TRACE Entry/Exit

[Anonymous]

Trace tool path is my BREAD and Butter!! It is critical to my projects, however it is, IMO, severely lacking in entry/exit control.

Bottom line: I need to have the same entry/exit point on all my CAMs.

Current Workaround I copy sketch lines offset to 0.001, then *trick* the Trace CAM to go IN and then OUT on the "same" path. I select the lines and swap the little red arrows to accomplish this. (This works BEAUTIFULLY 50% of the time)

The problem is that the TRACE tool-path will generate a retract at will, and I can't find a reason for this. I believe that my vertices are coincident, but at this point I'm so frustrated and fried from troubleshooting that I don't know what to think.

Further Reading: In the f3d attachment, the Cliffhanger TRACE is exactly what I want, the Exit TRACE is an example of my problem: there are two retracts when there should only be one. ZOOM in and you will see that the sketches are offset by 0.001 to try to accomplish what I want.

My Bio:

Broke CNC Hobbyist - trying to start a business

HUGE FUSION 360 Fan!!!

Big Shapeoko 3 FAN since I can't afford a Tormach 770!!

[Anonymous]

SOLVED: Wasn't using Chains Properly!

[rajis.kataria]

How did you manage to solve this? are you still adding a second line and offsetting it slightly?

Kind regards,

Rajis

[rajis.kataria]

I finally figured out that milling in both ways has to be checked, and having the same curve selected twice allows the tool to come out from where it came in without having to trick the software by duplicating the lines and offsetting them.