Working with Solids

[timmydabull]

i have been working with solids for about 3 months now,when i first enquired how to machine multiple operations on a part i was instructed to copy the part to another level,and rotate the part to use top coordinate for toolpathing.

by the end of a machining operation it would be common to wind up with 4 or 5 multiple copies of the solid on several levels.

the problem lies when i go to make a change to the solid model i would get lost,and the main level would have multiple copies of the wireframe tangled together,making it impossible to edit the geometry,usuall resulting in starting over again.

i gathered this was because the Make Main Level Always Visible box was checked and when i would copy the geometry to another level it would add another copy to the wireframe main level as well.(i always start out as wireframe on level 1).

after wasting much time over the last several months i started use just the original solid and rotate it around to create the different toolpath operations that i needed,and when i went to make a change to the model it was simple and easy to edit and keep track of the solid history.

is it common to create multiple copies of a part position on several levels the way i was doing it or is using a single model much more common?

using one model and rotating to create toolpaths certainly seems the way to go.

seems i have been learing the hard way.


thank you

[Matt Berube]

The answer you seek is "WCS" grasshopper. People who don't know any better sometimes rotate and translate geometry to origin but if you learn to use the WCS you will definitely make your life better and also never have duplicate on non-associative solids.

[cadcam]

Timmy downlaod this video.
www.mastercam-cadcam.com/sample1.zip review this avi.

[timmydabull]

thank you i will download and watch.

thank you too Matt,i think that is the direction i need to look.

[timmydabull]

wow that was a great video,i will need to watch it a couple of times to comprehend what is going on with the wcs details.

thank you very much.

Did you put together that video yourself?

very nice work,i like the speed of instruction too,on some other video tutorials i have seen i almost fall asleep waiting to tell me what i need to know.

[cadcam]

All videos I share are created by me. thank you for the nice words. I do need to redo that one with more detail.
But that should get you started.

[timmydabull]

cadcam,i have went over your video several times and i have attempted to start creating different views.

the only problem is when i try to create a toolpath from a named view,my tool backplot shows it coming from the wrong plane.

i have went over everything i seen in the videos several times and i cannot figure what i am doing wrong.

can you offer some suggestions?

thanks

[cadcam]

Timmy share one of the files your are doing so I can review what you are doing. this may help me help you.

[cadcam]

Timmy, by the way I was just talking to Jimmy yeasterday and will be again this week.
trying to put a deal together with him.

[timmydabull]

pm sent
thank you

[cadcam]

And you have Email sir.

[tobyaxis]

Originally Posted by cadcam And you have Email sir.

Dude, you used the "S" word, LOL. Personally I have to get used to that word because I hear it quite often now.