file types

[robh]

What would be the best type of file preferred for importing geo into mastercam best - worst?

[Leigh @ Kodiak]

Best: Anything but IGES. I prefer parasolids myself.

 

Worst: IGES

 

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

Free translators, STEP - *.step/*.stp, Parasolid - *.X_T/*.XMT_TXT, and ACIS - *.dat.

 

Those will be your most reliable. If you're truly running V9, you could have some issues as there are newer Versions of the kernels. Parasolid is up to V19 or V20 I think, and not sure what ACIS is up to. Your X4 will give you the most robust imports as of today.

 

There's a reason people pronounce IGES as Eye Guess, should be Eye Jess. It's dicey.

[moeh]

I mostly bring Inventor files in - I can't recall ever having a problem.

[timhochs]

For plain old 2d stuff AutoCad dwgs or dxfs are great.

 

I have imported IGES but that is only slightly better than nothing.

[Pete Rimkus from CNC Software Inc.]

robh,

The biggest factor determining what format to pass to Mastercam would be the CAD product that you'll be generating files with to send to Mastercam. Almost always, the 'direct' route is best (for instance, opening an Autodesk Inventor part directly).

[robh]

Thanks for responding everyone,and Pete, that's why I asked,I got sent an iges file when the file was made in SW.. so I asked for the sldprt one and got much better results.

[Jayson Kramer]

Its always good to ask what the native file is from. as we have many options for opening files you may be able do exactly as you did and ask for the SW file. Good luck...

 

Now that is funny. (pronounce IGES as Eye Guess,)

[Lee.]

Parasolid works really well for me.

[robh]

Thanks for the responses all..anyone familiar with vectorworks and its possible file extentions?

looks like dwg and dxf are the defaults but it can save in other formats also, any preference between those?