The Shop > Software Tools
What CAM?
AdeV:
OK, a word about 2d vs 3d.... yes, I'm sure I can do this wheel in 2d very easily. However, that rather defeats the point of the exercise, which is to find a good 3d partner to SW. Today a wheel, tomorrow a sump, the day after that around 2500 £2 coins to pay for a certain piece of software.
So, yes, I _could_ probably re-draw the wheel as a 2d drawing, but then I'm going to run into the same problems when I do my first complex 3d shape that isn't the same shape along the Z axis.
ANYWAY.... by removing the fillets, I got CamBam to produce some nice sensible tool paths and a relatively short program ( ~ 600 lines), unfortunately, the mill won't switch to ISO mode, it ignores my demands to change user parameters, mutter grumble.
Control is a Heidenhain TNC151. Press MOD -> up arrow -> up arrow (to get to User Parameters) -> ENT - nothing happens.
Everything else appears to be tickkety-boo, so I assume it's somehow locked (one of the machine params)? If anyone knows which one, I'd love to know... meanwhile, I will go googling.
Edit: I cheated & set the machine parameter, so now it's in ISO mode. Unfortunately, the CamBam output crashed the controller..... back to the drawing board...
John Stevenson:
Ade,
Long short is you need a program that has a dedicated Heidenhain post processor as it's a totally different lanuage.
I program various shapes [ as opposed to parts ] for a local one man band who doesn't have any CAM software, these are all simple 2D shapes which he then types in and adds repeat commands etc.
He understands Heidenhain language, I don't, even though I can do the programming the code is in a foreign language to me.
Dolphin is a decent program but only 2D, Bobcad is now OK but only from V24 on, Sprutcam again OK, last two are all 3D but anywhere from £500 to £1500.
After that, well you need to talk to the bank manager.
AdeV:
I've got a reasonable handle on the Heidenhain langauge - parts of it at least, I now know what I did wrong with my manually-written wheel program, and could probably fix that more easily than getting CamBam talking Heidenhain.
CamBam does have a HH TNC151 postprocessor, but it appears to be broken. MeshCam has one, but it's "untested on a real machine" and I can already see errors in the output. Both of those are producing "Heidenhain friendly G-code". Bobcam claims to do native, but at $1500 is currently out of reach. Maybe next month.
CamBam seems to have a pretty configurable postprocessor, I might try to get that writing HH.
Swarfing:
Adev
Send Andy (10bulls) a mail as he will let you know the limits for HH, if there are any and if you find issue he will correct them very quickly.
AdeV:
Woohoo!
Spent a few hours farting around with CamBam's postprocessor macros, and now I have a PP which writes Heidenhain conversational :beer: It needs a few post-process steps to make it "just so", a handy VBS script does most of the grunt work.
So, now I can cut out my spoked chair wheels! Hurrah! No more sitting in the office at a 20 degree list...
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