CAM experts please answer this...

[RandyKopf]

What influence do you have on 3D Adaptive Mill's tool path generation. As an example 3D Spiral allows you to select a point as an origination of it's tool path generation. And a min and max circle. Some 3D Adaptive tool paths seem like tool engaged is really good VS some tool paths seem to have more retract and re-engagement. I don't want to load an example file...I ask that you draw on your own knowledge. I don't need a working example I simply want to know does it even matter when your using this as a roughing tool path. I use Mastercam's Dynamic Mill. Yet it does NOT let you choose how it removes material, but the chips seem to really fly.

[LibertyMachine]

Could you share your file here ? I kid, I kid! 

There are several factors that go into how each 3D operation behaves. Some of them apply across the board to all features, some are unique to a particular few operations. For instance, Optimal Load. This is found mainly in the 2D and 3D adaptive. This would be the width of cut. In the Pocket operation, this is Stepover. On your last tab in the operation you also have Max Stay Down distance. This is the more important one for controlling how many retracts you have. Do note; a larger value will increase computing time a little bit, if that matters to you.

For 3D Adaptive, it's not always necessary to ramp down into a part. With manipulation of sketch constraints and other settings it's possible to start on the outside and work your way in along the XY plane rather than spiral to depth.

One other thing that has a decent impact on retracts; Max and min depth. Are you simply looking to hog off a ton of material and not so worried about using the 3D adaptive to lightly rough off the material for external fillets and chamfers? Set the max and min to the same value and it will ignore those features since it can't reach them with your step-down setting.

Want to 3D adaptive to a certain level, or start at a certain level and avoid some other features? Play with your Top and Bottom Height settings. This one above all the others can greatly influence what you get for code.

I can't speak for others on this, but I don't feel like I'm trapped into getting everything done with one 3D Adaptive operation. I'll get my first operation going, make the tweaks I want for speeds, feeds, depths and whatnot. CTRL+D and program in the next level of machining, rinse repeat. Sometimes I can get it all done in one operation, other times it will get broken up as geometry and strategy requres

Lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't give a plug for @mike.mattera series of tutorials. They do go into depth as to what each operation parameter does. You will need to drill down a little bit, as the 3D info is buried in "Reference"

And of course, anytime you get stuck or you want it to behave in a  certain manner, you know where to find friendly help 😉

[xander.luciano]

Randy! So good to see you around the forums.

3D Adaptive is my #1 most used toolpath strategy.

I could write whole blog posts on adaptive and all the crazy little tricks you can make it do. Here's probably the simplest trick you can do with it though:

But that's just barely using any of the options! I've got a whole video series planned around tricks like that. 

Here's a comparison between a default adaptive toolpath and one that I quickly edited to my favorite settings:

7 degree tapered spiral entry, minimum retraction, stay down level most, .001 tolerance + .001 smoothing (300kb for the path on the right, 76kb for my path, so yeah, I love smoothing).

Beyond that, because we can specify the engagement with adaptive we can use radial chip thinning when calculating toolpaths. 

2D contour? Whats that? Who needs those when you can use adaptive + stock to leave + rest machining! Check this out:

Create a derived operation (this will copy all settings and geometry, I suppose you could just duplicate it too, but this way you could do a pocket finishing instead)

Use from previous operations for rest machining:

Disable stock to leave and now you have the lazy-man's 2D contour.



But wait, there's more! If we had instead machined the entire with the adaptive first, we could use this trick to generate a "2D contour" for most (depending on the model) of the features AND it will already use multiple depths.

Yep, entire thing roughed and finished with adaptive only. And because we can use smoothing, we're still at a smaller file size than a single pocket at default settings:

And I haven't even touched on machining boundaries, and depth of cut, flat area detection, order by area, slot clearing and machining cavities.

Now touching on the points you mentioned, there is a setting that allow you to specify that you have a pre-drilled hole that you want to use as an entry location. With that enabled you can then plunge into the hole instead of the fancy tapered spiral.
Using what I showed above, you can significantly reduce the amount of retracting it does. Ordering by depth/area will make it so that it will do 1 location or 1 depth at a time instead of jumping around the part, reducing the amount of time spent retracting and linking. 

So in conclusion, I will restate the original question:

I simply want to know does it even matter when you're using this as a roughing tool path?

You tell me 🙂

Best,
-Xander Luciano

[LibertyMachine]

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@xander.luciano wrote:

Disable stock to leave and now you have the lazy-man's 2D contour.



Now touching on the points you mentioned, there is a setting that allow you to specify that you have a pre-drilled hole that you want to use as an entry location. With that enabled you can then plunge into the hole instead of the fancy tapered spiral.
Using what I showed above, you can significantly reduce the amount of retracting it does. Ordering by depth/area will make it so that it will do 1 location or 1 depth at a time instead of jumping around the part, reducing the amount of time spent retracting and linking. 
-Xander Luciano

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On the first point; Yes, but it won't give you the option of cutter comp, which can often be a need for finishing ops.

On the second point; I'd like to see this in action because everything I've ever tried ignored the hole and did what it wanted to do

[xander.luciano]

@LibertyMachine *sigh* You doubted me didn't you

 

But great point on that first one! Thanks for mentioning that. 🙂

-Xander

[RandyKopf]

Wow: I posted this late last night and @LibertyMachine and @xander.luciano you are all over this. Thank you!

I go back and re-read everything and play with more switches and settings. And I appreciate the pointer to @mike.mattera CAM reference it is rich I like the detail he put on Tools and Holders. If you open this file is uses the Pocket NC Spindle as a holder and collision works fairly well on 3D Adaptive.

So attached actual example file that drove the question. If you look at the 3D Adaptive Operation its ugly.

And I've been assisting other Pocket NC users on this other forum. I going to start pointing those folks to come over here.

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/pocket-nc/ZqDPcBo1n14

🙂

I want to mark all your answers as solutions! I appreciate anyone chiming in on this. 

[RandyKopf]

After looking at all the replies and playing with switches...I made a small discovery to affected the overall shape of the output

Since I'm NOT cutting a cavity I was able to turn Tool Containment to Outside +0.1 and turned off Rest Machining and look at the effect it had.

Left picture was the original driving issue.......................................................... Right picture shows improved preferred  tool path

[LibertyMachine]

See?! Playing with settings like that greatly effect how things go. The Tool Containment + half the radius of the tool does wonders for open pockets. Add in the increased "keep tool down" and it makes for a much smoother experience

Great to see you making headway!

And by all means, direct people to this forum. It's great that people form their own communities, but when it comes to knowledge and the exchange of information, it greatly helps when there is a large collection of information. It's one place where a large community can be better (this coming from an introverted country boy)