Xform, project....select your points, then surfaces, then turn on lines-point option box, and it will add the line length and point normal to the surface / face. Works well for point / vector 5 axis drilling.

This G code allows the user to correct for variations in the length of cutting tools without the need for a CAD/ That is the key statement in dealing with Haas at least on a VR9 5 ax...(read the word variations). Their math calculation limits will begin to gouge the part using G143 and full offset of tool length in the register. If you use small offset amounts (ie the difference from posted length to new length...say .500 or less) the comp works fine. I've done it both ways and found this out with no help from Haas on the subject.

Something to try. Go into the autocurser menue and click on the exclamation point icon (config). Turn on power keys. This is a hot key override that speeds up selection. Also make sure intersection is checked. Now when selecting lines rather then wait for the SLOW autocurser to find a midpoint, endpoint, intersect, arc center, ect use the first letter of what your trying to find. Type I (for interesection and it only finds intersetions..nothing else.) It's a good idea to get used to this, it's both faster and more accurate. You can hit M and select a line anywhere and it quickly finds midpoint only.

quote: I gave up on using the facemill definition a long time ago because I couldn't get it to do a 90 deg facemill with a corner radius which it still looks like it will not do. Yep...still true. This facemill bug has been in Mastercam for 8+ years at least . We have stairs, doors, and art now but still cannot define a 90 deg. facemill. The trick to workaround this is either use bullnose, or define the facemill as a 89 degs. with a slight difference in upper and lower dia.

In X3 and IIRC also X4 every time you import a STL as a mesh, then attempt to delete it, it will leave a so called enity that you cannot get rid of. Delete, unblank...nothing gets rid of it. I use merge stl mesh to verify cut stock against wire as a quick check of a machined operation and saw this every time...not just sometimes.

quote: don't know what world you live in but we can't find a creature like that.With that attitude you'll ceratinly never find them. Talk to the instructor, get recommendations, check references, use good instinct, and grill them. You'll have to weed thru quite a few to find them, but they're out there. We even used to let the trade schools tour our shop to develope a relationship before they get out. Can do attitude required.

quote: Any stories of shops charging for tooling. I understand stuff happens but it has been happening far far to frequently.You cannot make an hourly employee work for free in my state (Washington), that I know, and if you deduct from their check then there are unpaid hours. If somebody did that much dumb a$$ damage on 1 job, why are they still employed?? Go get a sharp / eager kid out of trade school, put a journey level - lead person to watch him, and start over.

quote: So my current working settings override my default config settings if I change ANYTHING else in my config.This is soooo 100% true! And the sad thing is, I believe it's been like this for all Version X's...so whats that 7-8 years? It's stuff like this that just never gets fixed that is irritating becuase its just not industry std. (and too much time gets wasted figuring out why) Default is default, and should stay until intentionally changed. I'm also still waiting for solid layout to see and use WCS system also, and a list a page long of other things.. If X5 had No "enhancements" and fixed all these issues, and just updated to 64b code...I'd be sooo dang excited!! Any bets??

quote: ,they want setup guy run part.cheap than pay progammer, buxxxx this.. that, and i'm get ....You've got that right. Obviously you are up against a language barrier with most shops out there, and many of those shops are willing to put up with that BECAUSE they think they "can" save a buck. No offence, just the way some people think. It's tough working with people that dont speak english very well, (and some that do)...you tell them you need something dead nuts, and they come back with squirrel food.

quote: It seems like the Quad i7's are great but they just don't like talking to Mastercam with all cylinders firing.But...you dont want to build an obsolete system either. There are other programs that will take advantage of the 4-8 core systems..Vericut ect. and you have to believe that Mastercam will eventually quit building stairs, doors, and art and make some 64b code.

Warnings like that make you wonder what kind of flunkies CNC believes run their software. Who cares if you even use the same coordinate in more then 1 view already. I never even attempted to find it personally, but I'll stay tuned for the answer.

quote: I've also heard of one of the ports failing. I purchased a FX570 and both ports failed. Although on the lower end of the Quadro spectrum, both conditions seem odd relative to the price paid for these cards.I upgraded from the 570 to the 580 on my home machine and the difference in speed was very surprising, especially in verify on large files (the 580 is much faster). I also built a core i7 920 machine and used the 580 in it as a work machine and both are working excellent. I run win7 x32 and Dell ultrasharp 24" monitor (not dual)...running 1920 x 1200 resolution.

quote: Maybe I am wrong, but I read Verndog's point to be based on .000 or .001 true position, and I agree with his point regarding this.Somebody gets it. Wow...what a firestorm this stirred up, right up to listing every machined programmed... have fun with the war stories. There is no reason for anybody on the shop floor to do any Trig. either way you program C/L or part zero. There are simple coordinate calculator programs that run on any PC that you give C/L in X and Z for horizonal or Y and Z for vertical with distance from C/L to "G54" X0Z0 is input...then input the rotations in program and new X Z are printed out...mathematically perfect. Someone skims .010 from a fixture face...no big deal, put in the new C/L to Z value, calculate new rotation without waiting for a programmer. [ 02-27-2010, 10:39 PM: Message edited by: Verndog ]

quote: You simply implied it could not be done using center of rotation.I never said it could not be done. If fact I said it could here. quote: Yes, it can be held under certain conditions, with certain features, but not "always" or even close in a practical mannor.I called you on your statement that...and in your exact words... but even in a production environment I always did everything from center of rotation and were always able to hold .001 true position all day long as well. Keeping within the context of discussion, we are talking about programming from C/L of rotation on a Horizontal machine. Assuming we are talking about indexes taking place because that is a main benifit of using a Horizontal you say you were ALWAYS able to hold true pos .001 when in fact you propably should have said "on certain occasions" you held TP .001 after you got everything dialed in, and when you did it had nothing to do with programming from C/L of rotation (the discussion)...correct?? What does always mean to you??...How about all day?? Wouldn't that include the first part you made, otherwise why throw that in?? And if you ALWAYS are able to hold TP .001 all day then yes you will need to fix those offsets, your own words in plain english told me that you did on that job and every job. Dont mind me though, I usually have prefered to let others show me how great they are rather then tell me. ..Peace...I made my point.

