Rob, Here is some machining info. Hope that helps.

quote: had no way to go back and edit them, so if you screwed up, might as well start over. There's always a way to go back and edit your path. You can add/remove geometry at any time without starting over. Drive surfaces , check surfaces , chains , points , etc... can all be edited. If you missed a fillet , click on the drive surface tab , add/solid/face. Regen , drink beer , verify , oopps missed another one , drink beer , add/solid/face , regen , drink beer....

JeremyG, You can change the color of the solid edges. I have mine set to white and change the color of the model to something darker. They light up pretty nice then. Here's how if ya don't already know............... screen/config/screen tab/system colors/scrol down to "solid face select color". Pick a color , and save your settings.

Thanks Guys! Here's how it posts now.......... N53 G0 Z.1 N54 M9 N55 M5 N56 G49 Z.1 N57 G91 G28 Z0. N58 G28Y0. N59 M30 % Which is fine by me. We have the fabulous umbrella style tool changer so I'm just trying to avoid coolant gettin sprayed in there. Just outta curiousity , how would you get the M9 up to the GO Z.1 line ? Thanks again for your time.

Thanks for the qick replies fellas. I've tried placing "scoolant" in different lines in pretract, posted a file , and hasn't worked yet. I must be missing something. from the post : pretract #End of tool path, toolchange sav_absinc = absinc sav_coolant = coolant coolant = zero #cc_pos is reset in the toolchange here cc_pos = zero gcode = zero pbld, n, sccomp, *sm05, psub_end_mny, e absinc = zero pbld, n, sgabsinc, "G49", pfzout, e absinc = one pbld, n, sgabsinc, sgcode, *sg28ref, "Z0.",scoolant, e # pbld, n, *sg28ref, "X0.", "Y0.", protretinc, e absinc = sav_absinc coolant = sav_coolant

Hey everyone, I've been trying to tweak my post to turn off the coolant sooner. Been at it for awhile with no luck. Here's what the code looks like now N53 G0 Z.1 N54 M5 N55 G49 Z.1 N56 G91 G28 Z0. M9 N57 G28Y0. N58 M30 % And here's what I'd like.... N53 G0 Z.1 M9 N54 M5 N55 G49 Z.1 N56 G91 G28 Z0. N57 G28Y0. N58 M30 % It's a slightly modified Mpfan post if that helps. I've backed up the post also. Any help would be greatly appreciated. NuNu teh postizzle aint editizzle wurth shiznet.

+1 Mayday, Brian, not exactly sure what you mean but here goes. Resize your bmp. , rename it Unzoom(for example), copy it into the icons folder. The next time you open up Mcam the new "Unzoom" image should be visible. Hope that's what you're lookin for. Chris

Size the image you want to 32 x 32 pixels.Copy it into the Mcam/Common/Icons folder.

I've noticed that verifing thread mill ops' with "Solid Tool" instaed of "Turbo" works best. But maybe I'm doing something else wrong?

quote: Is it OK for me to be here As long as you pay your monthly dues ON TIME. Welcome aboard Zippy !!! Enjoy.

Works fine here to. Do you have a question bout' it?

Is there enough room for the cutter to ramp? What size pocket versus cutter size, I mean. Gotta take off for the day, e-mail the file if you need to. I could check it out in da morning if you haven't got it by then Later

Do you have "ramp from entry point" clicked on from the Entry/Ramp tab?

What material , machine(max rpm/feed) , cutter size are ya using. I backplotted it at 3 1/2 hrs here.

Try: surface / finish / radial with a 3/4 ball if you have one. Adjust the max angle increment for desired finish.

Thanks for the replies fellas That's what I ended up doing (i think ) I extruded the letters thru the surface , offset the surface up .005" , then trimmed the solids to the offset surface. Thanks again !!

Hi All, I have some letters projected onto a curved surface. I would like to extrude them up .005". When I go solids/extrude/ then pick the chain it tells me "operation requires planar chain set" What am I missing? TIA

What do you have set on the "Advanced Settings" tab on the finish parallel page?

Try summfin like this. I use this on our HAAS. Not sure about your choice of machines though. T1 M6 G0 G90 G54 X(loc)Y(loc) M19 (add P value for degree of orientation if needed) G43 H1 Z.1 G01 Z-.(depth) F.(ipm) G00 Z.1 G49 Z.1 G91 G28 Z0. G28Y0. M30

Just a thought , Do you have "Safety Zone" checked on your job set-up page ? If so un-check it

quote: if i could change toolpath types without selecting the surfaces again each time that would save a lot of time. Do you have solids ? If so you could do , toolpath / surface / finish / parallel(or whichever) / solids / last

Congrats and Thank You to Everyone !! Best forum on da web. No bout a dout it!

Thanks betts , I created the surfaces , analyzed them , and found the problem spot. It was a sharp edge leading into a fillet that seemed to cause the problem. So I created a fillet on the solid model , regenerated the operation , and the path came out fine.

I'm trying to do a surface / rough / parallel on a solid model. When the path starts to generate I get this error message Bad trim surface found - use analyze / surface / check model to find all Then Error processing solid face Then ERROR - Error Regenerating Operation ! Surface Rough Parallel OP # 2 op_idn 6 I did , analyze / surface / check solid , and 0 errors were found. What am I missing? I tried a search with no luck. [ 03-17-2005, 09:40 AM: Message edited by: NuNu ]

Similar thing happened to me yesterday. I have a surface on top of a solid with a different color. When I opened the file , I couldn't see it , I verified da toolpath , went back to the model , there's the surface but it's all white. When I rotated the part , the color would show up but only in certain areas as I rotated. I checked the file this morning and everything is back to normal. Gotta be some vid-card glitch.