brief demo by a Job-shop. Now I need to know how it would work with Cadkey99-Cadkey-20.

Cadkey99 can output "sat[sab]"; solid iges, dxf, step, parasolid x_t and stl files.

So... my first question will be: is anyone on this forum using Cadkey as their Cad program and exporting files to mastercam?..and if so; how is it working out for you?

Thanks in advance.

------------------

PMJR

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Mastercam will import Parasolid files (x_t) as solids, and V8 will import Cadkey ACIS files (SAT) as solids as well (converting to Parasolid on the way). V7 handles the SAT files as surfaces.

Mastercam uses the Parasolid kernel so x_t files are preferred. With all solid files, you can import a wireframe at the same time, and convert solids to surfaces, so all geometry entities are covered.

I encourage others who use both systems to reply.

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Cadkey outputs a type of Conic that may not translate into Mastercam from Iges. The SAT and Parasolid are fine. If you handle data from outside sources by Iges, You will find that Mastercam is much better at it than Cadkey. Our mold designers have me import and export all data before it goes into Cadkey. We have had Cadkey/Mastercam for over 10 years inhouse and Mastercam has even translated Catia Iges when neither Cadkey or AutoCad could.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Greetings

I have been using Mastercam for 10 or 11 years now. I have found it to have the best translators around.

We bring all files with no problems at all.

For some "useless knowledge" see http://www.cadcamcnc.com

Very Best Regards,

George

PS

Contact [email protected] his name is George

and I have worked with him for over 15 years.

He is a top notch person and tells it like it is.

George is a teacher in one of the oldest "trade" schools in the US.

It is now called Worcester Vocational Technical HS.

I know MIT and WPI and believe Univ of Lowell use Masetercam and CADKEY

you can check with them as far as I know they are all happy campers.

[This message has been edited by cadcamcnc (edited 04-27-2000).]

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Brakeman, I am on a similar task as yourself in that I am studying Mastercam for translations. We use Cadkey 99 currently in our tool and fixture design dept.s. We recently purchased a seat of Mastercam to for our NC programming dept., the other software is CAMAX. Mastercam performs well as a cam package, a draw back is the large sized out-put machine files. I work in solids and export files to the Mastercam station and CAMAX station nearly exclusively. We don't use Mastercam for NC turning, we do alot of contour milling and engraving though. My files come through Mastercam nicely in both surfaces and wire-frame (desolidified solids). I would agree with the other replies you've gotten regarding Mastercam's translators, this in fact was a major influence in our purchase decision. We have the Catia translator but haven't done alot with it yet. Mastercam has stronger translating ability than any other software we've tried. Cadkey 99 has improved greatly but without the Mastercam conversions, I would be working with a lot less useable design geometry.

Please keep me informed on any information you dig up. You might also inquire on the Cadkey wedsite for more user input.

Regards, Max

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