EURON8 Posted June 9, 2012 Posted June 9, 2012 I just want to see an example of what a fabricator would expect to see, particularly so they can jam it straight into a CNC. this. Most of the stz i can forsee me neededing in the near future will all be basic as, cut out of flat plate stuff. Quote
eke_zetec_RWD Posted June 9, 2012 Posted June 9, 2012 Just need a dxf file. Helps to put material, thickness and quantity in the file name. Eg flange10mmsteelx4.dxf Use stightly oversize bolt holes. And if port matching go undersize port holes. Radius sharp corners. If drawing in layers then beside the shape is a seperate layer to everything else. Quote
mark105 Posted June 9, 2012 Posted June 9, 2012 ok if you look on the repository i made, there is an example.dxf, this is the exact file that would go straight in for programming to be cut. this write up is for laser cutting or flat plate 2d cutting, it is a bit biased as i used to work for a cutting company and as such i have written it as general as i can but will likely contain stuff that was specific to them. that said i would be surprised if any other companies of the same scale as what i worked for did things much different as after all they are out there to make money, the only thing that would change procedures is programming software used. the basic easy stuff: -just about everyone will accept dxf's so do all your to be cut files as these, then the company just has to program and cut it -1 part per file, your going to get charged extra if you dump a whole lot of stuff in one drawing and it has to be separated out -in your cut dxf's have just the part to be cut, nothing extra like dimensions and all that jazz, the part only how i draw stuff up: 1. doesn't matter how you draw it, its all the cleaning up afterwards that needs to be done to make a file usable, start with a dwg as these will save all your dimensions and so on nicely, so draw your shit up here 2. when you have finished drawing, do a zoom extents, this makes sure you havent got some random line 2 meters away from the part you drew and the cutter is going to be all wtf why is you part 2M square when all you wanted was an exhaust flange (command: type z enter then e enter for zoom extents) 3. region everything, this makes sure all your lines are joined up and you have one continuous line for the cutter to follow. this is very specific to the cutting program as to if it needs to be done or not but it is very time consuming for another person to pick the drawing up and fix such a problem so best to make sure that its done anyway. (command: type reg enter) 4. save now as from here on you start the export to dxf part 5. nows a good time to do a clean up as exploding is next and things like dimensions are difficult to clean up once exploded. so delete everything that is unneeded and not going to be cut 6. explode everything, this breaks everything up and allows you to check if things like your splines look sweet and aren't millions of little lines and will look like shit when cut. plus on the software we used if something was a region when you imported it it would just disappear and not get cut (damn german software writers) so just explode everything to be safe 7. about here you could just save it as dxf and send it away but i like to do one more thing to keep stuff tidy and it also was specific to the software we used and it is to do with lines and their colours and layers. for the software we used different colours meant the software did different things with that line, so anything to be cut make sure it is on layer 0 and all properties set to "by layer". if it is yellow it got etched. cyan was folding lines and so on. 8. save it as a dxf and your done hope that was helpful, any questions ask, also if you can identify what flange the example is please let me know as i have forgotten haha. Quote
Roman Posted June 10, 2012 Posted June 10, 2012 2. when you have finished drawing, do a zoom extents, this makes sure you havent got some random line 2 meters away from the part you drew and the cutter is going to be all wtf why is you part 2M square when all you wanted was an exhaust flange (command: type z enter then e enter for zoom extents) Haha, used to work for a structural steel company with a big BIG water jet cutter, more than once it it went smashing into a concrete wall because of a small spec of whatever on the drawing, 6 meters over to the left that it felt it needed to cut out. (Turns out it was a bug in the program, not a random piece in the model) Quote
Roman Posted June 10, 2012 Posted June 10, 2012 How do i set dimensions so if i want a 10mm diameter circle i can type in 5 to the set radius bit and not get a massive huge circle. Didnt really get through much CAD stz at tech. Night class maybe? haha would like to be able to just draw up my own shit now i have downloaded this program. You might have the OSNAP turned on (true story) I can spend a night with you. Oh, I could teach you some CAD stz too, at cost of Cider Quote
Llama Posted June 10, 2012 Posted June 10, 2012 Open it up, I'm sure there would be other people keen. For the CAD that is... Quote
eke_zetec_RWD Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 2. when you have finished drawing, do a zoom extents, this makes sure you havent got some random line 2 meters away from the part you drew and the cutter is going to be all wtf why is you part 2M square when all you wanted was an exhaust flange (command: type z enter then e enter for zoom extents) Haha, used to work for a structural steel company with a big BIG water jet cutter, more than once it it went smashing into a concrete wall because of a small spec of whatever on the drawing, 6 meters over to the left that it felt it needed to cut out. (Turns out it was a bug in the program, not a random piece in the model) Cutter not have table limits??!! Quote
EURON8 Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 its a date roman. will text sometime about dates. chur Quote
Roman Posted June 11, 2012 Posted June 11, 2012 Sweet as. Open it up, I'm sure there would be other people keen.For the CAD that is... Hey, well OS has provided me many lols, events, etc that I havent really ever contributed much back to. I'll have a think about the best way I can perhaps help out some OS guys here. What's the most common application, perhaps I could do a youtube tutorial on how to sketch up an exhaust manifold from scratch? Or a vid on basic autocad etc functions. Or dont mind helping out some AKL people learn the ropes in person if anyone else hates learning things by wading through help files and tutorials. Quote
peteretep Posted June 12, 2012 Posted June 12, 2012 I can also show people how to use it, maybe bring laptop to burgerfuel meet and I/we can show you? can also search youtube for tutorials Quote
EURON8 Posted June 12, 2012 Posted June 12, 2012 I wil bro g my laptop to burger fuel and Pete can explain basic points ? 1 Quote
michael0008 Posted June 19, 2012 Posted June 19, 2012 solid edge ST4 is another good free program for drawing http://www.solidedge.com/free2d/ also anyone got a 4age silver top itb cad file? Quote
ThePog Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 I have Solidworks, including the fuckoff version with FEA etc, so if anyone is in need let me know. Quote
Simon Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 I tried to do some FEA today ^ I think you have to have a legit license because the simulation calls home every time and I have stopped it calling home. Ended up going back into uni to do it. ? Quote
ThePog Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 Paying the 20k to get that functionality does help. Quote
peteretep Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 solidworks has basic fea which I have used, I downloaded a copy of solidworks and the FEA worked a couple of releases ago, ansys is another story altogether. I heard people have spent their whole careers on it and havent learned half of it Quote
Simon Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 FEA is crazy awesome. Like, crazy. Doesn't matter how much you think you know about "yeah sheel be right", FEA will give you exactly what you want down to a few hundred mili newtons / force applications of a part. Quote
Maru-So Posted June 25, 2012 Posted June 25, 2012 fea is ok but unless you have a way of verifying/calibrating your results all you are doing is generating pretty pictures Quote
Spencer Posted June 25, 2012 Author Posted June 25, 2012 I still have like 50 files to uplaod and convert/explode/tidy/sort but am running low on time as work is hectic, will get there at some stage Quote
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