Engraving small lettering.

[Rich05]

Is MasterCam the best for this? I need some pretty small clean text. What tool should be used for this? Is MasterCam the right program for this?

[Rekd]

It can easily do engraving. Is it the best? That's a matter of opinion.

[Rich05]

thanks I tried engrave tool path, but am confused about which tool would work best, also how do you handle the inside of of the lettering. to make a letter a solid block is not engrave I guess. a little bit confused about how to make nice lettering.

[cadcam]

Show us what you are trying to make and what version of MC?

[Rich05]

MasterCam X. Is just a simple plaque to put on the wall, kind of like an award the plaque has some lettering, a two sentence phrase. the part measures 5"x8" with a 3d image of a bird in middle. the bird is done. the text goes under it.


Thanks!
R

[neilw20]

I tried Mastercam a friend has, and it was making life difficult.
BobCad was much easier.
Make the letters, orient them, select them one at a time and generate the fragment of g-code for that letter, then used a macro to Up/down to create code to go UP.
I never bothered to figure out how to move from letter to letter and having it move the Z up and down.
I am sure it can doit all at once, but I never bothered to fiddle too much.
It still made a pretty PUMP/LAMP switch with 5mm letters to try it out.
I suppose I should read the manual/help.
I still haven't figured which CAM package I need (or like/hate)

[ZipSnipe]

Instead of engraving try the contour(works better than the engraving part) in Mastercam, with comp turned off.

[cadcam]

Ok guys, I made a little engraving video. please review and let me know if this helps.
give a min to start once you see the splash screen.
http://www.mastercam-cadcam.com/engr...engraving.html

[ZipSnipe]

Great video, now I get to show the guys at work how to use that engrave part of the program that they all don't use.

[Rekd]

Originally Posted by neilw20 Make the letters, orient them, select them one at a time and generate the fragment of g-code for that letter, then used a macro to Up/down to create code to go UP.

In Mastercam you create letters in the orientation you want (one step eliminated), select them all at the same time (multiple steps eliminated), generate the operation (for ALL letters, eliminating many steps), click post, send to machine.

Doesn't get much easier than that.

[Rich05]

Originally Posted by cadcam Ok guys, I made a little engraving video. please review and let me know if this helps. give a min to start once you see the splash screen. http://www.mastercam-cadcam.com/engr...engraving.html

Excellent video, thank you.

I bought two .025 endmills from McMaster. Would I just do better to use spot drills as you had on your video?

Also when you did the pocketing way of cutting the letters how come you did not check island pocketing in pocketing options or is that not needed?

Thanks
R

[Rekd]

Originally Posted by Rich05 Would I just do better to use spot drills as you had on your video?

If you're contouring, probably yes. I use 90° spot drills most of the time, but for smaller letters I use a number 0 or number 00 center drill.