Trying to get a CNC machine with a saw working is currently a massive pain. Currently it seems like the only option is defining a ridiculously sized end mill and then constantly redefining the tool orientation for each cut. This is especially frustrating because even when you are doing something simple like cutting a square box you need to do it as 4 separate toolpaths, each with a different setup. It is also very error prone as several of the default options will cause failures if used with a saw as a saw cut requires very different considerations than an end mill. For example,
- A saw doesn't retract or plunge along the tools z-axis. The plunge on a saw cut is actually one of the perpendicular axes. This results in all of the defined height planes becoming nonsensical as they exist in the wrong plane.
- A saw can not combine movements like an endmill can. If the tool orientation is defined with the x-axis along its direction of travel it can not make moves along the z-axis unless the saw "retracts", which is actually a y move. This is especially troublesome as the default behavior of a 2d contour strategy add a radial movement, the vertical lead-in radius, that a saw can not do and would be disastrous if it ever made its way into actual machine code. It also requires every saw cut to have a linear lead-in distance, the depth of which is your actual retract height.
- On a saw the roughing passes and mulitple depth options are effectively reversed.
In addition to safegaurding against these mentioned problems and any others that are specific to saws it would be handy to be able to select the full profile of a panel and having the tool strategy automatically generate the proper retracts and rotations to handle all the cuts at once instead of needing to generate a new toolpath for every single saw cut.
