quote: BTW ,Corey ,what are your first impressions from their hybrid modeling ? They have Hybrid modeling? Like VX Vision or ThinkDesign ?

I downloaded it too. But I missed auto complete feature in IE. Is it any way to enable it in Mozilla? I use to use search engines alot and want to see my previous keywords when typing.

I've been using SW since SW98 . And now I'm using 2004 although I'm trying to learn PRO/E WildFire. I think SW is the best mid range solid modeling software. However there are other factors that should be taken into consideration. The main question in choosing a CAD is what you want to design with it? Here are my findings about SW: SolidWorks is considered to be the main competitor for PRO/E WildFire (former PRO/E with the new look) which is a high end CAD. SW has one of the best User Interface that can be found in a CAD software. Unlike PRO/E WildFire, the interface is virtually unified throughout the software. WildFire is in the first stages of changing its interface and that's why it becomes easier to use in each update. The SW learning curve is shorter than WildFire and believe me, once you are used to SolidWorks and the way it works and its logic you can not work with other CADs easily. You can draw a sketch much faster in SW than PRO/E, you can handle your features easier in it ... But it's not the whole story: Unlike designing for mechanical parts/assy , desinging molds requires that your CAD is able to create complex surfaces/solids/assemblies/drawing too. SolidWorks has the basic tools to create solids and surfaces, eg , extrude/revolve/loft/sweep but you can not find complex features that are available in PRO/E. Also some features have less options than their equivalents have in PRO/E or UG , like variable draft, or creating sets of complex fillets w/ complex transitions in one feature that can be found in PRO/E. If your parts are not very complex in shape and can be built with simple geometric features like extrude/revolve/loft then SolidWorks is the way to go and beats PRO/E easily. On the other hand if your parts are complex in shapes and consist of free form surfaces or if you're using digitized points and curves to create your parts , then you're in trouble. SolidWorks does not have the appropriate tools to create/modify/optimize curves/surfaces, I don't know much about PRO/E in this field although it has more tools like IDX. I use Rhino and PowerSHAPE to create complex surfaces instead. You can find info on using Rhino along with SolidWorks on the net. Another issue we're having with SW is, Dassault Systemes (owner of SolidWorks) is constantly changing the way SW creates features. We have models in SW2004 SP0 that have rebuilt errors in SW2004SP1 mainly fillets/lofts/sweeps. And rebuilt errors from SP1 to SP2 , too. So usual rebuilt errors between major upgrades like 2003->2004 are common. It's really pain in the arse. I think the most stable version was 2001. I don't think the same applies to WildFire. My recommendation is to search about WildFire and compare it to SolidWorks especially if you do complex molds and parts.

Are you running any anti-virus program ?

Sorry for being late on this. Really thank you Thad , it works great. I used to do it with "Collision Check" in operation manager.

Hi everybody, I want to know how you guys check for gouges when machining with negative stock? I usually create an STL file from model and check gouges with respect to it but It doesn't apply when negative stock used in operaion. It's always possible that a transition/retract motion causes gouge.

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I think ASUS mobos (for workstation) have the best performance and stability. I don't know about 64bit platform but in 32bit ASUS most of the time is the best. Look at A7N8X for example. 1GB RAM is minimum these days. Also I want to know about ATi 9800P (bad and good). I always use Nvidia but recetly there's a patch that can soft mod your ATi 9700-9800 to FireGL X1. The benchmark and the guys said they had a real FireGL . In that case should we stay away from FireGL X1 too?

I had a problem like this before with a Dialog11 control. The control didn't accept those G2/G3 codes when the start radius and end radius differed only 1E-6. So I added some logic to post and moved center to the equidistant line and all the problems gone. HTH

i've been told to uncheck this option to get faster calc time. ALT-O -> Toolpaths -> Surface Options -> Uncheck Display surface/plane intersections HTH

Will next version be able to calculate roughing/finishing with respect to a STL file? (KSR) ?

AFAIK the only output from any 3d machining operation is linear move unless you use filter option (creating arcs from initial linear moves)

cadcam, You can import v15 however you can export v14.x .

You can import parasolid v15 into mc9.1sp2 too.

Hi everybody, The company decide to purchase a measuring device. The main use of the device will be: 1- verifying automobile parts (oil pumps and the like which the tolerances are 0.01mm) and calculating errors between machined and CAD models 2- Reverse engineering. Sometimes customers want minor changes in their products especially in plastics parts. So a reverse engineering is inevitable. I want to know basic differences between a CMM and a digitizer (especially in terms of accuracy/speed/functionality). For example can a digitizer be programmed like a CMM to measure a bore or other features? Thanks in advance

Thanks claus, Looks exciting. Does it run only on MC9.1SP1? Can we run it on 8.1.1 too?

Some days ago there was a thread about a 3rd party chook which decreased an scallop calculation time by a factor of 3x. I posted a reply about it but the post poofed. Is it that chook you're talking about?

2^15-1 = 32767

Claus, I should set DNC to ON every time the machine starts otherwise "DNC IN" will not be accessible. There are 3 modes in DNC 1- IN 2- OUT 3- DIR I wonder what the last item means? Jack, I think line number is mandatory . There is no way to input program without line number on these controllers .Besides the DNCMAX will change line numbers automatically with +1 increment. Each divided program begins with N1 and ends with N9999 .

Claus, I used offset 50000 with 125000 bytes memory reserved and my program number was 250. I called 50250 on controller . The CNC showed starting to download 50250 (with the message "NLP aus" in front of the program number) The program was 40 lines starting from N1 to N39 and N9999. Then starting 50251 and so on. When I selected 50250 and pressed cycle start everything went fine untill it reached to N9999 (in 50250). The machine stopped but download continued untill the memory became full and downloading stopped too. I looked at %50250, the last line was : N9999 L0 %50251 This code can not be run on this machine. And machine can't pass it. Is there anything I missed? Thanks

Thanks for the replies, Claus, I enabled this button but didn't know I should call 50012 instead of 12. Each time I set it the controller showed me an error msg. I'm going to my friend's shop again to try it . Maybe this time it works. I will inform you all. Thanks again

Jack, These controller doesn't have support as far as I know from DMG. At that time Deckel was not merged with MAHO and Gilemeister. With Cimco I can't use Xon/Xoff or hardware since in deckel 4 template there's no option to set them. I looked at the template file and saw that it uses flowcontrol=NONE . Editing thios file and changing it to HARDWARE or SOFTWARE did not solve the problem. Budgie, Dialog 11 is newer that 4 and both of them use decimal places without sign . And I can drip feed D11 at 19200. The max speed on D4 is 9600bps.

I've not seen MAHO 432. But I guess it should be different especially in communication. The machine is Deckel FP3NC . It was built in 1985-6.

Hi everyone, Today I installed an evaluation version of DNCMAX for a friend since I have a good exprience with it in our company with a Deckel Dialog 11 (LSV2). Now this time it is a Deckel Dialog 4 (the mid 80's control) . The problem is the machine continues to download codes and can execute it but it seems there's no mechanism to refresh memory and after 350Kb the memory is full. Error message is "Communication problem detected". I chose Deckel Dialog 4 LSV2 template. And 2400bps 7E1 on both sides. Any suggestion? Thanks Kevin

Back to the Wants for vX, - I wish I can use two other stock to leave : 1. axial stock to leave 2. radial stock to leave for ball/bull/flat end mills. - Gouge checking for negative stock to leave - Machining mesh entities such as STL/3DS just like any surface