VCarve Pro - Feature Requests

[bnewman]

• Allow individual vectors in grouped vectors to be selected for tool paths (I want them grouped so I can easier move them around without messing them up.
• Some way to save a set of Vectors their corresponding Tool Paths in a new "Super Group" so you can copy/paste the whole thing on to another sheet and make duplicates and arrange them, and also have other parts in the same sheet.
  Array Copy ToolPath, just don't really work that well because it just creates duplicate paths BUT you can move the tool paths around.

I guess really their needs to be some kind of concept of a "Part" where you can define all their tool paths, and then just put them on the sheet you actually want to cut them all.

This is a major for me, and I assume a lot of other people.

[martin54]

The forum is mainly user to user so feature requests are best sent directly to Vectric where they keep track of them

support@vectric.com

Not sure how your selecting an individual vector within a group would work, how does the software know if you want to toolpath a single vector or the whole group?
Not sure I understand the rest, the toolpath array does all that I need it to so I am obviously not understanding what you are asking for.

[Adrian]

• Allow individual vectors in grouped vectors to be selected for tool paths (I want them grouped so I can easier move them around without messing them up.
• Some way to save a set of Vectors their corresponding Tool Paths in a new "Super Group" so you can copy/paste the whole thing on to another sheet and make duplicates and arrange them, and also have other parts in the same sheet.
  Array Copy ToolPath, just don't really work that well because it just creates duplicate paths BUT you can move the tool paths around.

I guess really their needs to be some kind of concept of a "Part" where you can define all their tool paths, and then just put them on the sheet you actually want to cut them all.

This is a major for me, and I assume a lot of other people.

Look into layers, associated toolpaths, nesting, merged toolpaths with the By Part option etc. Reading between the lines you're not aware of the full power of those.

[bnewman]

Not sure how your selecting an individual vector within a group would work, how does the software know if you want to toolpath a single vector or the whole group?

They could easily create a hot key on the keyboard that you hold down when you want to select individual vectors.

Not sure I understand the rest, the toolpath array does all that I need it to so I am obviously not understanding what you are asking for.

Right now if you copy a vector group from one sheet to another sheet, it doesn't take the tool paths with it. I want to have a bunch of parts pre-programmed with tool paths, and then select different ones to put on a new sheet for cutting. Yeah I can do that now but I have to copy over the vectors, then reassign tool paths to them. If I use predefined tool paths for layers, I still have to go into each tool path and manually update it to include the new vectors that I added to the sheet. Further, I can't have these vectors grouped because then I can't assign different tool paths to them in the group, so I have to deal with them all individually, which adds time and introduces the possibility of messing up and a vector getting moved by itself or forgetting to update a tool path for a vector.

This is about saving time and reducing human error from having to do repetitive tasks. Time and Mistakes cost money.

If you guys know of a different CNC router-oriented software package that does all that let me know, but so far I haven't found one.

[bnewman]

Look into layers, associated toolpaths, nesting, merged toolpaths with the By Part option etc. Reading between the lines you're not aware of the full power of those.

I am aware of associated tool paths to layers, but you can't have different vectors in a group associated with different layers. Also when you move a new vector onto a sheet, the tool paths do not automatically select the new vector, which is part of the same layer. you have to manually go into the vector select dialog and save it which is annoying.

All of this is about saving time and reducing errors.

[bnewman]

with the By Part option etc. Reading between the lines you're not aware of the full power of those.

What is the By Part Option?

[adze_cnc]

That kind of proves Adrian’s point. The full concept is:

merged toolpaths with the By Part option

Look merge toolpaths up in the documentation. It’s all there. Here’s a handy link (you might want to bookmark it in your browser): Vectric documentation.

[Adrian]

I am aware of associated tool paths to layers, but you can't have different vectors in a group associated with different layers. Also when you move a new vector onto a sheet, the tool paths do not automatically select the new vector, which is part of the same layer. you have to manually go into the vector select dialog and save it which is annoying.

All of this is about saving time and reducing errors.

You can have multiple layers within a group. Yes you have to ungroup for the toolpaths to pick them up but it's a single keypress to ungroup once moved.

You can 100% move vectors between sheets and have the toolpaths recalculate by pressing Recalculate All to pick those vectors up. You need to turn off "Select sheets when edit toolpath" so the toolpaths aren't associated with the sheet.

[bnewman]

You can have multiple layers within a group. Yes you have to ungroup for the toolpaths to pick them up but it's a single keypress to ungroup once moved.

hmmm, so it saves the layer data in the group? it is just that the Tool path selector can't find them when they are grouped.

Ok let me play with this.

You can 100% move vectors between sheets and have the toolpaths recalculate by pressing Recalculate All to pick those vectors up. You need to turn off "Select sheets when edit toolpath" so the toolpaths aren't associated with the sheet.

hmm, does that mean that all of my tool paths would be global? Or only the ones I add to "All"

I will admit this setting confuses me a bit as to what behavior it changes.

it also looks like I also needed to change the tool path selection to "Associate with toolpath"

[Adrian]

Yes you have to have associate with toolpath set no matter what your sheet settings are otherwise there is no auto link between the toolpaths and vectors.

Set that and play around with moving vectors to see if it suits your workflow before worrying about changing the sheet options. The whole layer, auto toolpaths and sheets is a very powerful feature but a lot depends on your workflow to how you set it up.