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ahaslam

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Everything posted by ahaslam

  1. I haven't really played around with transform tool path until the past few days. I didn't realize until now that you can rotate by view and use tool plane as the method . Works great for multiple holes around a part on a fourth axis so long as they have even distribution.
  2. Another thing to check (that I really hope you are not doing) is if filter turned on. I have seen this before on a former co-worker's program. He would turn on filters for straight lines. I don't know why he did this but make sure line/arc is unchecked.
  3. BUMP, I would like to use this feature but it doesn't seem to be reading the .formula at all.
  4. I know this post is mostly dead but I did want to mention something about the corners that you see in high speed tool paths. HST is not calculated based on actual step over. Not in a direct sense. If it was, it would look like the standard contour with multi step enabled. What you are seeing around the corners is exactly what you want. Mastercam HST is based off engagement angle of the tool (as is all HST style tool paths) and compensates around corners accordingly. Think of a standard 90 deg corner around the outside of a part. If you turn off the roll around corner function in a standard contour, the end mill will go past the engagement point and then re engage after changing direction. Turn on roll around and you see it maintain engagement around the corner. But the actual angle of engagement of the tool is not maintained, only the step over. In HST, you tell the cam what your ideal width of cut is and then the cam calculates an engagement angle for that step over based on a straight cut and your tool DIA. Something to remember is that when you change direction, your point of nominal engagement changes with it. There for, a change in step over is not equal to/is not the same as a change in engagement angle. It's not as noticeable but you will see the same function on internal corners. The entire concept of HST paths is to quite literally cut corners buy maintaining a functional engagement angle regardless of actual step over. With all this said, if you filter your tool path too heavily, it will take that opportunity to hug the corner and will indeed over shoot the desired engagement angle. Any way, i'll leave you with some reference material so you know I'm not full of crap (about HST ) How to calculate TEA(tool engagement angle) Why it works Situations it works well in (when to use it) Enjoy!
  5. I agree that building planes is quick, simple and extremely powerful. With that said, I am always trying to think out side of the box we usually use, mostly to see if it's possible.
  6. I should have known you would have the answers. Thanks Colin, that's something worth looking into.
  7. Side note: I wonder if I could make a post that assumed the base as always abs regardless of the WCS then when it found a WCS that didn't match the xyz of the base, it would calculate the difference. That would be really handy but I don't know if the MP would let you do that.
  8. Yeah, that was it for sure. As soon as I made my wcs on center line of the holes, it started aiming for the holes correctly. But it wouldn't post right because my WCS is now not in the right spot relative to the rest of my part. This shows the result of setting up one tool path using only 2d drill function and the axis rotation. How ever it would seem that if the holes do not intersect center line of your wcs, it wont work. It does make sense now that i think about it. The wcs is being used as the projection point but I assumed the T-plane would be doing that. Oh well.
  9. Actually, I just had a duh moment. The holes are not on center with the z. That's why the are coming out at a funny angle. They are shooting for center. I'll play with it. If I get it to work I'll post a few more crappy pictures. I love this feature when I can get it to work. One time I had to create a ton of planes because I didn't even know it what there. Any way. Thanks for the feed back.
  10. I have been trying to figure out how to work the rotary axis positioning function in Mastercam. I got it to work yesterday on a part. today, no joy. I am sure this is an obvious mistake on my part but would love to get some input on what that thing is. Attached it my picture of my settings. Should be pretty straightforward. Thanks
  11. I like the ribbon but I can't seem to fully customize it. I want to trash the default and setup from scratch. Any ideas? Edit: Okay, now I feel kinda dumb. I ended up just renaming tabs. That's all I really wanted
