Help Me lobby mastercam - X7 toolmanager

[MrFish]

Please help me to lobby Mastercam to give us the ability to create "neck relieved" cutters as a part of the standard cutter creation in the new tool manager. We cut a lot of moulds and medical and use this style of cutter on a daily basis to reach into deep pockets/features.

 

I am sick of having to create custom geometry for what I consider an "industry standard" cutter.I actually can't believe that they didn't include it when building the new tool manager. I would like to see the ability to create cutters in a block building fashion, similar to the holder creation. This way we could create any cutter shape we need quickly and easily without being constrained to the basic end mill/slot drill shapes.

 

Something that really causes us a lot of wasted time is that as it stands now we have to create these tools with custom geometry in mastercam and then do the same thing again in a different format to be able to run the program through vericut. If it was a standard mastercam cutter it would transfer to vericut as part of the "mastercam to vericut" interface , therefore saving a whole step in the process and saving users of both these systems a lot of time.

 

I have emailed QC about this now and previously, but it often feels like requests fall on deaf ears. So the more people requesting the more chance we have !

 

Please help.

[Guest MTB Technical Services]

I feel your pain.

To say the new Tool Manager is a huge disappointment is an understatement.

It appears they put more effort into the GUI for the Tool Manager than the function it should and would be used for.

 

There is a big reseller meeting this week at HQ.

Make sure your reseller has your request registered with CNC Software and make sure you let them know you expect a response.

 

Only time will tell if anyone will actually listen.

 

This is just one specific area where Mastercam lags far behind the competition and it needs to be corrected in an expedited fashion.

[Bob W.]

I don't put much effort into my Mastercam tool library because it is pretty much a waste of time. When I get a new tool I create it in Mastercam with the speeds and feeds, etc... But then it goes on the comparator and is input into Vericut. I get every angle, neck relief, radius, and I assign a tool holder with gage length. For me the Vericut library is the one that really matters and the tools are defined exactly as they are.

[MrFish]

I don't put much effort into my Mastercam tool library because it is pretty much a waste of time. When I get a new tool I create it in Mastercam with the speeds and feeds, etc... But then it goes on the comparator and is input into Vericut. I get every angle, neck relief, radius, and I assign a tool holder with gage length. For me the Vericut library is the one that really matters and the tools are defined exactly as they are.

 

Wish I had that luxury !!

 

But yes the tools in vericut are what matters most to us too when using it to prove 5 axis programs. The interface between mastercam and vericut needs a lot of work in this area too. Cgtech have told me in previous versions that they couldn't do any better due to the lack of information in Mastercams tool manager. I was hoping that the new mastercam tool manager would allow CGtech to do a better job of transferring the tool data from mastercam to vericut, but after seeing how basic it is I have my doubts it is going to make any difference any time soon.

[Bob W.]

What I did is create my entire tool library in Vericut and instead of having the interface export the tools from Mastercam I have it reference the tools from the setup template. Every one of my tools has a unique tool number so when simulating the Makinos, which support this, it is a breeze and very accurate. When simulating the Haas it is more of a pain to deal with the tools since they have to be renumbered.

[Colin Gilchrist]

What Tim mentioned is very true. Please make your requests to your local Reseller. We have a big team of people working on the Tool Manager, and many user requests are being worked on currently. Please make sure your request is made through the Reseller channel so it can get in the backlog to be worked on.

 

One of the things that is built into the new Tool Manager is the ability to read data from various tool catalogs. More changes are planned, and we especially want to hear from our customers on what their needs are, so we can build features to help them make their jobs easier. The new database uses some form of SQL, (sql lite?), which means that running a query on the data, or building interfaces to read/write that data should be much easier for everyone to access, and gives us the ability to store other data like "cut data parameters". Your Resellers will have much more information after the conference in Connecticut this week.

 

Thanks,

 

Colin

[Mick]

What I did is create my entire tool library in Vericut and instead of having the interface export the tools from Mastercam I have it reference the tools from the setup template. Every one of my tools has a unique tool number so when simulating the Makinos, which support this, it is a breeze and very accurate. When simulating the Haas it is more of a pain to deal with the tools since they have to be renumbered.

 

Exactly. Don't rely on Mastercam for the tool, rely on Vericut. I kind of work in reverse nowadays. I tend to create generic tools in Mastercam but spend the time modeling them and building the Vericut tool library, because Vericut is the one that tells me wether the tool works or not.

