Nesting

[jdawg]

I have multiple CNC machines and would love to see nesting. I currently use Alpha Cam, Router Cim, Xilog, and Holzher Hops to program all my different machines. I think Fusion is ripe for being able to tap into this sector of machining. The ability to share, and posts and all the other features have me chomping at the bit. I have made programs with it on one of my routers, but it would be great to create one nest, and be able to tool it and post depending on what machine I want to send it to. Huge time saver, since the actual nesting takes the most time finding the perfect nest, and its also frustrating not having the machine control in some cam packages (HOPS) to be able to do fancy machining

[Brady_Fulton]

I haven't heard dates or details, but I've heard that this is coming, and I can't wait!

[balunist]

On subject or Nesting there is a new AddIn on the App Store called MapBoards which may offer a solution for some.  Give it a look.

MapBoards - Fusion 360 - App Store  

[jdawg]

@balunist I want to try the mapboard, that looks like something I could use. Is there more info on all the functions or will it just throw the parts to the material and you have to leave them where they land?

[balunist]

jdawg,

MapBoards does actually provide several arrangement method to pick from.
It has been tested to deal with a variety of shapes to at least insure it
won't throw and error.

*Placement is done with Joints which means you can select (double click)
and rearrange each body on a board or between boards*

[Anonymous]

  Another important issue for nesting process in the furniture business is printing and placing labels on the nested parts.

Really critical for custom cabinet shops.

I'm using THERMWOOD CNC.

Labels, generated from the eCabinet Systems (Thermwood's own Free software), also show which side of the nested part has to have the Edge tape and what color.

Alex

[jdawg]

I am building a machine that addresses this issue. In furniture we have the
same issue with so many skus of parts and they all look the same a lot of
the time.

[Anonymous]

Great
Please keep me posted
Thanks

[michael55SE4]

MapBoards doesn't really solve the problem, as its relatively easy to lay out the parts once; the problem for manufacturing is how to pack in all of the parts to maximize the entire cutting material.    My individual parts are small compared to a 4x8' sheet, so copying and pasting and hand nesting for every design change is the most time consuming part of my workflow.   I was shocked when I found out Fusion360 didn't have it.  

[jdawg]

Nesting has been a 2D game for quite a while. Most of the big players have
realized this and are charging very high entry fees touting rolling or
dynamic nesting to people who don't actually program or deal with the parts
coming off the machines. I have found so far the fastest way is to import
my 2d nest from cad just as if I was going to run it and place it like a
sketch on my 4x8 and program it in fusion.

[philip]

Can auto nesting parts on flat sheets for CNC routers and similar flat sheet materials / equipment be added as a feature?

[bryan5]

 This would be a crown jewel for 2D cutting CAM in Fusion 360 if we can get nesting.

[SilverHornet]

That would be fantastic. The current workflow to achieve that is a mess of duplications, even with add-ins and scripts.

[jeff.pek]

A few questions for you folks looking for nesting...

1) How would you expect to use it? Would this be for simple "one-off" situations where you just want to lay out a set of parts on a single sheet, and then use the CAM workspace to generate cutting toolpaths?

2) What's your level of need for multi-sheet nesting?

3) For those of you familiar with it, if we did something along the lines of what the Nesting Utility in Inventor does, would that work for you?

4) How important would it be that the nesting + cutting be automated?

Thanks for your thoughts,

  Jeff

[bryan5]

Let's get nesting added. 

It's in the Product, Design, and Manufacturing Solution from Autodesk. Why not Fusion 360.

https://www.autodesk.com/collections/product-design-manufacturing/included-software

[jdawg]

I prefer making really good static nests to be ran over and over. So for
me. Being able to easily move, bump, align, rotate, and mirror are very
important. I feel programs like sigma nest and alpha cam are for lazy
programming or one shot nests. Having the control over the machines and the
geometry is most important over quick nests. But we do more organic parts
than say a cabinet shop which has more cookie cutter parts.

[daniel_lyall]

@jeff.pek If it could take a model from solid to layed out and keep the ability to change parts positions as need.

Like taking a cabinet from its joined model to layed out and being able to go back to solid, like you can now with hand nesting.

Then ounces you are happy with the position you do your toolpaths auto or not.

With a program like vectric V carve pro 2014 you can import a sketchup model and it comes in nested with auto selections for things like holes and dog-bones it puts there sketch into layers , it's realy quick to get a sheet done like this.

[balunist]

*Jeff,I’m a retired SE who has taken up woodworking doing cabinetry and
some CNC work. I joined this thread in search of a solution for taking my
designs to build. I’m an impatient type so I authored MapBoards which does
place 3D objects from a design on the lumber specified. It does not
however do the tight nesting of organic objects that jdawg referred to.
Joints are used for placement enabling manual shuffling of the resulting
map.The app was originally designed to accommodate cabinetry and additional
support was added to handle most any shaped object that contain at least
one planer surface. Objects are size sorted and placed either vertically
(for crosscut) or horizontally (for rip cut).The number of users has grown
(27 countries) and there are a few users (not represented here) that would
like to see true nesting. Adding nesting to an app would be difficult but
not impossible IMO. As an app though the effort would not be worth the
reward. This type of function belongs in the product. A partial list of
requirements from users: - Yes on multiple boards or sheets as you
mentioned- Provide nested output without modifying the assembled design by
either output nest to a separate document or create copies of objects for
nesting under a top-level component- Handle externally linked components in
designHope this helped!*

[jdawg]

Yes. Exactly. Be able to design and have an assembly. Then pick the
components to be nested and those become a copy on a specified sheet for
nesting. Then have the ability to manipulate those copies and add knowledge
to them for machining...ie tooling and feed and speeds

[wtxrcdog]

I think that would be a good thing

[Anonymous]

Robin, until such time as Fusion adds nesting functionality
you could consider using the nesting feature that is
available with Vectric's 'Vcarve' software (about $600 US).
It works really well, and once the nesting has been done you
can save the file to .dxf and bring it into Fusion, or just
use the .dxf file as it is and send it to your cnc
machinery. You can download a 30 day demo of the software
and give it a try.



Peter Stenabaugh