I've been doing some glue-ups for end grain cutting boards and most times, the board needs to be planed before I can run my inlays. I cannot do the job with my planer as it causes too much tear-out on the edges and once the planer even blew my glue joints apart. Since then, I've been user the CNC to plane the board before doing my Aspire inlays. Is working great.
My issue is that I do not use the Pocket toolpath as it too causes tear-out on the outer edges of the board. I've tried both raster and offset modes with no luck.
I then switched to the Profile toolpath ON vector with a 1/2" end mill over multiple toolpaths offset inwards about 0.4" apart and that works great (see attachment). I start just outside the perimeter of the board and work my way in as I shave of 1/8" or 1/16" at a time. Sometimes only takes one go but others I run it twice. If I have to run it twice, I have to edit the board thickness by the 1/16" I just took off and recalculate the 10 to 12 Profile toolpaths. Not such a big deal but if the board is really rough I actually start at 1/8" then reduce it to 1/16" but then I have to edit every single of the 10 to 12 toolpaths.
The way I've found so far is to put all of the toolpaths on one Layer and select the vectors using the Automatic select by layer feature. This works great and saves all the editing BUT it goes from the inside to the outside and when it gets to the last vector on the outside, it still causes tear-out. I want the opposite...start with the outermost vector then work way to the center. No matter what I select as the vector order, it always seems to start in the center. When I run each vector as a single toolpath and start from the outside, there's no tear-out BUT that means I have to edit each toolpath individually if I need to change the depth of cut.
Is there a way to auto-select this group of vectors and have it machine from outer to inner?
I have attached a very small sample of what I'm trying to do.
Thanks for any help.
