New user, Heatsink grooves w/islands

[greeps]

Hi,
I'm a new user of DolphinCad/Cam (about a week). My project is a heatsink with a fan for a scientific camera (QSI583WSG).

It'll start as a 6" square of 1/4" aluminum plate. I'll mill two cutouts for existing 1" fans, drill the mounting holes to mount the plate to the camera, drill the holes for the 4" fan, and cut the perimeter of the plate. I've attached a jpg screen cap. The corners of the green square define the location of the bolts to mount the 4" fan.

What's troubling me is machining the heatsink grooves. I want to machine 1/8" grooves and have them 1/8" apart. I don't want to groove the 4 pads for the 4"fan screws.

Is there a way to just lie to the program, use a 1/8" end mill but tell the program I'm using a 1/4" end mill, then use a face off routine with no overlap to cut the grooves? Is there a fairly easy way to spare the 4 pads? Would it be practical to make 9 separate zones then face off each zone and spare the pads? The area clearance and pocket routine was my first thought but I don't think I can constrain it to parallel passes and I don't think I can define multiple islands.

Initially I set up each groove as a contour but that got old fast. I'd planned to make a slot in each contour. There are just so many of them.

I don't have the mill yet, I'm planning a mini mill conversion at the Digital Machinist CNC Workshop later this month. I'm trying to learn the CAD/CAM as well as have the parts done in software so I can cut them when I return with the mill.

Thanks for any suggestions.

David

[bassman2914]

I'm not completely sure what the question was but I'll try my best. The part about using an 1/8" end mill and saying it's a 1/4" is easy. If you're going to use mach 3 just put 1/4" in the tool size. That's not the best way to go though. If I understood your terms right it sounds like those two pads needed to be the full 1/4" high and that's why you couldn't just face it because you'd either have fins on it or it'd be recessed 1/8". The easiest thing i could suggest is to just suck it up and do a 3d model. I have solid works and would be glad to design it for you if you drew a more detailed picture(assuming you could even use any of the solid works files). It would probably take me just as long to design it as it would to draw that picture. That's my 2 cents.

[Dolphin USA]

Please attach the drawing file and we will show you how to tackle this. You'll probably have to zip it.

Dolphin CAD/CAM USA Support

[greeps]

OK, here's what I have.
There's a drawing without the outlines for grooves, one with, a CNC for cutting the shape, no grooves, and finally a drawing with contours for the grooves if I need to do each one individually.

Thanks

David

[andre-dolphin]

I've produced a short video that I hope will be of help.

As with all these types of things there is always more than one approach. The video shows a very simple method of producing the grooves.

Download the video here:-

www.dolphin2.myzen.co.uk/flash/heatsink.zip

ATB
Andre

[greeps]

Wow, that's absolutely great, thank you Andre! That's exactly what I wanted to do.

Very best regards,
David