Machsupport Forum

G-Code, CAD, and CAM => LazyCam (Beta) => Topic started by: Wheelock Auto on April 20, 2011, 01:24:10 PM

Title: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: Wheelock Auto on April 20, 2011, 01:24:10 PM

Hi all,

Although I have been using Autocad for about fifteen years now, I am very new to Lazycam and Mach 3.  I made a simple drawing consisting of 4 chains, one of them being an object consisting of one Pline, and the other two being circular holes in this object.  When I bring the DXF into Lazycam, the Pline shows up in multiple colors, green for the arced parts of it, and blue for the straight line parts of it.  I was wondering if this matters.

Secondly, when I bring this into Mach 3, the circles do not show up and the tool path consists of erratic loops.
I tried eliminating the circles and just using the Pline, which worked.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: RICH on April 20, 2011, 05:18:48 PM

Post the drawing and the dxf.
RICH

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: ger21 on April 20, 2011, 05:28:39 PM

Try changing the IJ mode in general config to incremental.

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: RICH on April 20, 2011, 06:36:04 PM

Quote

I was wondering if this matters.

Not really and there is no way to change the default displayed colors that I am aware of.

RICH

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: Wheelock Auto on April 21, 2011, 11:40:19 AM

Thanks for the replies.  I'm not entirely sure of what I might have done, but I am not experiencing problems with erratic tool patterns when sending circles into MAch 3 anymore.

I should also preface this posting by mentioning, for clarity purposes, that I am using Lazycam for a plasma cutter.

Attached is a .LCam file of what I am working on.  Another problem that I am encountering is that in Autocad this drawing consists of only four objects, the three circles and the flange shape that contains them (and I can't remember, but this file might also include a box that I put around them for scaling purposes), Lazycam, while recognizing the same amount of objects (noting them as chains), says that the outer flange shape is made up of 12 entities.  I am concerned that this will cause my machine to produce the shape with jerking start/stop motions, as opposed to a smooth, consistent speed.  Any ideas regarding how to have this pline reduced to one entity?

Thanks in advance for any replies.   

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: ger21 on April 21, 2011, 11:46:24 AM

post the .dxf file

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: Wheelock Auto on April 21, 2011, 11:55:38 AM

Here it is.

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: ger21 on April 21, 2011, 12:00:17 PM

There are 12 segments to the polyline. The number of segments shouldn't make any difference, as long as you're using CV mode.
You could reduce it to 8 segments, by drawing a closed 4 sided polygon and using the fillet command to add the radii to the corners, but it really shouldn't matter.

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: RICH on April 21, 2011, 06:03:36 PM

I had problems with you dxf in that I could not create offsets properly. So i redrew over the top of your flange and here are the results when postedto Mach.
Maybe LC likes me......! ;)
I have never used or tested the Plasma mode of LC so can't commnet on it and you will not find anything in the manual about it.
RICH

Title: Re: Problems with circles and plines
Post by: RICH on April 21, 2011, 06:16:05 PM

BTW, If i explode your polyline it works. I don't use polylines for LC or LT.
RICH