Using 4th Axis with Fusion 360 & Mach3

[Anonymous]

Good day,

I have been learning Fusion and Mach for the past three months to operate a small 4 axis desktop mill I bought. Before this I knew nothing about this exciting new world.

I did some 2 d stuff and had great success, but now its time to move on to the 4th axis. Unfortunately the videos on Youtube doesn't really help me at this moment nor the forums. Maybe if I was more fimiliar with the terms and names for functions it would.

Attached is an impeller I drew that I would like to cut. I tried to generate a tool path, but I get many errors. I really don't know where to go from here. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Please go light on the term names for English is not my home language.

Thanks in advance.

Arthur 

[owilliams3]

Unfortunately you need 5 axes to do this part and not 3+2 type 5 axis but continuous 5 axis

so no surprise that you get errors

F360 does not do 5 Axis continuous --- yet I hope

Regards

[daniel_lyall]

@Anonymous You maybe able to do it on a 4th but the setup will be tricky, depending on it's size as well can you post the model and I will have a look.

[Anonymous]

Hi,

Thanks for the help. I drew this model with no hidden areas that's why I think 4 axis would be able to cut it. I attached the model in f3d format. Please let me know if you can open it.

Kind regards

Arthur

[Steinwerks]

I'm working on your part actually, but there's one glaring caveat: you had a whole mess of bodies. I patched and solidified all your fins so they were solids, then combined the whole batch into a single Component to be machined. This will help immensely.

 I'll share more when I've got... more. 

[Steinwerks]

After running into a new-to-me bug (sketch geometry not updating for toolpath constraints) I figured this will still give you a good starting point, so here it is:

After making a plane representing the tangent top of each of the impeller blades I made a series of 3D Adaptive toolpaths and created a separate component (which I called an Arbor, assuming you'd use one, or it can just be the stock that gets left on the backside to hold the part until it's done) to avoid. It's only going to get worse from here as you'll have to specify more ways to constrain the toolpath for at least five finishing operations. Maybe ten if you want to try and pencil out those corners so the radius is small enough to approximate a sharp corner. This would be better with a multi-axis solution but it's not in Fusion yet, but you're right, this part is pretty close to possible, just might be very time-consuming.

[Steinwerks · Accepted solution]

I would probably call this semi-finishing:

[Anonymous]

Good day,

Thanks for your effort and help. I didn't receive the model in your
previous mail.

I kind off understand what you said about putting a plane above each blade
and it makes sense. Regarding the hole in the model... I drew the model
with a slight bigger hole than 6mm. The impeller will use a 6mm shaft in
the end. My plan was to drill a 6mm hole in the stock to put a 6mm shaft
threw. This would enable me to clamp it in the jaw and get a sturdy axis.
The cutting tool would then not go down to 6mm and touch the steel. I would
then finish it off later if all the cutting is done. (hope you understand
what I mean).

If I can see the model I think it would make more sense to me. Like I said
at this stage the terms are still a bit unclear to me. like "arbor". I
don't know what it means.

Regards
Arthur

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I received the model when I went into Fusion. Threw my mail I didn't see anything.

Thanks a lot man. I will keep you updated and also post a video as soon as I start the cutting. Not sure how long it will take but I'll get there.

Kind regards

Arthur

[Steinwerks]

Sorry, I always forget that an Arbor is to hold a cutting tool, and a Mandrel is to hold a workpiece, although they serve a similar function. Googling the terms with "machining" or "fixturing" should give you a good idea.

You will definitely want to model your mandrel fixturing so as to compare your toolpaths in simulation to make sure you don't wind up with collisions that can break your tooling. If you have any other questions feel free to post them here. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Also, I didn't do much with stepovers so don't go running what I programmed, it's just a process example to get you moving in the right direction. Your speeds, feeds, and stepovers will have to be tailored to your machine of course.

[Anonymous]

Hi Daniel,

Hope your well. I only got to this model yesterday to work on it. I had a bad flu for a week, but all is good now. 

I did make a few changes to the setup to suit my machine. Unfortunately my machine is very small and I had to reduce the clearance and retract height a lot. I used the first option you send to play around with. When I post processed I got this message attached. Even if I used an option that I didn't any setting changes, I got the same. 

I might miss something here. 

Thanks for letting me knock on your door again.

Regards

Arthur

[Steinwerks]

Hi Arthur,

I'm not Daniel 😉

What's happening though is your post is not set up to use the 4th axis. If you can share the post here it should be simple to modify so that it will use Tool Orientation properly.

[matthew.nichols]

Attached is a grbl post with 4th axis built in.  

Let me know if there are any questions.

[daniel_lyall]

@Anonymous @Steinwerks here are  Mach3 posts for A long X and A along Y 

[Anonymous]

Good day Daniel,

I had a look at your Youtube channel. Great stuff. I see you are into RC. Me to. About six years back I started to design and build a rc bait boat for surf fishing with a jet drive system. All the parts where hand made on my lathe and so on. I made the molds for all the parts and the boat and started producing them. I sold a few world wide, but sold the business.

I designed and build a new boat with a new jet system and this is what the impeller is for. Other parts will follow soon. I just have to get the 4th axis going.

Please have look at some video on you tube about my boat. type in "Hercules bait boat" in the Youtube search box. 

Kind regards

Arthur

[daniel_lyall]

there is another way you can do it but the round part between the blades is still going to be rough, you can do it how @Steinwerks shows to do it then lay it down and recut it, this will smooth the cone and top of the blades out, then flip and do the other side the same way.

or put a 20 sided shape on the back clocked to one of the blade edges then this will get you close to what you want but it will take a long time.

If you can hold out to the start of next year, or when flow and 4 axis comes into fusion it will be easy then. I would just hold out.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice,
I think I'll hold out till then. Learning all this at this stage is a bit
complicated for me. The thing is that I don't have so much time to spend in
front of my pc.

thanks again
Regards Arthur

[daniel_lyall]

it should not be too long they are testing it all now they will realise it when it's working a 100%

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the update.