So I was using Meshcam back about 10 years ago with a Taig CNC mill with much success. Since then I've been using Fusion for a lot of other non-manufacturing design projects for work and hobbies. I had my mill in storage and haven't used it in about 7 years, but now I've got some things I want to mill.
My mill has no limit switches installed and I never setup homes in Mach3. Whenever I milled things all I did was set the work zero at the corner of the stock and run the gcode from meshcam. Qualifying this further, I only ever mill 2d parts. Typically just cutting out tiny tiny parts out of flat stock (sheet). The most I ever dealt with was a single tool change. Maybe two. I set z zero with a z setter (pressure plate on top w/ dial that allows you to set to a 1" absolute distance above the work piece and then you manually z-1" to set z to zero). XY I would just jog to the corner of the stock since it doesn't really matter how close I am to being on XY for the work zero.
I setup a project with some parts I need to cut out of .381mm nickel silver (.016") basically brass. It's 2 drilling operations for 2 different sized holes (.5mm and .8mm) with a single 2D contour operation after drilling to cutout the parts. I generated the gcode for mach3 and it seems to be good based on simulating it with Fusion and NC viewer. I also compared the tap file to a bunch of NC files I have from when I was actively working with this stuff.
Here's the meat of my question. In Meshcam, you setup the tool diameter, but I don't recall anything about tool length other than maybe flute length and I think it had shaft length. There were no other tool offsets or anything regarding how far the tool protrudes from the head as far as I can remember. I don't have meshcam anymore so I can't look at how I had things configured. In fusion, for the 2D operation I put in all the parameters of the endmill I'll use. It's a 1mm 4 flute w/ a standard 1/8 shaft. I did input all the parameters of the tool.
I really don't fully get what I'm talking about here, but the only thing that concerns me is the tool protrusion from the collet (length below holder). Being that it's a really basic hobby mill, I obviously don't have an ATC and I have to manually insert the mills/drills, touch off a gauge height block, reset to z zero and continue the program. The depth the tool is set in the collet is variable. The drills have collet stops on them, but the endmills are just straight shafts. When I setup the tool in the library I left the length below holder at 12mm, but I don't know that I can reliably ensure that I'm exactly at a 12mm protrusion.
Being that I'm milling such thin stock, there's obviously a high risk of either being too shallow or too deep. I use sacrificial MDF, painters tape and super glue for work holding and I always used to set my cut depth about .1mm below bottom. I've pretty much followed suit in my setup in Fusion.
Sorry this is so wordy. If I set the work zero based on what I described above, and reset zero on tool changes using a z setter, is that going to result in the wrong depth based on the code fusion generates?
Fusion
