Meshcam - stand alone vs CAD integrated

[harryn]

Hi

I am hoping to clarify an important point for me.

A friend of mine wants to draw up a 3D part in Rhino, and have me cut it on my (under contstruction) DIY 3 axis router.

The router will be running Mach III (at least, that is the plan)

I don't own a copy of Rhino, and have no plans to buy it, at least near term.

Questions

1) Can I use a 3D CAD file from Rhino (emailed to me), load it into a stand- alone copy of Mesh CAM, and make tool paths / G code from it ?

2) Can the cut viewer software see the entire image of what is going on with the part and tool paths run in this mode (no Rhino s/w)

Thanks

[mcarvey]

Although I've never used Meshcam, they appears to offer a 60 day demo. This should give you answers to any questions you may have.

http://www.grzsoftware.com/download.php

-Matt

[anoel]

He can export it as an .stl file and Meshcam use it.

[ger21]

Have the friend export an .stl file from Rhino. You then load the .stl file in to MeshCAM, create your toolpaths, and save the g-code. Cut Viewer is a separate program from MeshCAM, so you then load the g-code into Cut Planner and have it display the simulation. (Provided you purchase Cut Viewer along with MeshCAM.) Cut Planner gets the stock and tool info from comments that MeshCAM adds to the g-code file.