Trochoidal Milling with Solidcam

[MRM RCModels]

I've used Solidcam for 2 years now and like it much more than Mastercam. I'm cutting a .5in radius inside corner in 1in thick Al tooling plate.

I heard trochoidal milling can provide a constant tool engagement angle at high IPM. It did not have much about this in the instruction manual . Has anyone used this feature in Solidcam before? If so, a few pointers would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Kelvin

[crabbass]

I am pretty new to solid cam myself. I have tried the trichoidal option in a pocket, I wasn't that satisfied with the results. I have seen this stategy applied on videos at trade shows and it is verry fast. The code that I generated using solid cam was verry slow. I think the examples I have seen elsewhere dont use circles, or use a different feed rate for looping back into the cut (when not cutting). In a circular shaped pocket (nice rounded corners) a contour strategy with a small step over achieves an almost constant approach angle allowing you to ramp up the feed pretty high. I tend to do this now, as it seems there is much less air cutting. I would like to mount a chunk of Al in the vise and spend some time playing with the radius and step over values in the trichoidal options.

AC

[jmcglynn]

I've tried that a few times, only in simulations. I think it's kind of bogus, the paths it generates don't make sense. For example, a straight cut on an open side of an open pocket and it spirals along. Maybe it can be made to work sensibly in some situations, but it seems like something that was put in to be able to claim "feature parity" with Surfcam.

[Ramilletes]

Necesito un tutorial de SolidCAM 2009

[mattpatt]

I've wanted to use it on several occasions but it gives ridiculous toolpaths. And yes, like you say it uses circles, which wastes a lot of time. I've looked at HSM works recently and a similar siuation uses a straight line back to the cut at a higher feed rate, which makes much more sense.