Simple Way to Flip X & Y in Aspire?

[gerryv]

Not being frequent users we find that we tend to do our drawings in the Aspire default settings so that the X/Y axes end up in Y/X when we tool path for the Shopbot Buddy. Lot's of wasted time. Is there a simple way to "flip" the axes setting in Aspire so that it's sync'd with the SB# software?

[donek]

Simply selecting all of your drawing and rotating it 90 degrees will do the trick.. You simply click the recalculate all tool paths after doing so and everything is corrected.

[adrianm]

I thought the bottom left origin setting in Aspire would match up with all ShopBots?

[Simops]

Have you considered swapping your X and Y on the Shopbot to match your Aspire X and Y orientation?

Cheers

[donek]

I thought the bottom left origin setting in Aspire would match up with all ShopBots?

It will, but if you orient your desk at the end of the machine and look at it as if y is the long dimension of the machine, you will confuse yourself quite easily. The problem can be simply altered by changing one's perspective, but it can be difficult. I have a small hobby machine I used for personal projects and with my kids that has the x and y swapped. Until I got used to it, it was always frustrating to find I was looking at the machine in the wrong coordinates.

[adrianm]

I replied on the thread in the Vectric forum that it might be a matter of standing in the wrong place. A lot of people do seem to get the side and front of a shopbot mixed up.

I always work from mine from the open end so the XY zero is at the bottom right. I've never found it an issue when designing in VCarve/Aspire though with the XY zero being where it's supposed to be.

[shilala]

I use Aspire on my bench laptop and my shopbot is behind me.
Then I turn around, and the x and y are in the wrong orientation.
Add to that, I transfer files to the laptop mounted to the bot and I always work from the front of the machine. If I just swung the laptop 90*, my orientation would at least be correct when I use sb3.

Oddly, I don't often get disoriented, but I carved an x and y in my spoilboard to keep me from questioning myself constantly. :D

The part that really screws me up is when I'm standing at -90* and move the router with the keypad. I always jog horizontally so my next z will be close and I click both arrows on the keypad at once. I just remember that "top right is that way".
If I just swing the laptop 3" to the right I don't get confused, but I'm too stubborn to do it.
This is one of the many reasons why I've driven myself insane. :)

[gerryv]

Thanks much everyone for the input. I'll be back at it in a couple of days so will now have something to work with. Happy New Year!