Need to round over the top on a part Help.

[Cartierusm]

So I'm making this yoke pictured below and instead of spending lots of time trying to figure out how model a curved top I was wondering if there was an easy way to put a curved top on this part, you know just rounded over so there is a little relief to it so it's not so square. It would have to be made with a ball nose bit as I need to do it on both sides. So I'd mill the rounded part on one side, flip it, mill the rounded part again and then do the cut out. Sound good?

[Cartierusm]

I'm building a 4th axis so I don't know if it would be easier to use a 4th axis, bolt this part on after it's cut out and do some kind of roudning operation. I've never done 4th axis work so I don't know how hard this would be. I do have RhinoCAM 1.0 Pro which has 4th Axis capability.

[BrendaEM]

I can't speak to the machining of it, but as for the model, you can use a Solid/Fillet to round over the top, and by selecting the top edges. I do think that square corner inside the yoke will give you trouble, filleting, machining, and finished part.

[Cartierusm]

Thanks. I'll try that.

[Cartierusm]

I was fooling around with the fillet and chamfer commands the problem is there are so many. I couldn't figure it out. First I did an extrusion to make it a solid but that didn't help. Every time I applied the fillet it came out with all these weird shapes that made it look like the Super Dome. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

[JCarruthers]

No there's no such thing as as simple way to just "put a curved top" on a part, not a shape like that anywya. It looks simple enough to make as 2 or three curved shapes, one for the bottom part, one for each 'fork,' one for the little 'protrusion' on the end, and blend/fillet them together.

[Cartierusm]

I don't really know what I was thinking. I just did a 2 rail sweep with a multiple arcs. Thanks for the help though.

[Cartierusm]

OK so I've got the tops rounded but don't know which method I should use to machine this so it efficient, parallel machining? Oh I have RhinoCAM 1.0 BTW.

Also in RhinoCAM how would I program a corner rounding endmill, because that might be an alternative.

[mgdesigns]

I just did a quick (5 minute) sketch with Rhino, and use the fillet surface command. Is this what you want?

[Cartierusm]

I apprecaite the help but I already got the answer, thanks though.