Roughing parts with complex surfaced floors.

 Hi Friends,

 

 There has been some discussion on requirements for roughing parts with complex surfaced floors.   

 

I have urged the COE Members, to document their observations and requirements here.

 

Thanks

Dave

Here is a link to the discussion, but it has many topics

I will start with asking for some kind of smoothing option.
It would be great if we could flip a switch that causes the roughing routine to go back and smooth out all of the steps it leaves all over.
Maybe some kind of max excess tolerance.
Those are just some thoughts. I might be better if it was a separate MO.
I realize this is asking a lot. It would be best if the tool used the most efficiant motion like dragging the tool up ramps rather than zleveling them down.

I doubt if anyone else can beat CATIA's roughing routine when you look at the whole picture. Especially video replay keeping track of cut stock.

RE ...like dragging the tool up ramps rather than zleveling them down.


I like that idea Roger!!!

Dave

Here's another request that may be a little off topic and it can be moved if there is somewhere more appropriate.

I save in process cut stock and pull it back in to my CATProcess so I can see my current stock status while I am programming.
I make it transparent and un pickable.
As I am programming I constantly overwrite the file and close my CATProcess and re open it to keep the cut stuck current.

Can Dassault automate that process?

Pertaining to excessive air moves back and forth in roughing…

 

I always thought, If we could select railtop areas, that would separate outside periphery, inside periphery, and pockets.

 

When I roughed in NCL, I always did the periphery first, then the railtops, and finally the pockets.  If we as programmers can supply the right kind of "machining areas" or a new "roughing railtop machining area" then perhaps CATIA can do the same kind of motion.

 

I used the methods, of isolating areas with Sketches, and that cut it down, but the motion as I stated, is more efficient.

 

Dave F

Posted By Roger Bombassei on 30 Jun 2011 03:37 PM
Here's another request that may be a little off topic and it can be moved if there is somewhere more appropriate.

I save in process cut stock and pull it back in to my CATProcess so I can see my current stock status while I am programming.
I make it transparent and un pickable.
As I am programming I constantly overwrite the file and close my CATProcess and re open it to keep the cut stuck current.

Can Dassault automate that process?

Hi Roger,

Yes, I see my co-workers do that also. 

How is that different then the intermediate stock?    Is the intermediate stock buggy, or is the transparency an issue?, or .....????

Thanks
Dave

I am not sure what you mean by intermediate stock. If you mean the stock that shows up in video replay, that is the stock I want to see but I want to see it when I am programming and not only when I am in video replay mode.

Part Operation + Option tab + Intermediate stock for milling and turning

It is a Radio button. That does kind of what you want. I think it is a resource hog, but if you have the RAM, and Video.... try it.

Dave

Posted By Roger Bombassei on 30 Jun 2011 03:33 PM
I will start with asking for some kind of smoothing option.
It would be great if we could flip a switch that causes the roughing routine to go back and smooth out all of the steps it leaves all over.
Maybe some kind of max excess tolerance.
Those are just some thoughts. I might be better if it was a separate MO.
I realize this is asking a lot. It would be best if the tool used the most efficiant motion like dragging the tool up ramps rather than zleveling them down.

I doubt if anyone else can beat CATIA's roughing routine when you look at the whole picture. Especially video replay keeping track of cut stock.

I cut such ramps using MAFC, Profile Contouring MOs ( If one fails then I use another) before using Roughing MO. It takes extra time but part comes out good even at roughing stages with consistent material instead having stairs, steps which causes interrupted cuts for ballnose and hard to measure with CMM probe.

I have already brought up this enhancement in Roughing MO a few months back in other topic. Anyway here it is again

Enhance the machining areas where user can define such ramps
And then there is an option to cut those ramps either at the end or at the beginning. Depending upon the position of the ramps as some are buried in the part on ribs connecting pockets. Or better define the sequence of order to cut these ramps. 

