generally speaking there's two families of plastic: thermoplastic and co-polymer resin. anything that's a thermoplastic can melt, like ABS, UHMW, or Ultem 1000 unmodified. Copolymer resins like acetal (delrin) PTFE (teflon) are the result of mixing chemicals which only become the plastic once mixed. while they don't "melt" they may do nasty things at their molar heat of decomposition. A lower SFM (speed) and higher CPT (feed) like they guys above said should help. Try the library material Acrylic as a starting point.

the retro coolant support command is in the general parameters of a machine definition. Edit the "library" copies of your machine defs if you wish to default this. The library control definitions can be edited to make permanent the T# = H# and D# = T# + 50 conditions

picking points at the target z depths in a single spotting op (then sorting for the shortest travel) sounds like the output you want. So to set that up you need the points generated. Q: have you tried: 1- making each diameter arc a different color (for masking) 2- running drillpt.dll in each color for point gen 3- xform each color point to target depth 4- window the points into one spotting op w/inc. depth While this gives you what you asked for it limits your restart options in the finished code Like JP sez we ain't hung up on having short mastercam files...we WANT screaming fast efficient NC code. I would rather spend extra time in the Mcam file and get more efficent code output than fluff thru the easy way and put out a mediocre program

My first question would be how big is the file? I had the same error on a large (16M) router file built for our training curriculum. It was reported to QC as a low priority (no end user affected) the response indicated it would be amongst the verify improvements in X3. Perhaps you've got the same issue?

Several open issues from the posts above: 1)Sample files - These are not automatically installed, but can be added from the mcam CDs any time (if they weren't installed originally or accidentally deleted) 2)C-axis tool planes - There's mention reading the top of your post. Excellent advice. Start in GENERIC FANUC 4X MT_LATHE.PST The information there if used in concert with some additional sources should give you a pretty good idea of what to do (It outlines the valid planes for C-Axis face and cross work, and how to use the misc integer 4 to activate cylindrical or polar interpolation should your control support it. There's also mention of the c-hook "cview" or look at the cview utility (accesed from the toolpaths drop down,mill toolpaths flyout when a mill turn mach def is loaded) to have Mastercam set you in the correct plane. Beware though of cutting past centerline. We have a file we use in our Advanced Lathe Curriculum to illustrate and solve the problem

This may sound off-topic, but any chance of getting a native format CAD model? (i.e. - open the iges file with your editor and read the header....if it was created with solidworks, ask for a .sldprt file)