I'm using X MR2 at the moment. I get the error cannot find parasolid data in Solidworks file. I tried your link John and registered the solidworks dll. That didn't solve the problem. Also described in the link is to unregister and then re-register using the Mastercam X utility in the control panel. Clicking on this utility gives me the error "LastInstalledVersion" key is missing and "Cannot access application key". Maybe I'll try installing X2. X MR2 is just working so well for me (programming, posting etc, except for importing these SW2007 files) that I don't want to mess things up.

Just a quick question, is Mastercam X supposed to be able to import Solidworks 2007? X2? Thanks.

Bruce, I have these manuals in PDF format. Let me know if you'd like them and I'll upload them to the FTP.

Thanks John. I might have to create edge curves and use the wireframe entites for drill points. Was there any indication of when it might be fixed?

I feel like I'm chasing drill points here. Using McamX with solids. Here is the scenario: I have a bunch of operations already from the previous job. This job has all the same size holes, so I'm deleting the original geometry and importing the new. Now all I need to do is pick new points for the drilling operations and I'm good to go. I start with all my pre-drill operations, pick all the points. Then I copy these points to the finish drill operations. Sometimes when I copy the points from one op the other, some of the points in other ops get all messed up. I feel I'm chasing these drill points all the time. I recall this happening a while ago, but I don't remember seeing it until the last couple of days again. I also seem to remember a thread about this however I'm unable to find it. Anyone else have this problem? I've created edge curves for now and I am picking the entities, but I'd like to know why it's not working right in solids.

Always computer or wear, never control. Having to put the value in at the control is one more thing to be messed up on a setup. If everything is programmed to nominal, all values should be "0". If there happens to be a small offset in the register already from the last setup (-.002" for example) there is less of a chance that it would affect the output of the current setup. Plus all the other reasons mentioned above, programming cutter centerline allows you to accurately verify, account for lead in/lead out and you know exactly where that tool is going. I used to program with CC in control when I was programming directly from a printed drawing into the controls keypad (9 years ago). But now it is old school.

Hymen, I have Cadkey (Keycreator). If it is a .prt file from Cadkey, I could translate it for you if you wanted to email it to me.

We have made a bunch of new tool change arms from broken ones. Don't think I've made one for an OKK yet though. Usually just the one side is broken so we are able to reverse engineer from the good half and rotate it around. We make them out of a stronger material and we add material to the back where we can to strengthen them up. Haven't had a complaint yet!

What I might try in that case is to change my original solid model (in Keycreator in my case) to reflect what has been machined to that point, then export that as an STL and use it.

The reason I'm asking is I saw some of these new HP laptops at future shop, and they were a great price. I've just looked at them online and noticed that most of the ones I pulled up had 128mb shared graphics memory. Was curious if the laptops talked about in this thread have this shared graphics memory and if this could be causing the problem.

Which HP laptop did you guys buy with the 6150 card?

If your post has the following line in it you can just change it to 0. This is what I had to change and it worked like a charm. quote: ret_on_indx : 0 #Machine home retract on rotary index moves, (0 = no, 1 = yes)

I've come to this before also. I usually just start the second drill at the top of the hole and let it drill down. But I think I've read in the past about outputting long code instead of using the drill cycles. Maybe something could be setup to make that work how you want it. However I'm not the person to advise how to do it!

Brian, I will have for example 3 separate groups (OP10, OP20, OP30) in a file, each could contain 5-20 different tool path operations. If I highlight all the OP10 group and click the setup sheet button, it will output a screen capture (current screen view) and a list of the tools used only in that operation, including an estimated cycle time for each toolpath operation and a total for the entire group. Same thing goes for OP20 and OP30. If there is an extra tool in OP30 that is not in OP10, it won't show up when I create the OP10 setup sheet. If I click the "create tool list" button, then it will generate a list of all the tools used in the file regardless of what I have highlighted. Hope I haven't completely missed your point!

If you create the setup by highlighting the required operations it will provide a list of tools for the highlighted ops only. If you click on the "tool list" icon it seems to grab everytool.

Full box and mouse pad here too.

The mpmaster post I use for the haas has an option in it to turn this on or off. quote: haas_drill : 0 #Haas style peck drill, 0=no, 1=yes

Lee, I missed your arc issue thread. I had a problem with Arcs on a Fanuc 0-M when I switched to Mcam X. I changed my post to break at quadrants, instead of 180. I found that my arc was fine at the start and end points but in between it was off. While I was running a program I stopped it and trigged out the x and y coordinates to find out the radius it was cutting at and it was smaller than what was programmed. Changed to quadrants and it was fine. Is this similar to your problem? edit: I believe this problem arose if my arc in Mastercam was not starting at 0, 90, 180, 270 degrees, but it was a couple months ago so my memory might not be accurate on that!

Blast from the past....

I always use O1000 for the program number. I put the part number, revision and operation etc in the comments. This shows up in the program list, which isn't long since I only ever have a couple programs in the machine memory. I name each toolpath group in Mcam as the part # (usually the same as the .MCX filename) and operation #. This shows up in the comments after the O1000 in the .NC file. Since it's very rare that I do any editing at the control, nothing needs to go back to the computer, so I always just delete O1000 before I need to pull in another program. If I think I'll need that program again real soon, I just rename it to O2000 or anything else other than O1000.

I have a Fanuc O-MD control. Do you what parameter would turn it on for that control?

I agree it is a nice option. Would definitely speed up a tapping cycle!

I guess you would have known right away if the spindle didn't speed up, it would've left the tap in the hole!

Does the spindle speed up when it feeds out?

I used a 3axis toolpath to rough the pocket out, then the swarf5ax to cleanup the corners. I used a curve5ax to mill a chamfer around all the pockets.