New Mastercam toolpaths are designed o use Z slices.
CNC Software Inc. (www.mastercam.com) has released a new version of its Mastercam software that incorporates seven new, high-speed toolpaths, and a new interface for toolpath creation.
The Tolland, Conn., company says the new toolpaths in its Maintenance Release (MR1) are tailored to high speed machining and hardmilling, and offer a smooth cutting motion with smooth entry and exits.
The seven new toolpaths include two roughing—core roughing and area clearance—and five finishing— waterline, scallop, horizontal area, raster and pencil-paths.
The core roughing and area clearance paths are designed for clearing large amounts of material. Core roughing cuts from the outside in, and is designed so that it always climb cuts. The area clearance path is designed to start from the center of the part and work outwards.
The waterline toolpath uses a set of constant Z slices, and is designed for semi-finishing and finishing.
The scallop toolpath is designed to create very smooth finishes by generating 3-D passes at a constant distance from each other along the surface of the part, starting from the outside and working in.
The horizontal area toolpath is designed to automatically recognize and machine flat areas.
The company says the raster toolpath is similar to parallel machining, and has an added benefit of smoothing sharp corners in the toolpath motion. And, the pencil toolpath is designed to identify the "seams" of a part and develop a toolpath along those seams, to conform to the shape of the part, and create a superior surface finish.
