Inventor Nesting and DXF Layer Mapping

[troy310589]

I am trying to get layer mapping to work properly in Inventor nesting, but I am finding some limitations that I have not been able to find a way around, and the documentation on this topic seems to be very vague and limited. 

I am importing DXF files from 2 other programs into inventor for nesting, (one is Autopol - pressbrake programming, the other is MaxiemLayout, waterjet programming)  

I have been able to adjust the import config to get it to work, and Export is working too - for the most part. 

The limitation I have is that then Importing, there only seens to be one option that is recognised as a nestable contour, (variable '1' in the .cfg from what I can gather), but my cut paths have different cut qualities among them, so in order to get a path to be recognised as a shape and nest properly, I must have all these layers get converted to 'layer 1' (nestible contours).  Therefore when I Export, all these items are now combined onto the one cut type, losing their origional cut qualities. 

Is there a config somewhere that allows you to set what layers are considered nestible contours? Some research I did mentioned editing a Cut Types config, but I have not been able to find this file, my other hunch is that possibly a custom Providers config needs to be made, but I have not been able to find any info on this either, in regards to editing or making a providers file.

Long story short, I need to have multiple layers that Inventor sees as nestable, so when I export they remain separate. 

Also, can I get confirmation that I am understanding the config files correctly,

Import config 

"LayerMapping":[

            {

                "DestLayer": 0, <- What the layer is being converted in to inside inventor

                "SrcLayer": "0" <- What the layer is called in the Origional DXF file

            },

Export Config

"LayerMapping":[

            {

                "DestLayer": 0, <- What the layer is currently known as inside inventor

                "SrcLayer": "0" <- What the layer will be in the exported .dxf

            },

All help is appreciated, Thank you.

[kacper.suchomski]

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@troy310589 wrote:

The limitation I have is that then Importing, there only seens to be one option that is recognised as a nestable contour, (variable '1' in the .cfg from what I can gather), but my cut paths have different cut qualities among them, so in order to get a path to be recognised as a shape and nest properly, I must have all these layers get converted to 'layer 1' (nestible contours).  Therefore when I Export, all these items are now combined onto the one cut type, losing their origional cut qualities. 

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What do you mean by "cut quality"?
Does this apply to pockets instead of holes?

Inventor Nesting doesn't recognize pockets, even in native Inventor files.
It's only used for cutting.

[troy310589]

It specifies the quality of the cut within the Maxiem software, basically adjusts the speed of the machine so as it is cutting more abrasive passes and it gives a cleaner edge, there are also variants of the cut quality such as a 'slit' cut, where the cutting is done on the centreline instead of cutting to the side of the line, i can deal with this one as they are not usually part of the outer edge of the shape so I can set them to any layer inside inventor.

Different parts may use different cut quality depending on specs or where its being used/if its an aesthetic part, but they are all just an outer edge cut. 

[kacper.suchomski]

As far as I know, IN does not have such advanced capabilities.

[troy310589]

All i need inventor to do is have more than 1 layer that it sees as a nestable entity, there has to be a config somewhere that is telling inventor that layer 1 is nestable, layer 4 is etching data, 14 is grain etc, (these are the values after extracting, the ones inside inventor)  I just want to be able to allocate some other layers, e.g. 20, 21, 22, or similar to be recognised as nestable contours, so I can assign the different cut types to these, keeping them separate but inventor still nests them properly,  then exporting back to the origional value for the waterjet software. 

[phillip.doup]

Hello @troy310589 ,

I was pointed to this post by a colleague, and while I haven't worked on this product in many years, I think I might have some pointers to help. The layer is what separates geometry into a number of categories, 1 being the "nesting geometry". There are many other layers that get used for various purposes, such as etching, lead in, lead out, etc. There is no way to have multiple layers treated as nesting geometry.

The alternative is to use either the color or line style, and I think I've typically seen line style used for this. When the DXF files are read, that information gets preserved on individual segments of geometry, regardless of the layer. You could have a different line style or color for your different cut qualities, and hopefully the downstream post processing would be configurable to recognize that.

[troy310589]

Thank you, 

How do I Edit the line style? remembering that I am importing the DXF from outside inventor, the only guides that I have seen to change this are for when the model/part has been made inside inventor.

[phillip.doup]

What's producing the DXF in the first place? I would expect whatever software that is to hopefully support setting the line style or color. You shouldn't have to do anything inside of Inventor for this to carry through. When the Nesting process in Inventor imports the DXF file, it should maintain the line style and color that were in the original DXF file that came from wherever it currently comes from.