Let me know if it is a Proe file and I can help you out.

Ron,

I need more information. I have made a request through the link on the website.

This looks like a solution we have been looking for with in mold inspection.

Let me first say that the guys I have worked with who have serious problems with ProE usually are pissing and moaning about it didn't work that way in (Insert Cad Package Here) and that goes for any software change. Embrace it and add it as another tool in your package of “look what I can do.” The Cost of Proe maintenance is HUGE when compared to many cad packages. Customer service for me has been great. I think a lot of that depends upon you Maintenance supplier and the size of your company. The ProE website is difficult to use, but once you have access, it has a lot of useful information. Pro can be buggy at times, but so are other cad packages.

IT all depends upon what you are doing. IF you are doing single prismatic parts then SolidWorks is sufficient and very efficient for your needs. Come into the realm of Family Table replacement parts in Mold Design and Solid works fails miserably....Come into the realm of complex surface design work and SolidWorks fails miserably. ProE works great when it is utilized properly. Come into the realm of mechanical simulation for complex automation functions and SolidWorks fails miserably compared to Pro. If you use ProProgram to automate many functions it flies. Electrode design is simplistic at best in Proe if you know how to use cut-out functionality in assembly mode, and if you can utilize surface design functionality it gets even better.

There is however a huge learning curve to become productive let alone efficient. We still have guys here after years who don't understand parentchild relations and the dangers there in if applied incorrectly. Proe part files and assemblies have always come in fine for me through the Proe Translator with solids. My datum planes, coordinate systems, axis, and curves always come in so that they can easily be layered off. The datum planes are very helpful when creating new Work Offsets.

Like others have said there are pluses and minuses to all packages. Don't fight the system your management is putting in place. Respectfully voice your concerns in writing with factual information backing your stance. Leave out your anecdotal evidence, because management will mark you as a complainer. Finally make the best with what you are given to work with. A lot of us make a living using Proe and Mastercam.

+1 on EMUGE. They are expensive, but when programmed at the recommeded speeds and feeds the tool life is expceptional. I ran a 1/8 NPT thread mill from EMUGE and did 150 holes in P20. The same cutter from Harvey would give me about 30 holes before I had enough tip chipping that the gage would no long fit. Harvey cost about a 1/3 of what the EMUGE did.

I used them alot until I started using the HPM line of cutters. The speeds are actually slow when people think of HSS machining, but the chip load and MMR is huge.

8mm CUTTER(JHP 170 SERIES)

56-62 Rc TOOL STEEL

SLOTTING

1201 RPM

36.3 IPM

.157 DOC

FULL WIDTH

For future reference Jabro makes some excellent cutters for this kind of application. Their HPM product line would work great for this. They make the cutters down to 2mm and up to 16mm. You could pretty much 1 pass those slots for roughing and then leave a .005" all around for clean-up. If you want their contact infromation e-mail me at john(dot)joyce(at)tycoelectronics(dot)com.

I am having to quote some wire cuts, and it has been about 3 years since I did it. I don't have my formulas with me for this calculation....I remember 28sq in from somewhere, but I don't remember on what thickness with .010" wire.

Will someone please give me hand here for calculating this? Much thanks in advance.

You must set your part and tool path tolerance very low. I used .00004, and never filtered.

John do you have the constructiona and toolplance set to the same? I have problems with chaineing when I have a construction plane chained somewhere.

Welcome back Randall....I can see the guys have missed you. I always enjoyed your spirited topics, and the fun that ensued from them.

Yes Keebler.

Prism has a real good demo of this function on CD that they will send you if you ask really really nice. It was part of the rollover training. Did you get missed. My boss made me go to the one in Baltimore instead of the one in Horsham. 1/2 day boondoggle instead of a full day with some overtime.

I was never happy with the results of using one toolpath. My recomendations would be to use two toolpaths. Make sure and limit your toolpaths with the angle setting so you are not recutting alot of area. I usually use about a 10° overlap.

I see how they are recouping some of the price drops that I have seen over the last few years.

Note to self make parts break and then gouge the he!! out of them for spares and will make more money in the long run. Managers stay happy because they see initial cost lower and they ignore employees and tell them to work around the problem. What the manager says, "We have a workaround? Then why do we need to fix it?" I love how business works.

No you can transform the "front" view you have drawn by changing to the front construction plane and xform translating the desired wire frame from the current location to the new z values of the front and back of your part. The options are copy, move, and join. Join copies your selected geometry and creates vector lines at all of your endpoints between your new and old geometry. Makes sure when you draw in the future that when you set your "Z" values at the end of the areas you want to draw on when you change your construction plane.

One very helpful thing you can do is to open up your viewports and then whatever port you work in will automatically change your construction plane and this will update all of your other ports real time. You can actually see what is happening without rotating your part around. I reccomend this to new people so that they will understand how the constructions take place in MC. I would never do that after you have a handle on z depths and construction planes verse view planes. HTH

Contact Tesco. They are the resellers for Seco and they have a great selection for hardmilling, hsm, and hpm.

I use G54's ect. We have 81 total work offsets on the Makino and they come in real handy. You can still work with subs and use G54, just make sure to output your sub programs in incremental. I usually keep one of my back up workoffeset set to the base work offset incase of some bonehead hitting the cooridinate zero button accidentally. That would be me for those of you that don't know it. On the makino control the relative work zero button and the work zeor button are side by side. Kinda like the start and reset buttons being side by side.

Back to the question. I work with all of my mill and wire toolpaths in the same file and it makes it easier with the WCS and outputing the WCS in the file. But I was a mill and Ram edm guy long before I ever saw a wire edm.

You can change to the ramp option for contouring and have it zigzag to the bottom of contour. But like the Kitty Kat said you keep changing the direction on your cutter. You also have to make sure to have enough room to lead in and out out of the contour to turn cutter comp on and off. We typically use this to quickly rough out a slot in Graphite with no cutter comp used. We then will profile around the edges of the part to finish.

John make sure you have your tool plane and construction plane set to the proper orientation for what you are cutting.

I work on makino's and have a little expierence with a Mits. The guys above are correct in what they are saying. I output no z values in my program and set-up everything at the control for z heights, and never have a problem with taper. You must ensure that the bottom of the part is at table zero or compensate one of your z values accordingly.

Your code is only half of the solution. You have to make sure your z heights in your parameters are correct telling the machine where your upper and lower guide heights are located. These values are typically based off of your Machine Coordinate system, not your work csys. You also have to tell the machine where the program and sub-planes are located based off of table zero. These are the bottom and top of your workpeice.

Taper is tricky and my machine offsets based off of the top guide height from table zero. So you won't see it offset the amout of your workpeice thickness. It should offset more than that if all of your z values are set up correctly. HTH

Sticky did someone say sticky. I never posted in the last one, but there is no way in he!! I am missing this one.

Merry Christmas to you Big John. I have 6 hours and counting before the Christmas Holiday begins for me....

I am always interested in a new tool for the box. What have you got? Questioning minds want to know.

He didn't ask for a post he asked where to find one. Hold the flames he doesn't have 10 posts yet, and he skirted the rule by asking "where" to find one.

There is a post on the installation CD that will get you close. It is called MPAN113X for the 3 axis and MPan112X for the 2 axis version. It took very little tweeking to get good code out of it set up the way we wanted it. HTH

If all else fails call your reseller. That is a widely used control on conversational machines and I am sure that they will have one already tweaked for you.

I got 4 boxes and 4 mouse pads for the 4 seats that we have here. My reseller does a great job supporting us.