Best method to corner pick Radius ??

[tim_h]

I'm looking for suggestions on the best methods to finish cut these corner radius'.

I've been experimenting with "Flowline" and "Waterline REST" referencing to a stock model.

So far I haven't come up with the greatest looking toolpaths.

This is on a Horz, rotating so flat areas can be faced milled.

Part is oriented long in Y axis.

 

I am thinking I may follow prior suggestions to create surfaces and use flowline toolpaths.

It appears to be very tedious however.

 

I was hoping for an EASY BUTTON here...

 

Any suggestions ?

 

THANKS !

[Guest]

Pencil might well be an option here

[tim_h]

I will give a try..

 

Thanks JP

[FTI2007]

Surface finish leftover is usually my go to because I it works for me most of the time. I have mixed results with pencil for some reason. 

[tim_h]

My Pencil paths are not coming out very well... They are cutting perpendicular to the corner radius instead of along the corner... and cutting up the side walls. (Bitangency angle maybe?)

 

Definitely some room for learning / improvement...

 

 

[Jayson Kramer]

if you create surfaces for the radii then make a stock model from the the surfaces just for the radii. After you select the surfaces then tell it in the stock model setup to extend by .02 for example.
Now to a HST pencil against those radii to get a smoother path.

[jlw™]

I would probably use flowline on most of those and blend on the rest.

[Fred @ Slate Industries]

 

 

The easy button is about $28,000 a seat with $ 5,000. A year in maint.

 

It can be done in Mc with some fudging around as others stated . You'll get good at it in no time we promise !

[jlw™]

Is that Topsolid?

[Bob W.]

I would pick that out with Optirest after the flats have been finished, then try pencil.  If you get crappy results with the HST pencil try the standard surface machining pencil.  In my experience the flowline works well with simpler radii but that part looks like it might take 6-8 flowline toolpaths to run efficiently where the cut direction isn't changing 20 times.  Another thing I like about pencil it is will collapse reducing the need for perfect roughing.  With some finessing you should be able to finish that entire part with 1-2 pencil toolpaths and it will run very well (smoothly).  Another dark horse is the multi-axis morph between curves.  Maybe Ron will chime in on this.  It really is amazing what that can do though it is a little work to get it going if not familiar with it.  How many of these are you producing?  Repeat job?

[kkasmarcik726]

If you cant do it with optirest, use surface finish contour and build containments. That's how I get controlled nice toolpaths

[jlw™]

Lots of ways to skin that cat.

[tim_h]

It was a WHOLE LOT EASIER when I had Power-Mill for this kind of cornering...

 

We are only making 8 pcs.  Repeat job... maybe

 

Lots of different ways to do this, yes.

 

We have multi-axis available, i just haven't explored using it much.

 

Thanks for the input fellas'

[jlw™]

Don't get discouraged brother. I come from another top level software and I was hating it at first. Now you couldn't get me to go back.

 

Can you share a file? Is it the pocket or the others that are troubling? What is your desired finish, cycle time and what is the material?

[tim_h]

My biggest hurdle is that I know smoother tool paths are possible, i just don't know the best way to get MCX to do it. It would be great to do it without a ton of geometry creation...

 

I work in a programming dept of one. So I really appreciate the help that I get here !!

 

Here is what i'm going with. It's a combination of Flowline, Water line, and Raster(for leftover cusps).

 

I don't think I can share.

It's aluminum.

Finish is not specified.

[jlw™]

You're so close.  Go into gap settings and set it to distance and put like 100in in it.

[tim_h]

This one area i'm not real happy with... I don't want to pull this apart surface by surface.

 

 

[jlw™]

can you share just those surfaces?

[tim_h]

CORNER RADIUS.mcx-9

 

 

THANKS FOR LOOKING !

[ajmer]

Take a look at this file

I used hybrid and I created no extra geometryajmer_ihs_CORNER RADIUS.mcx-9

[Grievous]

How about a simpler solution?

I will finish the walls and floors til where the rad starts then do the rads like in the example attached. I would also add some multipass cuts to just remove the most of material on those rads 1st leaving let's say 0.01, then a finish cut like in the file.

You can have comp on the cutter and control the size also and plus less code.

See attachment

ajmer_ihs_CORNER RADIUS.mcam

[Grievous]

This new file has all the rads from that model finished....didn't have time to finish all on the 1st file I attached  ...busy here....lol

ajmer_ihs_CORNER RADIUS.mcam