HSMWorks How-To: Slotting with equations

Slotting smartly with equations, defined stock and roughing passes.
BTW - PEMDAS, of course, was the word I was looking for. And naturally, it cam e back to screw me at the end of the video. Moving the *.8 out of the parenthesis was the correct syntax, and with the correct calculated expression one can alter the tool definition with confidence that it will produce a fairly optimized pass depth.

[@imbored742]

The odd capitalization is what's known as Camel Case, it's a common convention in computer programming, as many programming languages do not allow spaces in variable identifiers, using Camel Case makes it easier to distinguish separate words in the absence of spaces.

[@MorganOliff]

Fantastic Rob. I go straight to 2D adaptive most times then contour. Your method looks more reliable, and really protects from any wild linking moves. I have actually never enabled stock for my 2D contours, looks like it did a great job trimming up the roughing passes. Thanks.

[@pakman422]

Awesome! Great How-To's!! Learned a TON!

[@mikemattera6724]

Excellent Lesson. Thanks.

[@SVSeeker]

Just getting started and looking for cutters. Could you tell me where you found a T-Slot cutter with a .030 radius?

[@Keithvclausen]

If you would like to leave stock on the upper and lower faces and have it work para-metrically use this expression: -(tool_fluteLength-maximumStepdown+verticalStockToLeave) I also use the following expression for Rough depth passes (aka maximumStepdown): (Math.max(tool_fluteLength)*0.90)

[@rlockwood2]

Great tip, Keith. I've actually never thought to do it that way, my template usually dumps two operations, one for roughing the slot and one for finishing, but I think the roughing one just has a fixed integer stuck into the expression. But that's perfect.

[@Keithvclausen]

I just makes a clean work flow incorporating the stock into the base equation.

[@Keithvclausen]

We just need to get the math that is used for "Use Even Stepdown" probably from Rene or Mark and then we can work it into the expression.

[@rlockwood2]

The real issue, I think, is that you need to know the relative distance between the 'top' selection and the 'bottom' selection, and afaik there's no way to pull that. once you have it, it's really just a matter of using the max stepdown to find the number of passes, and dividing the distance by that rather than the max, etc.

[@Keithvclausen]

Regarding the trimming that happens when using stock contour and roughing passes increase the horizontal lead arc, decrease linear and remove vertical lead arc. You may need to alter the horizontal arc lead sweep. The horizontal arc is not effected the same way by the stock contour trimming. Something that needs to be played with a bit and ultimately it is something that development needs to address.

[@seeigecannon]

At 13:30 your tool is going from where it is cutting and moving up to the retract point with every pass. Is there a way to keep the tool down when you know it wont crash to save on the Z travel? I have tried playing with the keep tool down option (not on my SW computer, so I don't remember what it is called), but that massively increased my generation time and when the tool was down between passes it maintained the cutting feed rate. You really seem to know your stuff, so I appreciate the videos.

[@rlockwood2]

seeigecannon the short answer is no.. the longer answer is use adaptive and the same process, but it's far less reliable and far more risky!

[@ScottMoyse]

ideal mate! what ever happened to that 5-axis webinar follow up video?