Vectric Customer

I am attempting to carve a clock face. On there there are sixty tick marks created by a simple line. I realize that these are open vectors. But how do I carve these? When I select them for carving in the tool paths I get the error that I have 60 open vectors. I am confused.

Use a "Profile" toolpath and select ON.

You will need a Depth also, I suggest about .032 with a 60 degree cutter.

I assume then that I need to select the tick marks separately? Interested in why they can't be picked up in the carving tool Path?


Thanks for the help.

Interested in why they can't be picked up in the carving tool Path?

A V-Carve toolpath ALWAYS needs a closed vector because it is carving in the space between the vectors.

A profile toolpath ON the vector can be used with open or closed vectors.

You may find it helpful to watch the Profile Toolpath Guide video tutorial under:
Help/Video Tutorial Browser.../By Category/2D Toolpaths/Profile Toolpath Guide

Rcnewcomb wrote:

Interested in why they can't be picked up in the carving tool Path?

A V-Carve toolpath ALWAYS needs a closed vector because it is carving in the space between the vectors.

A profile toolpath ON the vector can be used with open or closed vectors.

You may find it helpful to watch the Profile Toolpath Guide video tutorial under:
Help/Video Tutorial Browser.../By Category/2D Toolpaths/Profile Toolpath Guide

Well I sat through the whole tutorial and not a single mention of carving a straight line. My very first post after buying Vcarve was me trying to cut a step into a piece of pine. The end result should have looked looked like a capital 'L' at the end of a 10" piece of 2x1" running the whole length.

I never did discover how to do what seemed like a simple task using Vcarve. Even now, I use a router table to perform this operation prior to engraving on the pine. I'll try now to find how to 'switch on' a toolpath and see what happens.

Thanks for the information. Apart from watching a Journalist force his or her opinion on the public in a current affairs program, my most hated viewing is watching tutorials. If they were broken down into specifics, it might not be so bad but to watch an hour and 45 minutes in anticipation of being told something you never get to see or hear is an incredibly frustrating process akin to water torture. At least with a book you can reference an index and find only what you want to know.

Ryadia

my most hated viewing is watching tutorials. If they were broken down into specifics, it might not be so bad

You bring up a few good points:
1. people have different learning styles so training materials other than video format would be a good addition
2. for any training material make it easier to find steps for how to use a feature, or how to perform a specific task

Regarding training/support material in a format other than video, what would people like to see? In the past with other software I've had books with exercises or examples. Some were focus on teaching theory, i.e. here is how this tool work, others were more tactical, i.e. here are the steps to do "this".

Regarding breaking into specifics, another software vendor (not CAD/CAM related) has online training videos, but they have set up a broad topic like Visual Analytics that is nearly two hours long and broken it into specific sections that are 2 to 7 minutes in length. This makes it very easy to go back an look at a particular step that may be troublesome.

Hello Ryadia,

With version 9 we have added a new Video Tutorial Browser which aims to help address this problem,
bookmarks can now be added to the videos to take you to specific areas of the video.
Over time, we hope to further improve the bookmarks based on search requests that are made.

http://forum.vectric.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=27821

Cheers,

Mark.

In the menu bar, Help--Help Contents takes you to a document that I have found quite helpful in explaining how the tools and toolpaths work. I'm not a fan of the tutorials, too. But once in a while they turn on a light bulb for me.

Straight lines appear overly difficult when you are new at this. I arrived at this thread because I'm trying to sort out using Vcarve to create/engrave machine tool indexing dials. This means making the correct number of tick marks around the circumference of a dial blank, and then adding numerals. I fear there are too many variable here for a Newbie. I.e. engraved straight lines, layout using array copy, and then putting it together using wrapping.
Any hints or pointers will be highly appreciated!

You only need to worry about wrapping if you have a rotary axis and you're make something cylindrical. If it's just a flat piece of material then it's just a straight profile toolpath on the line. Use the forum search to look for posts about clock faces. That should tell you all you need to know.

Maybe to little to late, but someone else may need this info. Just use the engraving tool path and it will do a straight line without being connected to anything else.