yeah, so we have some A36 steel pieces, pretty small. Only using drill, 3/8 carbide endmills, and 1 small (.078) endmill. It seems to cut worse and wear tools faster than 1018. Is there a trick or any tips you guys have? TIA!!

We have some generic machines here (VMC's) with the OI-MC control. Although the posts are not set up for automatic high-speed, I hand edit the G5.1 Q1 to turn it on G5.1 Q0 to turn off. It works very well for the surfacing and any toolpaths, really. I have it on all the time, except for drilling/tapping cycles, won't work with those on. Other than that, i would definitely recommend it.

No clue, but try unshading the solid before making the bounding box. I have no idea if it will make any difference, but give it a try. I never had a problem with that feature, but I'm always with a solid's license...

I've had this happen before, but I think it was my fault. I can't remember if it was a specific parameter i was adjusting or not. Just an example, let's say i opened up the parameters for a particular operation. Then, I went into the planes dialogue box to change the toolplane. If i accidentally closed the operation parameter box before closing the plane selection box, it would freeze up. I'm not sure if it's the same problem or somewhat related to the problems that you guys are having, though. I wanna say it was before MU1, but, again, I can't remember for sure.

Very good info, Keith. Thanks for posting what you found out.

I've had problems where the default turret would switch from lower to upper and the same code would be reversed as you described. However, I had to go in to each op and select lower turret to get the code output correctly. If yours switches without changing any parameters, just by regen-ing, then that is way weird.....

i usually use tip, but sometimes get better results with center.

What toolpath? Check cutter comp (center or tip). Check surface normals.

As far as i've been able to determine, it is not quite accurate. If the machined dynamics are set correctly in the Machine Definition, and the toolpaths are relatively simple, your time may be close. The more complex the toolpath (surfacing, many rapid moves and retracts) the less accurate the estimation. On simple ones, i've had them with in a minute or two. On long surfacing toolpaths, it's been off hours. It depends on what you're doing.

Are you talking the cycle time in the backplot?

That's what i have for a Haas TL-2. Lower left turret works

Yes, toward the tool. With HSS paths, it may be a number of things. Containment, gaps along edges, check surf's, stepover, min/max depth

check your surface normals, maybe

if it's from pro-e, search for related discussions. I think Murlin is the expert on these things and has explained many issues i've had when importing pro-files. It has something to do with the tolerance settings in pro-e when the file was created. I will try a rough explanation, as i understand it. The tolerances in pro-e can be set very loosely and create surfaces/solids that aren't "accurate" by fudging the math to mesh them. When you import them to MCAM, the imperfections get ugly and don't mesh. I think pro-e lets some engineers get sloppy when creating solids/surfaces and the tolerances in mastercam won't let you bring in "crap" very well. That's what i get, anyhow.

I would just offset the contour, regen, done. Save as new part number.

It should look like this. It's labeled as "Horiz4Front" in the drop down on the MachSim Startup Settings box.

We have one in our production shop, the Pallet Pool as well. I'm sure there's one in the MachSim folder. I attended the Multiaxis training at CNC Software a while ago and we had it set up on my laptop while i was there and it worked pretty sweet. I haven't used since then, however. I work in the prototype department and haven't needed to use it since. Maybe contact your reseller and have him run you through it.

Have you found the folder and the file isn't there? If you can find the folder, but not the specific file, you may need to contact your reseller. When I was first sent the new, updated tutorial, it was missing a few of the sample files. A quick email to my reseller and it was fixed. A couple of the sample files were left out of the folder, but he figured it out and got them to me.

Huh, that was it. Why am i thinking i never had to have a number there to just get one finish pass on a contour? I could swear I've had a zero in there before......

Ok, so if i change the multipass parameter to all depths, I get my .020 finish depth cut pass, but not a .005 finish pass on the wall??????

I've either become incredibly stupid and I'm missing something simple or something weird is going on. I have a simple single line chained for a contour. i want to have one finish depth cut at .020 and one finish wall pass of .005 and it won't work. I get one pass at final depth and final wall size. What the crap am i missing here?

I think the speed slider bar is relative to the size of the toolpath being backplotted. Leaving the slider bar in the same spot will create a slower speed on a smaller toolpath (when you just hit the play button) and a faster speed on a larger toolpath or toolpaths. Why, i don't know, but that's what it seems like.

^^^For sure^^^^ No matter how many times i do it, i always forget.

You can't select an mcx file. You can only select an stl file.

Yep, then you go into the graphics screen and select to solid model you want as your stock.