quote: even in a production environment I always did everything from center of rotation and were always able to hold .001 ture position all day long as wellI dont care how you approach it there are way too many influencing factors that prove in real life your comment is just "generally" wrong. And you imply that because you program from C/L this is easier to hold, when in fact the opposite is true, (unless you add coordinate offsets to lie to your C/L to allow adjustment for real world variables.) Yes, it can be held under certain conditions, with certain features, but not "always" or even close in a practical mannor. Please...do not advise any design engineers with such commnets as our jobs are challenging enough with the near impossible true pos ABC .005 crap dimensioning schemes with todays "engineers" that have no clue why it matters if -A- is the end of part profile 100.00" away from the dimensioned hole and the surface length is all of .250 wide...projected 100.00" = how close of angle error allowed?? BTW..you better re-do all those fixture offsets and carry them out to 4 place decimals as well if you want to hold true pos .001.

quote: Again to each their own, but even in a production environment I always did everything from center of rotation and were always able to hold .001 ture position all day long as well. Even do some .000 true positions with only .001 of bonus from max material condition. So how many re-posts did it take to get the true pos. .001 or 0?? Or are you saying your tooling is always within .0001 and all machines have zero backlash not to mention cutter variance since you have no more then .0005 possible error in any single axis to hold that tolerance? Sorry but Nobody can ALWAYS hold that kind of tolerance unless they always cut 1/2 thick alum. 6.0 long with brand new machines...try again.

quote: Once done, the COR numbers don't change unless something catastrophic happens.So would you consider not having that machine or tombstone available catastrophic...how about recutting form jaws cuz they wore over time?? quote: Having a known origin to start from is invaluable.Or it can be unnecessary and useless depending on the conditions. There is no right or wrong here, you have to look at the build qty, machine availability, importance of shop flexability and about 10 other factors to know what is best for that situation. Using a proven coordinate calculator on the shop floor with a good setup person its tough to beat programming from part zero for versatility in a job shop, and they will not be reliant on programming when they play musical machines or tombstones with parts as short run shops will do.

quote: never program a horizontal from center of the table IMHOIt really depends on the application IMO. If your shop tends to move jobs from 1 machine to the next, change tombstones or fixture plates ect..(job shop) then yes...do not program from C/L because you will be in a high maintanence situation. If the job is going to to stay put (with reasonble certainty) and your setup people are "less experianced" then programming from C/L will save parts and time in the long run. Also you are assuming there are no rotary axis or 4 axis swarf cuts on the part, otherwise you have to program from C/L.

quote: I tested V8, V9, and and VX3 about 3 or 4 months agoWhen you tested V8 and V9 did you try to run verify? That was the major problem I had besides some curser graphic issues that dropping the hardware acceleration down used to fix in XP. Problem with Win7 is they did away with adjusting hardware acceleration with the couple Quadro drivers I've tried.

quote: Getting about 10 or so slots. Despite my warnings, the operator invariably waits too long, and it explodes and leaves a nice gouge on the bottom.First thing I'd do is add a finish 3/8 data that just cleans up say .020-.03 on floor and .010-.020 on wall. That way even if the operator busts another tool, it wont scrap the part, and walls and floors will look better. Then I'd bump up SPM to around 200-225 (slotting is worst case scenario). Then I'd make damn sure chip evacuation is taking place. Recutting the chips while pocketing will kill tool life faster then anything else.

quote: Yes, It does.Yes it does run in windows 7 or just under XP mode? I tried loading V9 under Win 7 and verify would not come up at all, and it crashed several times loading a file. To me that is not working. After loading XP mode and attempting an install the system was so slow and degraded that by all practical purposes you would not want to consider running this. Isn't the idea of a new PC to speed things up? I'd stick with XP if you need to maintain V8 and V9 files.

Forget about XP mode in Win 7. Its a complete joke trying to run cad. Running excel would be pushing it. IIRC you get 512M total memory an video is choppy and rediculously slow. XP mode is a very poor attempt to get coorporate America excited about win7. Plus its a stripped down virtual OS, and will not run much of what will run in XP.

quote: does anyone know how i can convert a surface from male to female?I suggest you drill about a 1.0 dia. hole thru it and remove half its brains.

I dont know of any way to see holders in verify other then to draw them. Define tool as custom tool and draw tool and holder on its own level, then point custom tool to that level. You can see the holder during backplot and verify this way.

Well...I had a Quadro FX 570 that didn't perform well in Win XP and decided to throw it in. Very nice clean graphics compared to a high end "gaming card" GeForce 8800. It works WAY better in Win 7 then it ever did in Win XP. Guess I'll need to upgrade to the FX 1800.