do machining ABOVE the stock

[sebmay]

Hello,

I carve some plexi then fill the carving with some resin.
That resin makes bump (lump ? dent ? ok : i have to put far moreresin that geometrically needed, in order to make sure no light will appears on borders of the carving).

After the resin get hard, i want to remove the excess of resin.

The bump may be 2mm height approx. I set up a pocket, saying 1.7mm of depth. One pass.

I want to travel the stock at 3/10th of mm of altitude ABOVE the stock which should not be touched. That's why i keep a 0.3 mm above it.
When i go to the screen, i cannot set a negative -2mm for the position of the model, in order to have the mill flying at .3mm above the stock.

You do not allow users to set a negative value.
For now the machining is so simple, i will manually change all the Z. ..
But for sake of simplicity, can you plan a way to solve this ?

For me it will be very frequent, and will be too hard for complicated shapes.

What do you think about that ?

Cordially,
Sebastien

[Leo]

Sabatien,

What I do when I want to set the "Z" above the material is:

In the machine, not vectric, I set "MY" Z on top of the material. Top or bottom doesn't really matter at all, it still works either way. I move the tool tip to the top of my material and set the machine control to "Z" zero.

If I want to cut to the correct depth I just run the program.

If I want to cut ABOVE the material I move the tool tip to the height above that I want to be above, then set "Z" zero in the machine control. The program will cut above just like you want.

It really is simple and fast. You can use the DRO on the control to do it. It's a lot easier that reposting the code every time you want to do it.

[sebmay]

Thanks Leo,

I understand you suggest a work-around. I used that, but i wish to have a more direct way, mainstream method.

Allowing the user to enter negative values in the field should not even need any code rewrite.

Just a quick user confirmation with a MessageBox may protect users from entering negative values by mistake.

I thank you anyway for your support.
Sebastien

[4DThinker]

When I've got material above the top surface I want to clean off, I set Z zero ON the top, but instead of accepting 0 for the entry, I type in a negative value of how far above the surface I want the cut to be. Same result as above method, but slightly different strategy.

Yes, it would be nice to have Aspire/VCarve Pro accept negative starting depth values. Until it does you now have at least two workarounds to let you get the job done. Enjoy!

4D

[Adrian]

My personal view is that it's an unnecessary thing to have in the CAM software as it's so much easier and more flexible to adjust it on the machine with the control software. Same as wanting to cut a piece in a different place on the material. Why go back and generate new code when you can do it all from the control software?

Might be the new style machines that basically shield the users from anything other than just pushing a button to cut a file that is the real problem?

[Leo]

Thanks Leo,

I understand you suggest a work-around. I used that, but i wish to have a more direct way, mainstream method.

Allowing the user to enter negative values in the field should not even need any code rewrite.

Just a quick user confirmation with a MessageBox may protect users from entering negative values by mistake.

I thank you anyway for your support.
Sebastien

I don't consider that a "work around". That is something we do in industry as a normal process when we need to. It is quick and easy. If I had an option in Vectric or any other CAM, I would not use it.