Thanks that great info. I am going to have to get one to try out if all the laptops of the future are going to be without serial ports.

Are there special drivers for these or just pick comm 1, comm 2... like usual?

What types of machines is your company running? Many controllers, even some relatively older ones, would take in dxf or dwg files to be used to create toolpaths. I also remember coming accross something about taking in an ascii file, I am not sure how that worked though maybe someone else can add to this. This might be worth checking into since you can save out any of these formats from Mastercam.

Bulliness, can you do serial communication throuh a usb port? If so is there anything special that needs to be done to communicate from mastercam, cimco edit, or any serial communication application?

Most of the stuff that I have brought in as a bitmap have been logos. By using the create spline curves and playing with the tolerance you can get fairly smooth geometry. And since it is just a logo you don't have to worry to much about tolerances as long as it looks good.

I've played with it a bit when I received beta 1 and I agree offset the chain first, your spacings will work out much better.

If you are going to be using it for serial communications make sure it has a nine pin serial port. I actually came accross a laptop that didn't have one. Like everyone else said make sure you get the video card you want because you can't switch them out like in a desktop. good luck

create, next menu, add ins, txtchain or something like that [ 11-01-2002, 09:25 AM: Message edited by: Roger ]

quote: Rotary settings worked well. But where is that in the instruction book. There must be a heap of things Mcam can do that are not documented There are many things that are documented, and many that are not. The tutorials are great and give a great base to start from but there is no replacement for training and experience. There is a reason the School of hard knocks hasn't closed yet. I know I have many knocks headed my way yet. HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Your op defaults are not in the config file they are in the df9 file. In windows explorer see what the date of you df9 file is, if it hasn't been changed the date should be the last time you modified your defaults. In windows you can set the df9 file as read only and that may help to keep some people out. Other than that I don't know what to say other than good luck with that poltergeist on halloween.

Try chaining your geometry and then in the rotary axis button choose three axis and rotate about Z. This should work if not post it and I'm sure someone on the forum will help. good luck

Really like the wheel mouse stuff.

Try create, curve, slice. Create a line that represents where you want to split the surface ahead of time and you should be happy.

The free version of the Cimco Editor has some nice features such as color coding, line renumbering, and a pretty good file compare, but you are working with strctly text. Metacut Utilities has a very graphic editor where you can pick movements on the backplot and it will bring you to the line of code, if you change the code the backplot updates. Very cool stuff that I need to spend more time with. good luck

Vapor polish????? I used this on some acrylic parts many years ago. I don't remember the cost but the result was excellent. good luck

If this is a grid of holes just create the toolpath for the boring and one for the chamfering. Then use the transform translate, by operation type, copy source operations, and on the transform page click on the checkbox that says zigzag. It's been a while since I did this but I think this is pretty close. good luck

If you have exactly vertical surfaces they do take a long time. This has been sent in to QC. If you have a floor surface or you can create one try just not picking the vertical surfaces as drive surfaces and if you have a floor surface the toolpath will step down until it reaches the floor based on your max stepdown. good luck

I don't know if this has anything to do with what your problem is but can you use inverse time feedrates on the xxxxor. This give very predictable results when combining rotary and linear moves.

AWSOME TOOL. You don't even have move your hand from resting over the escape and F keys. Just click on the screen with your left mouse button instead of hitting enter. If you have done any geometry creation in lathe it is worth its weight in gold.

When machining a part designed in a cad package that also had some "professional manufacturing" capabilities I could not come up with a satisfactory finish with my .016" ball endmill. When machined with the "professional manufacturing" software the finish was still horrible, after some remodeling at tighter tollerances the finish was spectacular. In Mastercam it was much better but still not good. I am going somewhere with this. This brought up a lot of questions. Basically it came down to modeling tollerances and file translation. This was in V8 and the IGES file was now the problem. I tried several other methods and results ranged from the better to spectacular. STEP files are a great universal alternative to "IGUESS" files. This was not on an expensive machine with only a 10,000 rpm spindle. I don't want to kick a dead horse and I don't know if the sf your looking for is attainable but good luck.

Most of the time I have had to remove a broken tap in aluminum it wasn't neccesarily stuck that bad. The problem was you just didn't have a good way of putting any torque on it. Most of the time an easy out or if it broke off flush weld a smaller bolt to it. Try not to use shcs they get awful brittle when welded. Cobalt drills do a fair job of drill hss taps. Another trick is if it is broke a ways into the hole is to take a bolt of the correct size and chuck it up in the lathe drill a hole the size of the drill you want to use and spin it into the hole and now the hole you drill for you easy out is on center and if you apply a bit of torque when screwing it in you don't have to worry about the tap spinning and breaking your drill. Having a few sizes of left hand drill bits around isn't a bad thing either. The last time I tried the acid aproach it took a while. my 2 cents good luck quote: I have used an chemical in a kit called Tap Out. It is an acid that will SLOWLY eat away the tap and not aluminum. I have only used it on small taps and it still took quite a while so you might want to find another method for your headace. Eric I agree SLOWLY is the key word [ 10-03-2002, 02:50 PM: Message edited by: Roger ]

If you are trying to keep your run time down why not mill multiple parts at one time? This will keep your pph up and the getting sewed factor down. good luck

when you create using the select menu you can use the rotate option. hope this helps

Yes a post can be made for a centurian 4 controller, this is good I think. This topic was covered not too long ago so if you do a search I'm sure you will find some good info. have your reseller start with the mp_ez post and the drill cycles will need to be modified. good luck

The ability to backplot / verify gcode outside Mastercam is in some cases neccesary. I have not seen what the cimco backplot looks like but Metacut Utilities allows you to backplot, verify, and click on a line graphically on the screen and edit it there or in the text editor. Very cool stuff. Not an expert on it but it is very powerful, and you don't have to sell your first born to have it. good luck