Offsetting vectors

[andre]

Why does part works give me a dashed line and not a solid line when I offset multiple shapes?
I am intersecting several circles and rectangles and it only offsets some and with those some of the arcs are segmented dashed lines.
Has any one encountered this and if so is there a solution?

[Brian Moran]

Andre,

You will need to use the weld tool to combine your intersecting circles and rectangles before offseting. If the geometry is intersecting, the program can not work out which parts of the geometry should be inside or outside. If the geometry does not describe a 'valid' shape, the result will be fairly random results like you are seeing

Brian
.

[andre]

Hey Brian
When I weld I lose all the intersecting shapes, the ones I want.
Thats another quirk is the wlding feature. It seems inconsistant. It's weld feature is way different than partworks. the subtract feature subtracts the opposite vectors. I dont know, i am having difficulty with a few things, I have a difficult pattern I am trying to duplicate and it is very labor intensvive.

[voll]

Does it matter how the file is imported? dxf? Is dxf a flattened file? I am having a similar problem.

ex: I have one rectangle (which is the blank) and an overlapping rectangle (which is for the dado). Partworks doesn't know what to do with the information. This doesn't happen all of the time either. It will just randomly flatten it out or make some wild toolpath and creates the dashed lines also.

I usually end up redrawing it in Partworks, but that takes a long time. have also found that selecting fewer parts for each toolpathing op sometimes solves the problem

[andre]

Steve
I feel your pain
It seems for simple things that partwizard handles so well, part works struggles. Thats why for cabinet parts I still use partwizard.
PArt works for exampe cant do a simple subtraction weld for a toe kick. It subtracts the cabinet instead of the toe kick. Perhaps these are just bugs that shopbot and the software people will resolve.
The weld feature seems to be almost useless in most cases

[tony_mac]

Andre - We aren't aware of any problems with Welding tools in PW. If you could send a sample file that shows what you are seeing to - support@vectric.com (mailto:support@vectric.com) - we can take a look.

Steve - If rectangles / shapes overlap the geometry is ambiguous, making it impossible for the software to consistently determine what are the inside and outside boundaries for calculating toolpaths.

A workaround is to - Select the vectors that don't overlap and calculate one toolpaths.

Use the Copy Toolpath option to create a second toolpath that uses the same tool and cutting parameters, Edit this toolpath, select the remaining vectors and calculate the second toolpath.

Because the 2 toolpaths use the same cutter, they can be saved into a single SBP file to run on the machine.

I hope this makes sense and helps.

Tony

[scottj]

Hi Andre,
The weld feature works like it did in our previous package but you have to select the Vectors in the correct order. If you select the cabinet rectangle first then select the rectangle for your Toekick it will leave you with your Cabinet side and the Rest will be gone. I hope this helps .

Scott

[andre]

Tony
thanks for the response. I am slowly getting used to the weld features. They are different than part wizard, but htats ok.
I was trying some difficult patterns and was getting frustrated, but have figured out my solution. I was overlapping circles and wanted to derive the shapes inbetween interesctions. So I figured out that if I offset each shape to both the inside and out side, selecting the offsets and use the welding features, I was able to get my shapes. You have to re- offset each time for every shape because the welding deletes the original off sets.
This is valuable experience, because yet another layer has revealed itself

[andre]

Scott thanks!
That makes too much sense! I feel silly about having that problem when the solution is so simple.

[john_l]

Tony,

My version is VCarvePro but I think it's the same... If I have a part with a pocketed area clear using a .25" end mill and also have a outer profile cut-out cut using a .25" end mill can these files be saved in one .sbp file for the bot? If so, how do I get the order correct (so it cuts the profile last)?

Thanks.

[mark_m]

Hello John,
Yes you can do this.
Within the Toolpath List, tick both toolpaths.
The arrows to the right of the toolpaths will move the highlighted toolpath up or down the cut order (topmost will cut first)
When you click on the "Save Toolpath" Icon this will bring up the "Save Toolpaths" form.
On this form tick the "Output all visible toolpaths to one file" tickbox, this will display the separate toolpaths that will be included in the .spb file.
I hope this helps.
If you need further assistance, please feel free to mail support at vectric dot com.

Cheers,
Mark.