Engineering Change...Again !!

[Incogneeto]

Hi Guys, Can someone explain How to import or export all of my toolpaths and Definitions to a stp.file that has been slightly modified by engineering. Hate having to restart the whole process over when its only a simple change. TIA

[gcode]

There are three ways to go

1.Open your stp file, load the correct machine def and import all the ops from the original

2. Open the original, export all the ops to an ops file, then import the ops file to your new STP file

3.Open the original, import the new stp, and delete the old stp .. this is the method I would probably use

[Incogneeto]

5 minutes ago, gcode said:

There are three ways to go

1.Open your stp file, load the correct machine def and import all the ops from the original

2. Open the original, export all the ops to an ops file, then import the ops file to your new STP file

3.Open the original, import the new stp, and delete the old stp .. this is the method I would probably use

#3 sounds right on 2018 should I go through Change Recognition? I'm not seeing import or export.

[gcode]

1 minute ago, Incogneeto said:

#3 sounds right on 2018 should I go through Change Recognition? I'm not seeing import or export.

you could try Change Recognition .. though I must confess I'm not smart enough to figure it out.

I would normally use File/Merge and bring the new model it.

[huskermcdoogle]

I'm with gcode on change recognition.

I open the original mcam file. 

Save as new rev.

Merge in new solid to new revised level, then go through toolpath by toolpath reassigning and created geometry as needed. 

     Old Rev geometry I created which needs updating gets copied to a new "old rev" level, geo on original level gets modified to reflect revisions.

Solid toolpath associations, get reassigned to the new solid.  (this gets tricky finding them all, but the easiest way is to make them all go dirty and go through them one by one.)

 

There is no truly easy way.  It also depends heavily on how much has been updated, is it a quick change, or heavy modification.  Light changes I hardly every bother doing anything other than updating toolpaths that need to be updated, no solid associations get updated.  Get's time consuming very quickly.

 

 

[Guest]

Change recognition isn't too bad but on a really complex file, yeah, it could be cumbersome...

Biggest thing to do to start is to make sure to get the incoming part into the same orientation as the existing part....

Once you begin the Change Recognition process, it will show the paths that are not compliant to the new geometry, within that dialog you can reselect the new geo....going through op by op...

For parts where it hasn't gone through a wholesale change, it can get quick...

 

[Incogneeto]

Thanks Gentlemen, You too G,

And yes JP orientation is kicking me , I didn't make the original so I'm unfamiliar with the program as of now.

Thanks All of You.

[gcode]

If the seed and donor files have different orientations I usually save my new model as a Mastercam file,

orient that to match the original, then merge it.

If new rev's are happening a lot cause the engineers can't make up their minds, I'll export

some defining geometry from the original file into a translate template file.

Then you can merge your new model to the template and use 3D Translate (plane to plane/point to point) to orient your new model.

Of course the best solution is to leave everything in your customer's model space, but in this case,

a previous programmer has taken that option off the table.