cad still falls short

[Joel Walker]

I don't know how many of you out their have Solidworks,Invertor,Solidedge,ProE,UGS,or Catia in their shop, but thouse who do I think will agree with me on this statement, The new Version of Mastercam is vastly improved over the older versions and I like it very much, but, the cad modeling is still very inferior to the other CAD programs I listed above, it is to tedius and unforgiving when drawing that i rarly use it. Once they make the cad part of the program with Parametric dimentioning I think the program will be close to perfect. For thouse of you who havent used any of the CAD programs that I mentioned above I'll try to explain how they work, let's say you drew a 2inch square in mastercam, and later on you need to change it to a 1x2 inch rectangle yes you can change the dimentions after it has been drawn, but none of the lines are associative so you have to change the length of 2 lines as supossed to 1 as in Solidworks. this is just one example of faster and easier ways of drawing in Solidworks. I hope that CNC Software will think of adding this superior way of drawing into thier future releases of Mastercam.

 

PS. sorry about the spelling

[Guest]

Master "CAM"

 

 

[Allan Brown]

+1

 

CNC Software would tend to set the bar for CAD based on other CAM packages, not on other pure CAD packages. They're not trying to compete with SolidsWorks.

[chris m]

+2

 

quote:

---

I hope that CNC Software will think of adding this superior way of drawing into thier future releases of Mastercam

---

If you want a banged-out CAD package, buy one; MasterCAM devotes their resources to the machining facets of their program because that's what its for. I am far from a CNC Software butt-boy but I will definitely say that their focus is in the right place.

 

C

[Joel Walker]

I agree with you Dave, and the program is really good, but why not go the extra mile (km up here eh!) and make it next to perfect.

[Bill]

I was discussing this last Friday.

 

I may be wrong but what I came up with is... to have MCam to be comparative to UG or Catia in the cad side would be bumping the price enormously.

 

I do like the constraint and expressions aspects of UG and Catia where I can change components on the fly without rebuilding them as well as the assembly links you can make with UG where as new data can change electrodes etc.. down the line, but I think to get these added features the cost would go up greatly.

 

I also like th drafting sheets you get but that is an additional interface (more money).

 

But I wouldn't use any cam software but MCam for milling.

 

We tried WorkNC and some others... Nope! Not for me.

[DC Gorn]

Look at it this way Joel. Mastercam gets $xxx in sales per year +/- 10% so they budget $x for development. This is not the bug chasers or the support guys just development. I want those guys working to make Post Processors easier to edit, 5 axis paths logs better, More ways to control my tools and for god sake a CNC software supported way to program my dang CMM. Not trying to keep up with a drawing package that is better funded and already way ahead of them.

[Altek]

Joel I'm with you on this one,

 

Were not talking about CAD vs. CAM, were talking design (Last I checked Mastercam was available as a standalone design package)

 

I'm not bashing Mastercam by any means - but we all do a fair amount of design work, it only adds complexity to do it in a separate piece of software. Unfortunately Given the choice when I need to design a fixture or make some shop floor prints I can do it much more efficiently in Inventor / Solidworks / etc... But the disconnect this creates in my data for the given job really sucks.

 

It would be nice to have the option of having all that functionality in one piece of software. That's all.

[chris m]

quote:

---

Last I checked Mastercam was available as a standalone design package

---

Sorry, but if you pick Mastercam from all of the available packages for design, you are a complete idiot.

 

It is what it is, and I'm sure that it will be improved as time elapses but I doubt very VERY much that it will ever touch the pure CAD packages.

 

C

[Thad]

UG's basic curve tools suck. I know people who work for EDS that will tell you that.

 

MC works great for our shop floor "design" uses, but I wouldn't buy it as our only design package.

 

Thad

[crazy^millman]

Everyone I knows get the desin seat to see things done in Mastercam. If you want the $5000 to $20000 capability for just design then go spend that much for that capability.