5921
General Mach Discussion / Re: Contouring
« on: August 09, 2008, 02:27:56 PM »
I'll agree with the MeshCAM option. Also a longtime user. Easy to use and works great, with new features being added all the time.
This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.
- for example if you are cutting a window with the tool on the inside, which with standard bit rotation would probably mean you are cutting round in a clockwise direction, what do you use, and for example (since it says left and right) do you need to alter it when you come down the other side)
Hi, Imagine the cutter is a car with 2 steering wheels, one on the left for turning left and one on the right for turning right.
OK so far.
So you get in your car on the right hand side and drive. You can only turn right hand turns so, eventually if you turn 4 rights you have travelled in a rectangle or square. Which ever compensation you used, right for a hole, left for an island. You did not need to change it.
Now lets say the road is an S shape. The start of the S is a left hand turn so jump over to the left seat of the car and start driving left. You follow the S road until you get to the middle of the S you will see that you will need to turn to the right. To do this you have to stop the car and jump into the right hand seat to turn right.
The point at which you have to jump over to the correct seat in the car is the point at which you need to change the cutter compensation if you want to keep following the correct cutter path.
If you were actually cutting an S in material and you had only left compensation on, the bottom of the S would follow the correct path but the top part would not.
John
So I take it tool diameter compensation has to be done before Mach3?
What I must admit is that I have never been told what left and right mean - does that mean the tool is on the left or right - or the compensation is on the left or right.
There is another problem as well - where the cut finishes. Start the cut halfway along a straight edge and finish along the same straight edge, do not meet at a corner - because you do not know where the compensation is applied.