Hello, I would like to use the rotary to cut a table leg and add a mortise on the top end of the leg to accept an apron tenon. Has anyone created a two-part tool path file to cut both the rotary toolpath and a 3-axis WCS toolpath to cut the mortise without removing the part from the rotary chuck? If so, would you please share the details of how you created the toolpath and executed it? I’m also not sure whether the servo motor would be able to hold the part with a slight eccentric cut for the mortise. Thanks!
Not to the same scale but I turned a Christmas ornament on a rotary then bored some funny shaped holes in it. The project was a bit of a failure in that on my non-avid machine I couldn’t get the alignment right and the holes came out off center.
I used DeskProto 8 to generate the toolpath. I find the software capable, but isn’t intuitive for me. It allows you to make rotary tool paths and also lets you set the rotary angle and make a standard x,y,z tool path. I watched the deskproto Nefertiti demo a few times before I figured out what to do. For me DeskProto is better than any other alternative (and pretty cheap) but I just don’t enjoy using it.
I tried to make the same toolpath on Fusion. I tried a demo version of their advanced tooling but it never stayed up long enough for it to complete the toolpath. As badly as I wanted it to work I just couldn’t get it to. I was hoping to replace the deskproto with fusion but ….
Yes, you can absolutely do this. The rotary shouldn’t slip as long as the mortise toolpath is reasonable. I suppose it could slip for some aggressive combination of cut depth, plunge rate, bit type, material hardness, etc., but probably not. I do fairly aggressive off-axis cutting on the rotary without any issues.
I could talk a bit about Fusion if that would be helpful to you. I don’t have the machining extension to get the native rotary toolpaths, but I have done rotary toolpaths for rotationally symmetric objects (bowls) using M98 calls in the same file as other toolpath types. If you know how to create each toolpath (3+1 and rotary) and the origin stays consistent, it’s straightforward.
Thank you for your response! I use Aspire for generating my toolpaths, so talking about the process using Fusion 360 may not apply for me. But perhaps other members could benefit from your wisdom! If you are interested, I’m attaching the table leg Aspire file I used to generate both the rotary and 3+1 g-code files. I appended the 3+1 g-code to the rotary g-code file resulting in the attached g-code file. I also modified the g-code to rotate the leg 90 degrees and add a second mortise. Now, I have not attempted to actually run even an air cut using this g-code yet, as I need to study this process a bit more before taking it to the machine. Any advice would be appreciated.
Table Leg xyz.crv3d (1.7 MB)
Table Leg.cnc (4.6 MB)
Sorry, I attached the wrong Aspire file in this last post. Here is the correct file:
Table Leg.zip (6.4 MB)