Pocket toolpath via chook

[Duckman]

Hi everyone, have a nice little question to ask...

 

I quite a newbie, but am (and must) create a chook that will create a pocket toolpath, given a certain set of closed chains in MasterCAM. What needs to happen is that the user will load a MC* file, and when he runs the chook, the chook will create a horizontally running toolpath.

 

I really have no idea how to start, so I'm just wondering if anyone has any ideas, or if anyone knows how the toolpath->pocket operations works (after user has selected chain(s)...

 

I've looked into the API, and have found the pock_chn struct and the chains_to_pock_bounds methods will prob be useful...and I know that things are stored as entities...but assuming that none of these entities are connected via chains, how would i proceed?

 

perhaps a little long winded, but thanks for any help!!

[cadcam]

Duckman no disrespect.but I am still not understanding why you are trying to make this

you are talking less then few min of work by just saving an op then putting it to the new file. it has all the feeds speeds tools and you are done.

 

JM2C

[Duckman]

O, because in addition to the parameters that can be set within mastercam, i also need set additional parameters of the toolpath, such as the angle of the pocket cuts relative to the x axis, overlap between successive cuts...

 

also, this step is necessary for extension into 3D applications..

[Duckman]

Suppose that I am only considering lines and arcs. Is it possible to cycle through all the entities and determine which entities have a common endpoint, and then create a chain from that?

 

Thx again!