Alibre cam and Visual mill 6.

[cjdavis618]

Within VM6 and Alibre cam, how do I restrict a tool from cutting outside of a boundary that I place?

The reason I ask for both is that I have both packages and some toolpaths seem to go a bit crazy on certain geometry. I can't seem to figure out how to order them by location.

Thanks

[cjdavis618]

Maybe I didn't ask the question right or something.

I know that most of the work in Alibre cam and Visual mill is Sketch. Is there a way that I can set a simple boundary to machine within rather than the part extremes?

I asked Alibre about this and never got an answer from them. They sure don't mind taking my support fees though.

[MichaelHenry]

Did you try support by email or by phone?

It seems like phone support might be more responsive, at least on pure Alibre issues. You might also try the MecSoft forum for Alibre CAM, though they seem to have bailed out on direct support for that product.

[Rico55]

I don't know about AlibreCam, but in VisualMill, you need to draw regions, or boundaries for tooling operations. Most 3d operations restrict the centerline of the tool to the boundary, so you are cutting past it- I will use another region that I offset inside that boundary by half the diameter of the tool if I want the tool to stay inside my original boundary. In 2.5d operations like pocketing or profiling, the tool should stay within the region, but you still want to draw those regions for the operation. I have found the best program for drawing regions is Rhino, and for pockets and profiles, it works best if the region is at the top of the stock. I also draw my stock in Rhino, and then delete it in VM after creating a 'part box stock' with no offsets. You can import the regions, or new ones, into your VM file if you need to change something. If you are having trouble with some of your regions, try changing the elevation of them- sometimes the program will not recognize one if it is at the bottom of the stock, and you are cutting above it. Hope this helps.

[cjdavis618]

Did you try support by email or by phone?

It seems like phone support might be more responsive, at least on pure Alibre issues. You might also try the MecSoft forum for Alibre CAM, though they seem to have bailed out on direct support for that product.

I did Email, and usually, they have good response times, but lately I am not getting responses at all. I will try calling because I pay for this out of my pocket. I have spent nearly 10k with them for all of my software and will get some help.

[cjdavis618]

I don't know about AlibreCam, but in VisualMill, you need to draw regions, or boundaries for tooling operations. Most 3d operations restrict the centerline of the tool to the boundary, so you are cutting past it- I will use another region that I offset inside that boundary by half the diameter of the tool if I want the tool to stay inside my original boundary. In 2.5d operations like pocketing or profiling, the tool should stay within the region, but you still want to draw those regions for the operation. I have found the best program for drawing regions is Rhino, and for pockets and profiles, it works best if the region is at the top of the stock. I also draw my stock in Rhino, and then delete it in VM after creating a 'part box stock' with no offsets. You can import the regions, or new ones, into your VM file if you need to change something. If you are having trouble with some of your regions, try changing the elevation of them- sometimes the program will not recognize one if it is at the bottom of the stock, and you are cutting above it. Hope this helps.

Thanks, and yeah that does make sense. Let me try it and see what I can do. After working with Alibre and dimensioning items, I find it hard to add any specific size boxes or items to visual mill since the dimensioning tools do not work the same way. I guess I will have to make my coordinate entries better.

Alibre Cam is tough to work with at times as well. But I think it is a matter of knowing half of what I need in VM6 and half in Alibre and not completely getting the process in the Cam side. The modeling side is much easier to me, but the Cad side tutorials and training are a bit simplistic and I didn't see any references to these topics. Maybe I am overthinking the process too much.

[DareBee]

FWIW the manuals/videos are here. http://www.mecsoft.com/MillSelfTraining.shtml

With 3d it is sometimes easiest to convert surface edges for containment regions.
I also find that it is necessary to create CPlanes to draw geometry on obtuse faces or for 4 axis work.
I also find that making regions using coordinate(command line) inputs can give weird/unexpected results unless you are on the base planes and "ortho" is f**&&^ed up (maybe it is just me though).

[DURATEC]

I bought Alibre and was totally disapointed with their help. They just seem to not have time. Alibre cam IS visual mill. You are much better off just buying Visual Mill from Mechsoft directly and bypass Alibre altogether.

Mecsoft WILL help you. They WILL call you back. Take the class in their office. Although Visualmill is affordable, it will get you by in a clinch. I found it ok.

I have a HAAS VF3 and do most of my programming right on the control. I also have basic operations set up on my laptop in notepad. when I need to do a quick part, with several basic operations, I just copy,paste, and edit my tool, offset..etc,etc,etc...quick, easy, down and dirty, and I am milling in a fraction of the time.

Email me your addy and I will send you a couple of them to try. Also I use my laser software for some parts on my mill. Both use international machine tool code.

I have both laser cutting and milling along with forming, welding and other stuff. My phylosophy is this,:We need to help eachother out, because as manufacturing goes offshore, so goes the country".

Look what we did in WWll.....we cannot do the same thing today......why is that?

Thanks

[cjdavis618]

Hey Duratec,

Welcome to the board. I am fortunate in the fact that I have VM6 standard and Alibre Cam expert so I can grip at both of them, but my experiance is the same as yours as for getting support from Alibre. The "Online support" is terrible and rarely do I get any response.

I would be glad to look at anything you can send me. I will send my email to you through the PM system here.

Thanks again.