Roger,
You might to double check UG's cavity milling which has far better cutting action than Catia's Roughing. And it has better idea of gouge avoidance of holder while computing. Because it keeps track of remaining cut-stock after successive cuts and Catia only looks at the Design part/Fixtures for such gouge avoidance when you check the option "Compute with Holder"

Another Roughing Idea would be to make a super-roughing.

For upward compatibility, I would never, repeat never remove Cavity, roughing, or Muilipocket, …. but merging all those functions into one MO, where you have ALL the functions would be great.

Specifically, Cavity has separate thick's for floors and walls. I like that but get better motion with roughing then Cavity sometimes. I will try to be more specific later….

This has been discussed before..


Dave

Dave,

They are all the same if you look at their names for APIs. It is simple business to make extra in a separate bundle. It is same stuff like wheat bread whatever you may call it
In India: Roti, Chapaati, Naan, etc..
In Mexico: Tortilla, etc..

Dave, I turned on that button but don't see anything. I will dig into it deeper.

Samarinder, You don't have to be thrilled to death with CATIA just because I am. lol

I don't know where you find time to play with UG. People pay me to play with CATIA every free minute I have.

How about implement some of the motion that Spiral Milling producing and last pass of the Roughing routing follow the compound surface to clean up the steps applying same technique for max angle for ramping (2 angles to be sure one for ramp down and another for the ramp up).

Also in roughing last pass always (unless bottom specified) will leave more material than minimum offset on Part. Example... excess on Part +.030 with Axial DOC .35 will leave me about .28 on the bottom instead of .030 if I don't pick the bottom and specified it exactly 0.030 from the bottom offset. I am OK with smaller last step milled in Roughing just to maintain that .030 on the bottom... Want Catia to do it automatically instead of picking Variable Depths.

More things off topic is Pocketing Approach/Retract Macros in Roughing and individual Selection of starting point of entry in each pocket, as well as Better Restmilling option with high Speed techniques like Valumill in Roughing and constant Speed Ups and Slow Downs downs in the Roughing Routine to Maintain same in^3 Volume removal Like Optipath and again Volumill... Dassault developers have a lot more skills than Volumill developers so lets make it happen... Next Release to have Volumill type of motion in Catia for 3 axis Roughing... Constant Slow Downs and Speed Ups...

By the way don't break anything in Roughing routine that is already working haha... I love that thing just the way it is... But always want to be able to do more.

Dave, I think you may be right. Someone stole my idea and implemented it already. lol You are also right that it is a resource hog. I will play with it more and see if it is good enough.

Posted By Roger Bombassei on 30 Jun 2011 05:42 PM
Dave, I think you may be right. Someone stole my idea and implemented it already. lol You are also right that it is a resource hog. I will play with it more and see if it is good enough.

Wow.... I taught you something finally, after all you taught me. I need to celebrate. Where is the Jack and Coke?


Well, your Idea may be a good alternative, if it turns out that your part is to big for your hardware. Or if the CPU drag slows you down. but hey, everyone has  8 CPU'S now right?

So far from what I see it works great. If you update the output it doesn't take long to display the next MO.
Right on Dassault.
I'm so busy using the old stuff I don't take the time to check out the new.

I am looking at new computers again. My 690 kicks butt so I'm in no hurry but one day...

This looks like a Top Ten for 2014.  Yes?

How important is this to you?

---

Dave Frank  *    Bell Helicopter *  Grand Prairie Texas

Advanced Computer Aided Manufacturing Systems Engineer

COE Product Co-Chairman, Digital Numerical Control

 

I'd honestly be happy enough to see it work properly on parts with simple floors. I hate to say it but the roughing mo was best in R18. Somehow they messed it up. I've had parts that roughed perfect in R18. Years later now, minor revision, and I can't even get the roughing mo to compute in r19. Too late to go back to r18 because I already saved everything as r19, so I ended up having to program the entire roughing using sketcher and profile contouring! Needless to say this took about ten times as long.