quote: Don't use ball mills when surfacing electrodes for 2D orbit Allot of our electrode detail dictates using very small ball mills. I’m hoping Mastercam will add the 2d offset feature in the future.

quote: 2 axis orbit is easily achieved in Mastercam by cheating tool diameters.So how do you cheat on a ball mill doing a surface?

The problem I have using negative stock is you’re stuck with 3 axis orbit. We prefer 2 axis orbit to maintain sharp corners and only use one trode design to rough and finish. Currently we have to offset or draw the trode from scratch to get a 2 axis orbit. The only program I found that does 2 axis orbit is Cimatron.

Does Moldplus allow you to select orbiting method and reduction amount? I didn’t see anything on their site referring to orbiting or reduction.

I need to find a faster and easier way to engineer electrodes. I’ve been engineering electrodes in Mastercam for years and it can be a real pain in the arse at times. We use a couple different orbit styles depending on the detail and geometry. Most of the time we use a simple orbit on the XY plane so corner detail remains sharp and some spherical orbiting. The spherical orbiting is easier because you can adjust the USPS using the stock amount or lie about the ball EM size. The XY orbiting can be hard if the geometry gets complex. Can Solidworks or any other program take a face or cavity detail and make a reverse detail and reduce that detail a specified amount on a plane or spherical? We have a seat of Solidworks but if it’s not going to help speed up our process were not going to update it. Thanks!

Iv'e been working with QC on something simular to this. They have reproduced one error with the undo but mine has something to do with placing/editing notes and the live feature. I loose all my geometry and if I dont pay attention when I hit save I have to redo it all. It's kinda hard remembering to check the level manager to see if everything is there when your crusing along trying to keep from getting too far behind.

You might want to go here for info on older Sodicks. They have it disabled for posting but you can still get manuals and other info. http://www.sodick.com/forum/index.php

kdt, We use CuW on our old MK XI and the conditions might be similar to what you need listed below. "( ON OFF MA IP SV UP DN LN STEP PL V HP PP C S L;" "( CuW - WC(G2) WEAR CONDITION A,B );" "C700 = 001 034 03 0010 04 02 03 001 0000 - 02 000 10 01 04 05;" "C710 = 001 034 03 0020 04 02 03 001 0000 - 02 000 10 02 04 05;" "C720 = 002 034 03 0030 03 02 03 001 0000 - 02 000 10 03 04 05;" "C730 = 002 034 02 0050 03 02 05 001 0010 - 02 000 10 04 04 05;" "C740 = 003 034 02 0070 03 02 04 001 0000 - 02 000 10 05 04 06;" "C750 = 003 035 02 0100 03 02 05 001 0000 - 02 000 10 06 04 06;" "C760 = 003 035 02 0120 03 02 06 001 0000 - 02 000 10 06 04 05;" "C770 = 003 035 02 0150 03 02 06 001 0000 - 02 000 10 07 04 05;" "C780 = 004 035 02 0230 03 02 00 001 0000 - 02 000 10 08 04 05;" "C790 = 004 035 02 0310 03 02 00 001 0000 - 02 000 10 08 04 05;" ";" ";" "-------------------------------------------------------------------;" " COND. O.B. ON IP VDI./.RMS./.RMAX ;" "-------------------------------------------------------------------;" " C790 .0048 4 31 30 100 15 ;" "...................................................................;" " C780 .0037 4 23 29 89 14 ;" "...................................................................;" " C760 .0028 3 12 27 70 11 ;" "...................................................................;" " C740 .0018 3 07 25 56 9 ;" "...................................................................;" " C720 .0012 2 03 22 39 6 ;" "...................................................................;" " C710 .0009 1 02 20 31 5 ;" "...................................................................;" " C700 .0006 1 01 18 25 4 ;" "...................................................................;" " C972 .0004 1 00 16 20 3 ;" "...................................................................;" " C903 .0002 1 00 6 6 1 ;" "-------------------------------------------------------------------;"

I just installed an Acer AL2223W 22” Widescreen and updated the drivers on a ATI X600 SE to 8.421.0.0 and Mastercam X2 MR2 won’t start. It gets to the “reading machine definitions” and crashes. Everything worked fine up until I updated the drivers but the odd thing is that MC X LT runs fine. It also grabs a seat from the network before it crashes and doesn’t let go unless we reboot. Any suggestions on a fix?

I uninstalled all versions of X and reinstalled X2 and all the MR's & SP. Going to work with it fresh and cross my fingers...LOL

I lost a whole file in MR2 while dimensioning and placing notes. I've been having problems with the note button so I started saving after using it and it bit me in the arse! One of the problems I was seeing was stuff disappearing after placing a note, which was usually the note but this time after saving (everything was still on the screen) I went to change levels and noticed that there were “0” entities listed on all my levels and I could still see my geometry in the graphics window Anyone else seeing odd stuff happening while using the note feature?

Don’t know if this will help find the problem but I can get the OP manager disappear by switching from windowed to full screen. Just switch between full and windowed and toggle the OP manager and there’s a couple of combinations that will make it disappear when switching.

File with 16 levels and contrast checked...still no contrast!

Contrast rows is checked. Even rebooted and still no contrast!

My contrast rows doesn't work. What am I missing?

I need to find suppliers that can 3D mill electrodes for us. We currently don’t have a graphite mill to produce some highly detailed electrodes needed for a few jobs from a regular customer and I’m having a hard time finding one. We would supply a solid model (Solid Works) of the face detail and it would need reversed and cut small for a spherical orbit. We would supply the graphite trodes on 50mm Erowa tooling. If interested or questions Email me at [email protected] Thanks in advance for any help guys!

Was Design LT for X2 ever released? Any chance of getting it with the viewsheet feature thats new with MR1?

Programs that are usualy running on my workstation. Symantec AV Ver 10.0.0.359 Outlook 2003 IE 7.0 Visual Mfg V6.4

I get the same thing! Buy the end of the day you can watch the colors box (256) fill in line by line. Most of the files being worked on are 2D and under 1MB.

Thanks Roger...I'll give it a try.

I thought I’d use this thread to bring up a question concerning the recent folders. I have it set to show 20 in the list but it only shows the last folder I used and the other 19 listings are the first 19 folders I used after installing X2. Other than showing the last folder I used it’s backwards by keeping the folders I first used after setting it up. Is there anything in settings to change this or is it a bug on my installation?

I just experienced the same problem today when trying to move some detail in Y and there is no toolpaths associated to the geometry. Everything worked fine last week...

I get the error of wrong version also

I’ve been trying out the lock feature on dimensioning and it doesn’t seem to work for me. Using smart dimension I can lock intersection and after selecting 2 intersections it stays in select mode and I have to press escape to place the dimension. After placing the dimension I lose the lock When I just select horizontal, vertical, or one of the others I can lock intersection, pick 2 intersections, and place the dimension but it unlocks after placing it. Is the lock feature supposed to stay on during dimensioning or is it only good for one dimension?

I uninstalled IE-7 and I'm still having problems with the first toolpath in a group. I have a file that no mater how many times I hit regen and then post, the toolpath the file comes up blank. If I hit regen twice then post it gives me the code!