CAM comparisons - Dolphin & CamBam

[jmccracken]

Friends,

I'm looking at purchasing either Dolphin Partmaster Pro or CamBam Plus for my Bridgeport Interact w/ Heidenhain 151B. I have been tooling around the CNCZone forums and their respective online forums for a couple of days ... both seem to have rich communities with quick responses.

I'd love to hear from this forum any positives and negatives with CamBam with the Heidehain controllers, 151B specifically. I definitely want the ability to do some 3D contouring. Further, I have aspiration of doing a 4th, rotary axis, so having some capability with a rotary is desirable.

Is this the package with which to get started?

Many thanks,
John

[blowlamp]

I moved from Dolphin over to CamBam and am perfectly happy with my decision.

CamBam doesn't have 4th axis yet, but if you want 3D machining capability, then you don't have any choice between the two, as this feature isn't present in Dolphin Partmaster. On the other hand, 3D is very well supported in CamBam and is something I do quite frequently without any drama from the software.

2D machining is a very strong area in CamBam with excellent, clean toolpaths that are arcs wherever possible (for smooth machine movement and compact code), that can be altered to suit your needs by changing one or more of the many available options.

Check the forum at CamBam - Index There are loads of helpful people there. I'm sure one chap on there says he gets better code from CamBam than he does from MasterCam


Martin.

[jmccracken]

Well ... I wanted to say that, after test driving CamBam, I'm pretty much in love with it. It seems intuitive and powerful. I'm struggling now with getting the first post to work with my Heidenhain 151B controller ...

Anyway, nice software ... I think this package is my ticket ...

[Desertrunner]

Hi John,
I agree CamBam is a very good package, a couple of months ago I wanted to do Trochoidal milling so I was prepared to pay 3k for a software package and they turned around and said it could not do it. Now with Andy's efforts we are doing it with CamBam.
Martin is right the people on the forum really help getting up to speed fast. As well I think you would have to say Andy speed of improvment of the software is very impressive. While it can't do 4th axis today I am sure it will in the future.
Its the best all round package you will find.
Tony