 

I had a chance to have a look at the Zoller presetter in Charlotte. That is a real nice piece of equipment. I didn't get pricing though...

[Guest MTB Technical Services]

If Vericut is part of your toolbox, take a good look at WinTool and TDM for building your Tooling Assemblies.

Both can export directly to Vericut as well as interfacing directly to Tool Presetters like Zoller

[Thee Rickster ™]

What Tim mentioned is very true. Please make your requests to your local Reseller. We have a big team of people working on the Tool Manager, and many user requests are being worked on currently. Please make sure your request is made through the Reseller channel so it can get in the backlog to be worked on.

 

Will this happen for X7 MU3, (MU4), or is X8 going to have most of the fixes?

[Colin Gilchrist]

Well, since we are working on X7 MU1 currently, I'd say let's try and get the requests in for the current Maintenance Update. The more feedback we get on an issue, the more attention an issue gets.

[Guess_who]

If Vericut is part of your toolbox, take a good look at WinTool and TDM for building your Tooling Assemblies.

Both can export directly to Vericut as well as interfacing directly to Tool Presetters like Zoller

 

We have Vericut and Wintool here. I'm not a big fan of Wintool. It is always way behind on updates for the MasterCam interface and it's still a bit buggy. Not very much support either.

[Thee Rickster ™]

Sorry Colin, I meant SP3....

[JAMMAN]

Well, since we are working on X7 MU1 currently, I'd say let's try and get the requests in for the current Maintenance Update. The more feedback we get on an issue, the more attention an issue gets.

 

Perhaps us as the end users don't see the actual requests or the frequency of submission of certain request.

[RonC.]

seem like everyone agree that vericut is the way to go, then why not merge vericut and mastercam into one package?

I know we have looked into vericut but for some reason the powers that be don't think we need it..lol even thought we do 5x machining on a daily bases, I guess cause no one has hit anything hard yet .. they figure we got a good grasp on things...

[Guest MTB Technical Services]

We have Vericut and Wintool here. I'm not a big fan of Wintool. It is always way behind on updates for the MasterCam interface and it's still a bit buggy. Not very much support either.

 

Ray,

 

Call Marcus at Datos and let him know about your support issue.

The US arm of WinTool is based here in TX and they are just plain lousy on support for everything.

 

I initially had problems with them for ESPRIT as well.

The ESPRIT interface works very well now.

Seamless bi-directional translation now.

 

I would expect the Vericut Module of WinTool to be as stable and reliable as the ESPRIT module.

[Guess_who]

Ray,

 

Call Marcus at Datos and let him know about your support issue.

The US arm of WinTool is based here in TX and they are just plain lousy on support for everything.

 

I initially had problems with them for ESPRIT as well.

The ESPRIT interface works very well now.

Seamless bi-directional translation now.

 

I would expect the Vericut Module of WinTool to be as stable and reliable as the ESPRIT module.

 

 

I'll do that. Thanks.

[MrFish]

What Tim mentioned is very true. Please make your requests to your local Reseller. We have a big team of people working on the Tool Manager, and many user requests are being worked on currently. Please make sure your request is made through the Reseller channel so it can get in the backlog to be worked on.

 

One of the things that is built into the new Tool Manager is the ability to read data from various tool catalogs. More changes are planned, and we especially want to hear from our customers on what their needs are, so we can build features to help them make their jobs easier. The new database uses some form of SQL, (sql lite?), which means that running a query on the data, or building interfaces to read/write that data should be much easier for everyone to access, and gives us the ability to store other data like "cut data parameters". Your Resellers will have much more information after the conference in Connecticut this week.

 

Thanks,

 

Colin

 

Thanks for the reply Colin. As mentioned I have sent it through to QC so hopefully will be logged as a request.

 

Thought it was good idea to start the forum topic too to hopefully gain some support for my request, knowing that CNC software are actively monitoring the forum now

[Newbeeee™]

Having not used the X7 toolmanager yet, after reading this thread I would respectfully suggest the obvious that CNC have a good look at Vericut's toolmanager.

Copying good points off of someone else is obviously not a bad thing - copying bad things off someone else is

[Watcher]

We have Vericut and Wintool here. I'm not a big fan of Wintool. It is always way behind on updates for the MasterCam interface and it's still a bit buggy. Not very much support either.

 

Thanks for you input here. That was the info I was looking for to make an investment decison.

 

Tks

 

Daniel