Someone I know did a 5 axis hydroplane propeller. It had two different configurations in one file (there were differences in only about 60 of the operations). The file had 908 operation. I almost lost it when I saw that. I think the most I've done was around 200. -Colin

Surface High Speed Horizontal gives you seperate values for Wall and Floor stock to leave as well. Finally!!! And they added this feature to all the High Speed toolpaths for MR2. -Colin

Anybody try the Chook STLHeal.dll ? -Colin

Hi Randy, Give your re-seller a call. You may need an update code for your NetHasp license manager. We just got our codes for MR2. -Colin

+1 John Also, Go to Settings - Configuration-Toolpath Manager This is a new function for MR2 and controls how Mastercam names your NC files. You can read about it in the Whats New document (C:/McamX-Mr2/Documentation). -Colin

Man... I'm going to have to get faster at typing. Good job John/Jay, and Good Morning!

Hi Chuck, The "boolean remove operation would result in disjoint body" warning means that when you are attempting your second extrude cut your chain of geometry is going to cut your solid into two pieces. Make sure that your chain does not completely intersect your solid. Also, make sure you are doing the extrude cut operation in the correct construction plane. I'm sure if you put a copy of your file on the FTP site that someone would take a look at it. Unfortunatly, I'm behind a firewall so I can't take a look at it until later. I'm sure if you ask that someone will let you know how to put a file on the FTP. Hope that helps get you started. -Colin

Greg, You are quite welcome. Depending on your needs it sounds like an actual APT post for Mastercam might be more what you are looking for. Thanks, Colin

It has been updated for X too!

Hi Greg, The NCI2APT Chook is a custom Chook written by Cimtech Inc. in Fife, WA. It is a great utility and converts into 5 different formats of APT code. It is a custom add-in to Mastercam and must be purchased seperately from Mastercam. Contact: Cimtech Inc. Steve Kidd, Owner 5013 Pacific Hwy E. Fife, WA 98424 Suite 1 www.multiaxis.com 253-922-8770 -Colin

I Go Dell all the way. Great hardware, great service, good price. Get the extended warranty, its priceless. I had a hard drive die after two years and after about 30 min. on the phone with a tech guy they shipped me a new hard drive UPS Red. I got it the next day. I called Dell tech support back and the guy walked me through the entire backup process. I went from sweating bullets to sitting pretty.... Just my 2 cents -Colin

I agree Thad, the only thing about typing the number in manually in the number field is that pressing enter doesn't accept the value you type in. The cursor remains in the number field and blinks. If you click on your scroll wheel like its a button, Mastercam will accept the number that you type in, but if you scroll the wheel mastercam will scroll through the most recently used values. I've already written to CNC about it and hopefully it will be fixed for X2. I can't tell you how many times I've entered a new Z depth and accidentally scrolled to a new Z value without even realizing it until it was too late. -Colin

I guess I should have used the "BUG" icon instead of the "X" icon per Thad's sticky....

Hi Guys, I wonder if any of you have seen this: when I left click on the Z: button to set my Z depth and start typing numbers on the number pad the enter coordinates dialog no longer comes up. It looks like it goes into "fast point" mode instead. So if you have the Autocursor settings set to "Default to Fast Point mode" then the option of clicking on the Z button and typing in a depth is gone. I'd like CNC Software to change it so we can default to Fast Point mode, but always have the "Enter Coordinates" dialog box come up when you press the Z depth button. Anyone concur? -Colin www.boeing.com

Randle, Also try turning off multi-threading in your system bios. Mastercam doesn't like this one too much. Also, is your network drive running BlackIce by any chance? Its a little firewall utility that Mastercam doesn't like very well. We are running 18 copies of Mastercam here on a NetHasp and working only from the Network drive. We have practically elimitated crashes in Mastercam. Another note has to do with running functions in Mastercam in-line. I recommend that when you are using Mastercam you use the ESC key to fully exit a function before beginning a new one. Mastercam seems to run better if you exit the current command before calling a new one. Jumping into Xform while in the middle of creating a line isn't necessarly the best idea. I'm not saying it won't work, but Mastercam has been notoriously bad at Memory Management in windows. On a final note, if you notice Mastercam behaving strangely at all, STOP and save your file. Shut down Mastercam and restart the program. By strangely, I am refering to things like entities not highlighting correctly, the 2D/3D switch not working, shading not turning on or off, in short, Anything out of the ordinary. I know its a pain, but we have eliminated most of our crashes here using these simple techniques. I also tend to save after every toolpath I create and save before verifying. Also, IMHO, the programmers at CNC Software have done a pretty darn good job at taking a C language program and re-writing it from the ground up in .NET. Having done a very limited amount of C, VB, and C# programming, I can tell you that the guys at CNC Software are doing incredible stuff with Mastercam. Do you remember how buggy V9 was when it was first released? It took several years before we got a truly stable release. Now within a year of the release of X we are about to get MR2 which should be the cat's meow. At least we can hope....... -Colin

sorry about the spelling guys.......

Dgriffiths, How long is your spline? I just created a small spline (about 3 inches long) and used break many pieces to break it into .0005 long line segments. This small spline turned into 24,531 small lines. It also took about 3 minutes to do (which is a long time for an entity that was relativly small to begin with. I suggest breaking the spline into several smaller pieces first (I would use Trim/Break and the "trim to point" function to break the spline at its midpoint. Then repeat that process on the smaller splines if necessary.) Are you writing the toolpath in Mastercam? If so you should be able to use the spline as a spline and use the toolpath filter and linerization tolerance of the toolpath to get the accurate code you need. You may have to check the tolerances in your post processor as well. Hope that helps, Colin