I used FBM once for 5 axis drilling and tapping 110 holes each on a different vector so for center drilling, tap drilling, and tapping that's 330 different selections of the same size holes. You have to fill in all the values asked for in the tools and other sections before I could make it work. But once the blanks were all filled in with feeds and speeds and tool depths and vectors of the right length etc, it worked very well. It cut and tapped all the holes correctly in about 8 minutes from regen to NC code and I was using X7 I think. No way to do it that fast any other way. There was a left and right side parts too. I've never tried milling with it but it worked for that particular job.

After a G94 line the next line has a G93 and an A axis move. That line and everyone after have a Fxxx feed rate line. I have now changed the rot_type :0 to a 2 and will try it again. Another line I changed from 0 to 2 is ipr_type :0 #Feedrate for rotary, 0=UPM 1=DPM, 2=inverse. If I should change it back let me know but that change seemed logical.

Ok it's not working quite right yet. The post is giving a G93 call and a Fxx number on every line. A and X axis are moving at the same time but the rotary head moves to the A call out then all the way around to the next A call then all the way around to the next A etc. Effectively a 362° move that should be a 2° move. What causes this to happen?

Thanks Alex, I had the MD set just like that except for the feed rate in minutes. And now it works.

After reading up on inverse time feed rates I remember now that after a G93 call there is a F callout on every line. I have made some changes to the mpmaster.pst file and I'm getting inverse time feeds but not on every line and I'm not getting the G93 either. What do I change to make this work?

I'm at a new job and they have a Fadal 6030 with a rotary table set along X axis and plugged into the control. They have been running parts using it as an indexer, but they don't know of it will run inverse time code as in a full simultaneous 4 axis machine. We have tried to send it a program with inverse time feed rate, but it errors out. I don't have enough experience with Fadals to know if there is a setting in the control to allow use of inverse time feeds. Is there a setting in the control or maybe in the post that can be changed to get this to work?

The solution to another problem I was having, solved this one too. The files I was posting didn't all have the same nc filename. Correcting that cured this problem too.

Thanks Jeff, that did the trick and solved another issue I was having with adding text to my files.

I've had this problem years ago and cant remember how it got solved. In MC 2018 have a mill file with several parts and each part has it's own T and C planes not used by the other parts. There are a dozen ops for two larger parts, some drilling, some 2D contour, and some flowline surface paths. When I check all the ops and hit the G1 command to post the part I get 2 separate .NC files on both of the larger parts. Ops in each are not split by mill or drill, not in order, but are renamed -1 and -2 by Mastercam or the post processor. Parts with fewer ops post as they should, a single .NC file. Using an mpmaster.pst

The post seems to be a mpmaster.pst with the revision log mostly by IHS. We use this same post on most of our machines, Fadals mostly, Awea VP2012 and a Mazak. I've tried it again and once it worked correctly and in my zip2go example it didn't output the note at all. 353A4231-2---REF.ZIP

I want to put notes in with the code but not manually in code expert. In 2D tool paths at the bottom there is a manual entry selection (tool path) that I can put notes in to insert in the code where needed. Problem is it doesn't go where I put it. For example I may put it after the 2nd or 3rd operation but in the .NC file it appears on the first line, the N100 line. How can I make it show up where I need it?

Thanks for that tip gcode. You have been one of the most helpful members of this forum for quite a long time. I appreciate your response.

I haven't posted here in a long time. Glad to see familiar names still around. I'm still getting my work from Catia drivers. When I was machining friction stir weld tools, I found arc centers off the tool centerline constantly. Came down to the method used to create the tool and probably tolerance settings. Mastercam dealer had 2 Catia converters and neither of them worked as well as STEP or .igs conversion for me. Always hated that end lines often don't meet and arcs are 2 splines. At this new job we convert using Solidworks. Been reading page after page in this thread. I was using X9 daily until I was politicaly incorrect to the boss. Now I'm not running machines anymore, just programming only and trying to figure out where the commands I used so much are located in MC 2018. I'm so happy that this forum still exists and you all are posting here. Glad to be back.

I had X5 through X8 installed. I removed X5 to make room on hard drive for Catia R23. Afterward the icon in Windows explorer no longer showed the last saved .jpg of each file. Instead it just shows X8 or whatever version the file was last saved in. This happen to anyone else?

Nope, thats not it. Also thumbnails that were created in any MCX version that once were viewable are now just rectangular box with X7 or whatever version I was using at the time.

The thumbnail pix of parts generated when you save or close Mastercam no longer work. I have an older 125Gb SSD drive and I had to make some room for Catia R23 to be installed so I uninstalled MCX5. Those are the only changes made recently. How can I get those thumbnails working again?

This months issue of Modern Machine Shop Online has an article "The anatomy of an end mill for Titanium" on page 30. It should enlighten you on this subject and help with cutter choices.

Thanks Cathedral, I didn't know that was the new reverse. You may be correct RonC. There shows to be two solids on that level but one highlights the whole part and one doesnt seem to chose anything.

I can create a new body and I can make the new body go both directions. I just tried going the other direction which used to be if the arrow pointed one way you clicked the highlighted geometry and the arrow would point the other way or you could check a box labeled reverse direction. I have no reverse direction box and my geometry has a little ball and when I clicked the highlighted geometry the direction stayed the same but the little ball followed my cursor around at perpendicular angle. I have Moldplus Catia converter, Verisurf tools and the part file was a Catia conversion.

I have a solid I'm trying to put bolt holes in but MC won't do it. I created the arc on the bottom surface, then chose extrude solids,single chain then selected the circle and I get an arrow pointing down into the solid. In the solid extrude window and select cut body, in the chains window I select chain 1 (the only one) set distance to 1.000 in. press the green check box and there's no hole,why?

I had to drill and tap 114 holes, each one had a unique vector. Programing would have been a nightmare. After reading up on FBD it took a whold day to get it to actually work but it worked beautifully. There was a left and right hand part so even better. That was my one and only time using it and it was in X4 or X5. It works so well but the hoops you have to jump through to get it to work really suck. It could be a really awesome tool path if they could make it user friendly. I was hoping that would have happened by X8 but it doesn't seem to have.

Thanks Jay, that worked. Del, your way didn't work because you left out the part about right clicking the attributes button. Done that way it works too.

The previous boss here had a little trouble seeing lines, arcs, splines, etc at the narrow setting. He used the wide setting for all those. Now I have to deal with his files and with the geometry being this wide lots of things get covered up and hard to select in a crowd. Is there an easy way to change all the geometry on a file, to the small width?

The post is for a Haas VR-8 Head-Head 5 axis machine. It won't run with the generic haas post. I tried to copy and paste the code I was getting last Thursday but it crashed my browser.

That didn't work. I ran it with the same settings in your example but it just started to run the first part again. If I enter the X & Y distance between G54 & G55 I could see it working I've never run sub programs before but that's how I thought it would be done. Is there a tutorial on it?