Turning Confinement - Change confinement to work like milling heights

[Lonnie.Cady]

Change the confinement to behave like the heights planes in millling.  Have the ability to select options like from back of stock, from back of model, from jaws, from front of model, from front of stock, from selection.

One benifit is these would provide a visual indication of where the confinement is set.  When you want to bore thru a part that has stock on the backside you are forced to remember the correct backside offset from setup and put that in the confinement.  There is currently no visual indication you have this set correctly.  Also if the next time you run the job the slug of stock is cut slightly longer you have to change the backside offset in the setup and then change all operations that you want to bore thur.  Being able to say from back of stock would take care of this automatically.

Update from Autodesk Product manager:

Reference points:

• Stock Front 
• Model Front
• Chuck Front
• Front
• Back
• Selection
• Absolute
• Machine home

Reference Image:

[Lonnie.Cady]

Change the confinement to behave like the heights planes in millling.  Have the ability to select options like, from back of stock, from back of model, from jaws, from front of model, from front of stock, from selection.

One benifit is these would provide a visual indication of where the confinement is set.  When you want to bore thru a part that has stock on the backside you are forced to remember the correct backside offset from setup and put that in the confinement.  There is currently no visual indication you have this set correctly.  Also if the next time you run the job the slug of stock is cut slightly longer you have to change the backside offset in the setup and then change all operations that you want to bore thur.  Being able to say from back of stock would take care of this automatically.

[Rob.Lockwood]

Great minds think alike, lonnie. Fantastic suggestion, couldn't have said it better myself.

[Rob.Lockwood]

This is easily among my top requests for turning. Glad you submitted the Idea, this one's been kicked around on the forum in general for awhile. It would really go a long ways to make turning more template-able, and mimics the way people actually work much better.

[al.whatmough]

@Lonnie.Cady + @Rob.Lockwood thank you for adding this request.  I agree, this would be a good one.

It is how we are handling the UI for the update Stock transfer operation.

WE will leverage this code for turning confinements once we have Stock transfer released.

[Lonnie.Cady]

may want to consider a tool change plane for each tool in the confinement.  basically a place to have the z return to when the operation is complete.

[al.whatmough]

@Lonnie.Cady  So, basically you are suggesting the Geometry tab for Turning becomes a lot like the heights tab for milling.

I am going to take a attempt at what you are suggesting so we can get feedback from others.

Instead of "confinement" you have 4 planes: 

Start Clearance

• Default to home
  • Add all options shown in image below

End Clearance

• Default to home
  • Add all options shown in image below

(start and end clearance replace "Go home" options on tool tab)

Front

• Default to Stock front
  • All options shown in image below

Back

Default to Model Back

• All options shown in image below

[al.whatmough]

I merged the two ideas.  (this time I didn't goof so we got the added votes)

[al.whatmough]

I agree with the additional reference points, here is the list I have:

Stock Front 

Model Front

Chuck Front

Front

Back

Selection

Absolute

Machine home

Attached an image I have used to communicate with dev on this.

[Lonnie.Cady]

@al.whatmough for the confinements section of the geometry tab I would say yes.  I definitely like the idea of planes for the confinement,  I think it is also a good idea for the tool changes.  I would think more input is needed on the tool start and tool end planes to make sure they cover all situations.

It needs to be considered that there are times when a part may start out with a tailstock in it to allow for heavy roughing.  Then remove the programmable tailstock, drill, and bore.  Each on these can require a different tool change position and it is important to handle them correctly.

Also I would give some serious consideration on the suggestion @Rob.Lockwood and I taked about in the post.  That is separating the Z and X move for the initial positioning.  Most post are configured so that the tool change occurs at the setup home position and X axis at machine home.  If I am doing tailsock work I need to move z to just off the end on the part before the x axis move to prevent a collision.  If I am going from a facing tool to a long drill I need the drill to clear in z prior to doing an X axis move.  Basically always position the Z axis with the new offset before moving X.

I have done this is my post and has made the tool home position less of a problem as long as you can index long tools over the part and then back up in z.

[al.whatmough]

@Lonnie.Cady  Can you create a separate idea for updating the post logic for all turning posts as you have described.

I follow what you are saying and I agree with the reasoning.  I would just like a public place of reference to point to what went into the decision making process.

We can certainly work with @AchimN and team to prioritize this work for the post team.

[Rob.Lockwood]

@Lonnie.Cady If you have individual control over the initial plane for each operation, and you could control the order of movement from that plane to the start position and back say, X->Z, Z->X, or X+Z at the same time, etc) would that still meet your needs? I ask, as this would have the potential to push more stuff out of the post and into the actual UI, which I think is always a huge win for everyone.

FWIW, this is definitely a place where NX seems to have some sound logic. You can define your initial (avoidance) position via a point along the X/Z plane, and then define the motion logic for basically every move it would make from or to that point (to part, from part, from avoidance to home, from home to avoidance, etc..) - Its defined as a piece of geometry, and every operation can have one attached to it. The same avoidance can be, and in most cases is, reused for many operations. 

And with this, the work is kept in the UI and not pushed into the dark depths of the post processor. I don't know that it's a 100% perfect solution, but it's certainly capable of handling all contingencies, which I don't think is accurate of the current method in HSM.

[Lonnie.Cady]

@Rob.Lockwood I think that is a great idea.  I was thinking a similar idea but was not sure it would not just clutter up the UI.  I think the method you outline offers much more control than the post processor and also allow for better simulation to show the proper moves vs them being separated in the post processor.

One thought though is that what we are talking with how the tool moves before/after the operation may not make as much sense on the Geometry tab.  IMO the geometry tab is were we either override the model selection or set the confinement to limit what  geometry the kernel sees for tool path creation.  

How the tool moves between to and from an operation almost sounds like linking tab stuff to me.  I would be fine either way.

Another thought is that it appears as thought in NX you are specifying a point.  In HSM turning products that point would be derived from 2 different tabs.  The Height tab and the Geometry.  It would be nice if they could show a graphical point on the screen as to where the intersection of the Radial and Axial clearance is since the are only visible while the tab is active.

I think HSMWorks had some better visual indicators than the current HSM Inventor or Fusion.

[Rob.Lockwood]

Right, in NX, confinement applies to both axial and radial, and they're
defined much like the current confinement in HSMWorks, though a box exists
for both a min/max radial, a min/max axial, and two more that i'm not
entirely positive what they do 🙂

The page I showed covers 'avoidance' - and it's entire purpose is to define
how the tool moves from operation to operation, in essence, linking.. but
there's some inevitable crossover in there someplace no matter how you cut
it.

[Lonnie.Cady]

Anymore thought being given to this idea???????????

[al.whatmough]

Yes, the first view of this was the work that was done for Stock Transfer.    

[Laurens-3DTechDraw]

@al.whatmough

I think what @Lonnie.Cady is getting at. The longer you postpone these things the harder they get to implement. You know legacy wise etc.

[Lonnie.Cady]

@Laurens-3DTechDraw I appreciate you chiming in on by behalf but but it has become really irrelevant for me at this point in time. 

[Laurens-3DTechDraw]

@Lonnie.Cady I understand. But you still have fusion. So it could still matter.
And it doesn't make it less true.

[Lonnie.Cady]

@Laurens-3DTechDraw Nope, multiple cam systems are a pain in the ass to maintain.  So I am switching to a single solution.  Since some customers are not okay with cloud that rules Fusion out.  But if it is a useful solution for others I hope it is implemented.

[al.whatmough]

This is in progress.  Here is a screen shot (it doesn't show the planes yet, that will be in before it is released.