Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Cathar
Nah, I just bring MS-Paint drawn plans in to the machinists, and they then draw it up in MasterCam 9.
|
I have been on the road all month so far. Today is the first day I had internet access. The past week in my spare time I have been coding a CNC version of the pics I showed in the first page of this thread for my little CNC mill. Not an easy task with mill control software that only works in 2D. Made some significant modification to the design but I think it will be good. Calling it "Jet Block XT". Unfortunately my mill is broke. But by the time I get all this code figured out it will be this time next year anyway and the mill should be fixed or replaced.
.
Anyway here is the basic drawing if the middle piece. All the red lines are tool paths. My mill came with a .dxf to G-Code converter. So basically I draw the tool paths I want to use and import it in .dxf format and it creates G-Code. Very very very sloppy G-Code but G-Code non the less. Unfortunately it only spits out 2D G-Code meaning only one pass (the first pass of about 5). So I have to create the next 4 passes changing alot of code..... One more obstacle it my mill can only run about an hour at a time before the motor overheats so I am going to have to break this up into about 5 different sets of code. Each set only doing one set of passes. My main reason for making my own version is to complete the project originally started here:
http://forums.procooling.com/vbb/showthread.php?t=5476. Sorry the pics are gone, will try and find them and re-upload them when I get home.
Anyway excellent work Cathar