Vectric Customer

I am attempting to make a dome shape (think of cutting an egg in half to see what I am talking about) and I can't figure out how to do it. The dishes in the clip art are not domed enough and I don't know if there is a way to make them more domed. I guess there is a shape icon in Aspire and maybe in VCarve Pro but since there isn't such a thing in the Desktop version I was wondering if there is any way to make a dome shape with the options available in Desktop. I would appreciate any help that anyone has to offer.
Skip

If you don't like the height of the domes, you can always edit them on the modeling tab. It's the symbol right up top with the dome and the arrows next to it.
These three are all the same diameter, all started out the same height, I just clicked that symbol and threw a different # in the box.

And you can stretch that dome into an oval if you wanted it to look like an egg cut sideways, then tilt it and fade it if that floats your boat. Both of these are the same dome stretched to the same oval shape, just one is set to a taller height and one is tilted and faded.

Thanks Joe. I am attempting to have that dome shape inverted so that it is carved out of the wood. What I did was bring in a dish and then surrounded that dish with a circle so that I had vectors to select. I then tried to tell the software that I wanted the height to be 0.9 inches. I used the subtract mode and what I end up with is a cylinder 2" in diameter that goes into the wood .9 inches. It is cylindrical not dome shaped. What am I doing wrong?

Have you watched any of the tutorials?

Yes. I have watched about a half dozen of them. None of the ones I watched dealt with this type of issue though. I have went to youtube as well looking for something that would help but most of the vectric videos deal with Aspire which I can't afford. If you know of a tutorial that will give me some guidance on this topic I will definitely go learn from it. So far I have watched the tutorials titled: Bulls head, Five Star Coffee, Golf Award, CNC Mini Project, Howling Wolf, Magic Beans, Banner and Avalon Nameplate.

You only need to add a vector around the dome if you want to check the box that says "selected vectors" when you do the roughing/finishing paths. Otherwise, just select the 3d dome itself and check "model boundary" instead when you do the toolpaths.

Make sure your height doesn't exceed your material thickness.

If you're doing a dish shaped then on the modeling tab you check the U (2nd from the left).

If you're doing that and getting weird results, then make sure you haven't played with the base height.

Other than that, I can't guess without seeing the crv file.


edit:
I just read this:

hjskip wrote: I end up with is a cylinder 2" in diameter that goes into the wood .9 inches. It is cylindrical not dome shaped.

You are creating a 3d toolpath right? You're using the roughing and/or the finishing toolpaths? The ones that say 3D Roughing and 3D finishing when you hover your mouse over them?
Because what you are describing sounds suspiciously like someone selecting that circle he added around the dome, and then creating a 2D pocket toolpath....

THANK YOU! That was the problem. I was not selecting the correct toolpath and you were correct that the vector was what I was zeroing in on since every time I tried to get a toolpath it would say no valid vector is selected. I did not have the check mark in the correct place so I just tried it with the information you provided and I get the desired shape. I can't thank you enough for taking the time to straighten me out.

Does anyone know how to create a dome by removing the material around the dome then leveling another piece of clipart on that dome

Something like this? By your description, I'm not sure of what you want or the clipart you want to use. I placed and sized the dome first and placed the clipart on top of the dome. Then I created a vector around the dome, selected both the dome and the vector and set the level to clipping..

yes exactly!!! I set the level to "CLIPPING" but nothing changed...I want to use a .75" thick board so the top of the dome matches the boards thickness and then add a piece of clip art "fleur De lis" and reduce dome height until I get the New piece of clip art at .75" z level. Leaving about.25" of original stock and the rest the image(fleur)

It might be a better approach to adjust the height of the dome and the Fleur to what ever looks good and then set the overall height of the model to .75" in the modeling tab. Don't forget to check the position of the model in the material on the toolpath tab. Unless I missed something I don't think you will need the clipping. If you want the fleur to be inverse (sunken in) then right click on it and select properties and set the combine mode to "Inverse".

You could also right click on each component, select properties and set the height of each separately so when added together they equal .75".