  12. Best explanation ever. Now that I see an applied matrix, it all clicks. I thought a 9 variable matrix was something you used relative to planes but, in reality it is the plane. It's relative, but only that origin is assumed. That's why Mastercam loses it's marbles when you shift your plane wrong. It can't build the matrix because (your example) machine_X_x : 1 is no longer valid (assuming your plane bad rotation shifted X_x). Okay, so to build a matrix for HMC, you would start with your base, same as any other plane. (this assumes that you are programming the top plane as the primary plane and that you constructed it to rotate around y) 1 0 0 (x) 0 1 0 (y) 0 0 1 (z) but then, you rotate your tomb stone +90 deg. The plane shift is seen as follows. 0 0 1 (x) 0 1 0 (y) -1 0 0 (z) I might have that backwards, that might be 270 degrees. Relatively speaking, your new plane sees the motion of x and z changed and your y remains centered. I'll check out the videos soon.
  13. o.O I have a confession. I didn't make the switch to 2017... I reviewed the new features pdf, ran the beta, and my co workers all made the switch but I am still running x9 for a number of reasons... I didn't realize they took it out of the right click section. I use that all the time too.
  14. Lol it's in there. Check out the bottom of page 39 http://whatsnew.mastercam.com/2017/docs/WhatsNew.pdf I would have lost my cheese if they took that out. I use it EVERY DAY.
  15. I think I follow. I guess my road block is being stuck on Cartesian system. What you just explained is more Cartesian, right? Because you have point to point with no parameters defining how to get there. Basically it's trig, a straight shot via the shortest distance. Assuming all this is correct, the point I lose it is when things go polar and when you start defining points with parameters. You spoke about how NCI doesn't output rotary position, it calculates them. Say you drop an end mill (or what ever) to a surface .5 units from center in Z (pretend I'm using a VMC with a 4th along x) Then you tell it to shift the plane +90 degrees (assumed abs origin). At some point, the NCI calculates the equivalent of an arc, right? It sees the shift in the plane but no motion in x or y. If it was Cartesian, planes wouldn't move and you would instead find the motion of Z-.5 and Y.5 gets you to the point. But, because the plane has rotated about the X axis, MP knows to trig it and finds that a 90 deg rotation gets you to the position defined. I don't know how much of that is right but that's kind of where I am. As for a matrix... I'm not even sure what to do with 9 variables. PS, you're awesome. Thanks for the run down.
  16. People are pretty amazing. So many great things starting with one person. I still can't seem to get a grip on 3D vectors but I guess that's why I'm trying to learn it. It would be neat to see some one like John Summers in action.
  17. One last question while the pros are here. Can you do undercuts with Multi axis Curve?
  18. Oh, Interesting. How come it worked fine on the first one? I guess that's why they call it a bug.
  19. The file isn't fully setup but it gives you an idea of what I am doing. Look at number 4. See if you get the same issue. ***Removed file***
  20. Sure, I'm still kicken it with X9. What's the easiest way for me to send you a file?
  21. I'm using Multi axis tool path - Curve to deburr a part. First tool path looks amazing. Just what I wanted. So I moved on to the second path. Copy... Paste... Re select 3D Curves. I noticed that It says zero curves selected right after I selected curves. So I try again. Still nothing. I deleted the tool path and just started with a new one. Still, same issue. So I shut down mastercam and restarted.... Same issue... To heck with it, I restarted My computer... Still I can't select Curves unless I start a completely new file. Some one please tell me I don't have to completely start over. It's an easy program but I'm not used to 5 Axis and I don't want to keep having to restart my program. Any ideas? (sim already verified with emastercam, I'm legit. As for asking my mastercam guy, my re seller is... A good guy... lets just leave it at that)
  22. 3D Vector Math Function Thanks Colin! I'm off to learn more about vectoring.
  23. Why does the IHS have these? What does pe_inc_calc do for the post and why? I see that it updates and rounds off xia, but how is xia different than xinc? The reason I am asking is because I placed a pfxout in my post to call xy after a rotation on the tomb stone. Does it matter if I have pfxout before or after the ps_inc? ps_inc_calc #Incremental calculations, start xia = fmtrnd(xabs) yia = fmtrnd(yabs) zia = fmtrnd(zabs) xinc = vsub (xia, prv_xia) ps_cinc_calc pfxout #Force X axis output if absinc$ = zero, *xabs, !xinc else, *xinc, !xabs Thanks for any feed back. Not a pressing issue as the post seem to work fine now but just wanted to understand the concept.

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