X7 Tool Manager

[Hondarosa1]

Hello Everyone- Been lurking for a bit, haven't posted in a while.

 

I'm curious how many of you are using the new Tool Manager with success? I was just trying it out today and it seems to crash quite a bit. If you don't take perfect sequential steps to build your tool, holder, assembly, it'll crash.

 

Anyone else having issues?

 

Is there a way to get the Mastercam holder libraries into Tool Manager?

 

Cheers

Hondarosa1

[tedly]

it has not crash yet but i can't claim the exact ways to creat custom tools yet. it gave me a different shape tool in the assembly. other than that it works fine. i am not understand about iso 13399. Mastercam don't have much to read about. may be some one can tell me otherwise.

[Rob Peirolo CNC Software]

If you are creating a tool from a DXF file, the DXF you are importing the geometry from must conform to ISO1339

If you are creating a custom tool from Mastercam geometry, then the old rules apply (Vertical tool in the X+,Y+ quadrant)

 

ISO 13399 in a nut shell....

1) The tool must be oriented horizontally, totally on the Y+ side of the "Y" origin.

2) The holder, or "Non-cutting" portion of the tool must be on a level named "NOCUT" the level number is insignificant.

3) The cutting portion of the tool i.e. the chain that represents the flutes or insert, (All this chain has to be is a rectangle) must be on a level named "CUT".

4) The CUT and NOCUT boundaries must be closed boundaries and at minimum must touch each other. They can overlap, but the CUT boundary cannot be totally within the NOCUT boundary.

 

If you open a DXF file from a tool vendor in Mastercam you will see all kinds of other information and geometry in the file.

This is O.K. as we search for the CUT and NOCUT levels.

So as far as ISO13399 is concerned you can create a valid tool with 2 rectangles on 2 levels named CUT and NOCUT.

[Matthew Hajicek - Singularity]

I've been using it successfully, but yes, it does crash a lot. You can have multiple Tool Manager's open at once and drag-and-drop holders, tools, and assemblies between them. When you click-hold to drag, you get about a 60% or so chance of being able to move it. If you see a rectangle you've got it. If you see a "no" symbol, try again. Clicking on another tool and then back often seems to help. Development is aware of the problems and working on them.

[kunfuzed]

When trying to create a new tool, it let me create a 90 degree Facemill with corner radius's (using the full radius option oddly enough), but once created, it was an invalid tool. Seems that's always been a problem, having a 90 facemill with corner radii.

[Hondarosa1]

Thanks Guys- I'm not creating custom tools, but thanks for the in depth description, I'm sure it'll come up. It took me almost an hour just to create 6 standard tools and holder/assembly combinations.... Crashed probably 7 times. The little "box" did show up a couple times, but not consistently and I never saw "no".

I was trying to expand the columns on the "tool" tab in between "name" and "diameter, when all of a sudden the column shrinks and I mysteriously have 2 copied tools....

Similar experience with the Face mill deal. When using it with backplot it's got this ghost like tip below the tool, but in Mach Sim it looks o.k.

There also seems to be issues with editing a tool in MasterCam after it's been created in "ToolManager". I was trying change the diameter of a facemill in MC using edit tool, but the diameter wouldn't stay.

I'm still curious if you can access any of the holder libraries within "ToolManager" or does every holder need to be created ?

 

Sincerely frustrated with this and MachSim...

 

Hondarosa

[Hondarosa1]

my bad. The facemill edit wasn't working because the outter diameter wasn't large enough...

[Matthew Hajicek - Singularity]

I don't know about accessing the older style holder libraries if you have customs in there, but there is a new HOLDERS.TOOLDB that you can access and copy from.

[olivier]

How to import your old holders in the Tool Manager:

 

1. Create a contour operation

2. Click "Open library" in "Holder" tab of operation

3. Browse your *.holders file

4. Click "Save library"

5. Select "Save as type" *.tooldb

6. Open this file with Tool manager

 

This manager is fabulous with new tool paths.

It is useless with old style operations like engraving where there is no holder management.

 

Good luck.

[Guest]

One thing to note with the new tool manager, you NEED to be patient. I know all you hotkey fiends just itch to hit keys, just relax, make deliberate keystrokes and DO NOT GET IN A HURRY!!!!!!!! that will help a bunch.

[spade117]

I have not had any crashing issues so far, but I do have problems when unchecking the *inch values* box when editing a tool. If I go back to that tool, the box is checked again.

[specv]

it crashes on me as soon as I try to create a tool, it is absolutely worthless for me.

[Scott Lundin Shopware Inc.]

it crashes on me as soon as I try to create a tool, it is absolutely worthless for me.

If you are getting an error message that mentions target of an invocation or unable to cast object of type, then it is most likely due to a messed up netframework 4.0 installation. I have run into this twice now. Try a windows update first, be aware the netframework updates are under optional updates, not always under critical/important updates. In the two cases I ran into I had to uninstall netframework 4.0 and download/install again from microsoft's website. Make sure to re-start the computer after re-installing netframework 4.0 to get it to take effect.

[specv]

If you are getting an error message that mentions target of an invocation or unable to cast object of type, then it is most likely due to a messed up netframework 4.0 installation. I have run into this twice now. Try a windows update first, be aware the netframework updates are under optional updates, not always under critical/important updates. In the two cases I ran into I had to uninstall netframework 4.0 and download/install again from microsoft's website. Make sure to re-start the computer after re-installing netframework 4.0 to get it to take effect.

 

I have done this several times as advised by my reseller and cnc software. I've un installed mc and re installed, nothing works.

[specv]

It finally started working after the last set of windows updates.

[Scott Lundin Shopware Inc.]

Windows updates can cause some strange things sometimes. It once took out one of my raid backup hard drives because the firmware was not compatible with the update.

[Matthew Hajicek - Singularity]

If you are getting an error message that mentions target of an invocation or unable to cast object of type, maybe your wizard needs to be a higher level.

[Scott Lundin Shopware Inc.]

Higher wizard level....Good One!

[Matthew]

Is there a tutorial for using the tool manager? I messed around with it a little bit but haven't had a lot of success. I created a tool, created a holder, but how to I assemble them together?

 

Matt.

[CarbonCAD]

Scott - The .NET Framework 4.0 fix worked for me. Thanks.

[tozmaster]

Mathew Hajicek is right

I updated my wizard and all problems went away