Frustration

[emc3zach]

Hi, new to the site and I have a few questions. I just got my new Tormach mill up and running and SprutCAM 7 Pro. I am frustrated with SprutCAM at this point and am pulling my hair out. I’m trying to make a wooden plaque. I created the plaque in Solidworks, put text on the plaque (Freestyle Script), did an extruded cut to a depth of .250, and then saved the file as an .igs. Then imported into SprutCAM, did the sew function, and did a job assignment. I’ve tried several different operations all with a 1/16th end mill as the tool, and nothing seems to work. I cannot get it to accept and generate the tool paths to cut the lettering. It should be a simple pocketing operating, but I cannot seem to get it to work. Any ideas on the best way to do this?

[MetalShavings]

Just out of curiosity, did you try to run the simulation? If so, did it look like it was supposed to?

Sorry I'm not much help. I've only been working with SprutCAM for a couple of weeks.

If I weren't already Bald-Headed I'm sure would have lost all my hair by now.

I'm slowly making progress but, not fast enough for my liking.

I think there needs to be an offshoot section of this SprutCAM forum. It could be called, "SprutCAM Anxiety Support Group" or "SprutCAMs Annonymous."

The software itself is OK I guess but, the tutorials seem to be geared to those who already know about SprutCAM. I've had great difficulty following them.

Incidently, when I ran my simulations initially (drilling and pocketing in particular) I found that my tool would follow the tool path but wouldn't do anything other than that. I had to expand the "Jobs" menu and go in and switch the "Enable" menu from "Off" to "On," then the simulation would show all the work that was assigned to the given operation.

I'm wondering if this is the case with your project?

On the left of your screen in the "Job Assignment" list click on the little "+" icon to the left of the Job assingment. It expands the details of that job assignment. Double click on the last item of that expanded list. It should have something to do with that actual cutting of your script. A information box opens up and at the top of that list is the column, "OFF" or "ON." If it's in the OFF position I think it means that the actual cutting portion of your Job assignment is disabled. Change it to the "ON" position and click Enter; then try again.

Hope this helps. If it doesn't, I plead ignorance.

MetalShavings

[MichaelHenry]

I can't help directly, but it's sometimes helpful to upload the STC file to make it easier for other users to help you troubleshoot. You might have to convert it to a ZIP file so that the forum software will accept it.

Mike

Originally Posted by emc3zach Hi, new to the site and I have a few questions. I just got my new Tormach mill up and running and SprutCAM 7 Pro. I am frustrated with SprutCAM at this point and am pulling my hair out. I’m trying to make a wooden plaque. I created the plaque in Solidworks, put text on the plaque (Freestyle Script), did an extruded cut to a depth of .250, and then saved the file as an .igs. Then imported into SprutCAM, did the sew function, and did a job assignment. I’ve tried several different operations all with a 1/16th end mill as the tool, and nothing seems to work. I cannot get it to accept and generate the tool paths to cut the lettering. It should be a simple pocketing operating, but I cannot seem to get it to work. Any ideas on the best way to do this?

[dbrija]

Originally Posted by emc3zach Hi, new to the site and I have a few questions. I just got my new Tormach mill up and running and SprutCAM 7 Pro. I am frustrated with SprutCAM at this point and am pulling my hair out. I’m trying to make a wooden plaque. I created the plaque in Solidworks, put text on the plaque (Freestyle Script), did an extruded cut to a depth of .250, and then saved the file as an .igs. Then imported into SprutCAM, did the sew function, and did a job assignment. I’ve tried several different operations all with a 1/16th end mill as the tool, and nothing seems to work. I cannot get it to accept and generate the tool paths to cut the lettering. It should be a simple pocketing operating, but I cannot seem to get it to work. Any ideas on the best way to do this?

From my experience, use the text generator in Sprutcam itself. In the 2D geometry on the Model tab. It is very friendly and easy to use. Uses the native fonts on your system.

When you igs out your file, it breaks the letters into a million faces and Sprutcam does not handle that well. I spent a long time trying to get it to work, and then I just used the method I described above and had a part within 1 hour. I tried Engraving and Pocketing ops to no avail. Some letters worked, until I simulated the posted file in the PCNC software. Ugly.

Note that things like spacing and height are a bit non-intuitive, but a few minutes playing with it, you'll understand. Tormach has a nice training video on using the text generator.

[emc3zach]

All, thanks for your replies and suggestions. I did finally get my issue resolved, at least on this project. I did quite a bit of searching on this forum and found several suggestions to other people that had similar problems. The one that seemed to work was to make sure that the A axis was turned off on the mill parameters, and then to use the Finishing 2D contouring function. After that it worked like a charm. To answer Metalshavings question, yes I did run the simulations many times, with multiple results, this is how I knew things were not working out like I wanted. I did not know about the "Off, On" function, I'll check that out tomorrow. I agree this is going to be a steep learning curve. Thanks for everyone's responses and help.

emc3zach

[TXFred]

I'm new to SprutCAM myself. I quit my job to become self employed, using Sprut and my Tormach to make parts.

I had already watched all the tutorials prior to this.

The first week of self employment, I spent 40 hours messing with SprutCAM.
The second week, I spent another 38 hours on SprutCAM, and then two hours running a part on the CNC.

SprutCAM is very powerful and versatile, but the learning curve is a real [DELETED]. Stick with it, you'll get the hang of it eventually.

Frederic

[emc3zach]

TXFread, Thanks for the encouragement and I am going to stick with it, don't have much choice, it's my job now. We bought a Tormach and SprutCAM to enhance our capability in the shop where I work and I'm the only one in the shop that knows anything at all about CNC. So I have to prove to everyone that we did not waste our money. So thanks for the kind words. I admire the fact that you had the courage to quit your job to become self employed. I too hope to be able to do that after I retire from my current job in about 15 yrs. In the meantime I plan our getting things started up at home and have a sideline so when I do retire it will be a smooth transition.
Thanks
emc3zach