SOLID WORKS

[darde@hotmail.com]

I am in the process of buying a router. I have been running a router for another company for 7 years and they have decided to sell it. (not shopbot). I have clients that still would like some work done so I will be stepping out on my own. The shop bot seems to be one of the only ones in my price range for the amount of work that I have at this point. One of the clients is a lost foam foundary and I have a steady job of cutting parts for them now but they would like some part prototypes made of limited run projects. They already draw there own parts in solid works. Can I create the files needed for the Shopbot using there drawings without having to buy a seat of Solid works, and if I can what software would I need to run the shopbot. The PRTAlpha is what I'm looking at right now.

[Brady Watson]

David,
You can do this if you get them to export the part geometry as an STL or 3D DXF file. At that point you could use MillWizard ($250 thru ShopBot) to do basic 3D toolpathing or DeskProto ($1300 online) to do 3D milling with advanced features. This is ideal since you will be getting the geometry right from the customer, there is no need for you to invest in 3D file editing or creating software, although I would plan on investing in it down the line.

-Brady

[darde@hotmail.com]

I have looked into the rhino and visual mill combo would that work.

[Brady Watson]

Yes it would...but a bit more $ than the ones I suggested, provided that you are getting VM5 Standard and Rhino...NOT RhinoCAM which has a stripped version of VM5, if I understand it correctly.

Just saying this as a word to the wise before you buy. Be sure you get what you THINK you are getting.

-Brady

[tbs]

David, you can send email to me info@thebestsupply.info (mailto:info@thebestsupply.info)