Anybody Using X to program a wire EDM? specifically AGIE

[MILLRUNNER]

I have Mastercam X2, and I currently use it to program for AGIE Classicut machines. However, I only use it to chain a contour and produce an ISO file. I'm trying to understand the different output methods and in researching the different posts I have I found a couple of different things. I want to try one of the other Generic Agievision post processors that puts out an SBL file.

 

Currently, the only thing I do is chain the contour I have in Mastercam and then produce an ISO. Then, once I get to my wire machine I do all my offsets, entry point, tab size, number of cuts (accuracy) etc there. I also enter all block dimensions and other information at the machine. From what I understand, if I do all of this in Mastercam I won't have to do it in the machine. An SBL file appears to output all information (block dimensions, start points, offsets etc), but I don't know how to set up the Mastercam part of it.

 

When I open Mastercam I go up to the top and click "machining type", and then pick my post processor. Here I would select "AGIE GENERIC AGIEVISION 4X WIRE.WMD" as the new one I want to try which outputs the SBL file. I'm not sure if this is the correct post processor or not, but for now I just want to figure out how to program the block from inside of mastercam instead of at the wire.

 

From there If I open up the + signs to make the sub menues show I see the Files, Program Settings, and Stock setup. I'm not really sure about the Files tab. I see the location of where the program will be sent?? and maybe some other things. The Program settings tab seems to define the program # and sequence #. I'm not sure what effect any changes I make here would have. Finally the block dimensions page will define the block dimensions. I'm thinking I would go with rectabgle here because most of our blocks are rectangle or some sort of square. I'm not sure what the changes in the display button will do. From what I can tell the buttons at the bottom are just simple ways of selecting the geometry in the drawing window so that you don't have to enter values into the fields for X,Y, and Z manually. Is this correct?

 

When I go up to the top and click my chaining button the box pops up asking me for the name and I hit the green check for OK. Then the chaining box pops up to the left. I'm not sure what to click here for the right thing, but I have always clicked the button on the top left with the three overlapping circles that says "Chain" when you mouse-over. Once I do that I click my contour and then I click the green check for OK.

 

The wire contour box pops up and has the several tabs across the top. I just noticed that there is a button for AGIEVISION to the right. When I click it, a box pops up that says "Incompatible perameter settings for agievision were detected-output tabcut/with last cut not enabled, yes resets perameters, no to continue with errors" I hit no here and it pops up a box that looks very similar to my machine interface - same fields, values etc. I'm not sure where to go from here, as it gets really involved.

 

If I could get some help with what I have listed above I might be able to figure it out. Can anybody assist me in this part of the operation of Mastercam?

 

Thanks

[steveo25]

If you go to the in house solutions website and get a tutorial book that would probably be the best bet and the fastest way to get started. Another good website is eapprentice.net I believe you can get a one day free pass to see if you like it. This website has an abundance of useful videos that would probably help you get started aswell.

[steveo25]

The program# and sequence# options are the settings for when you post your toolpaths into your editor. Sequence will set your block numbers N100, N102...ect. The stock setup will setup your stock. after you get your dimensions for your stock setup and placed properly on your origin you will need to check the display option so your stock is visible. The rest you will just have to play with and go through the tutorial book or videos. When you create your toolpath just back plot it and see if its what you are looking for.

[Roger Peterson]

Get updated, X4 and X5 have a Agievision AWF machine definition. This stands for Agie Work Flow, this machine definition modifies the Mastercam wirepath interface to basically look like the agievision controller, and it only includes wirepaths that the Agievision supports. It is worth taking a look at it, it makes programming the agievision controller really straight forward. Your dealer can give you more info, there may even be some videos online that show the AWF functionality. There's not much info here but this is a link to mastercam's wire page which has a little info on the agievision:

 

agievision support

 

HTH