Mastercam Drawing

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Cilinia Looker

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Aug 4, 2024, 11:39:32 PM8/4/24

to conraniren

Ijust started using mastercam this week. I use construction lines to draw in Auto-cad and would like to use them in MC but I can not find that function. Does anyone know if MC has construction lines??

Ok, i think I understand what you are saying. I really have never used autocad (nor have I wanted too) but what you are describing, while possible in Mastercam, is much slower and more cumbersome than just drawing a 2X3 rectangle.

When you go into Horizontal or Verticle mode, you will sketch a line on the screen by clicking the two endpoints. The line will be automatically constrained to horizontal or verticle depending on which mode you are in.

So say you sketch a horizontal line on the screen that is close to the origin (say it's initial placement is Y .1824), then you just type "0" on the keyboard and hit enter, this will move the line to Y 0. Then you can sketch another randomly placed horizontal line and type "3" and the line will snap to that Y position. The same goes for Verticle. Just sketch the line on the screen, then enter the X coordinate you want the line to snap too.

I used to draw in mastercam like that, using "line parallel". Draw a long line vertically through 0 and a horizontal line through 0. Then make lines parallel to the first lines by inputting distance. Then trim where lines meet to make corners. Or use "break at intersection" to break where all lines meet and delete which ever line segments aren't needed.

There is no contraction line command in MC like other Design software. You can make line with dotted line, but MC will read as normal line and using for contour. Thats sad and I feel Same way to create some design.

Go back to 1985-2000 and draw in AutoCad. Mastercam is not much different and what allowed me to be efficient at drawing and modeling in Mastercam when I started using it 20+ years ago. I was making solids that Pro-E struggled with back then. I had to design a 50 caliber helix Cartilage loader for a Military program. I then had to break it up into 1/4 sections for composite layup molds for Carbon fiber. I had to model pockets along the helix in solids so I could machine the layup tools. I had to model the scribe lines and everything. They took my models and imported them into Pro-E. I had only been using Mastercam 6 months at the time.

We are here to help so ask away. Put up sample files they help us help you the best. You start running out of room then you can delete the content or get a free share account and share files that way. I do contract programming for a living and when I see effort it shows me someone is serious.

That's what I thought many years ago. I have my own seat of MC and could draw anything I wanted using it. Then my son was taking Solidworks classes, and we would have competitions creating solid models, and I seen how much better Solidworks handled that. I also noticed that a lot of programming jobs also wanted someone that knew Solidworks.

So, I took a couple of evening classes in Solidworks, and did many hours of modeling at home with things I found around the house, etc. Now I use it exclusively at work for modeling, but more for designing fixtures! Once you get use to changing back and forth between the two you will see it is a very powerful tool in being a programmer.

I agree that its incredibly powerful, and the more I learn the better it gets. I also understand why its complicated, I just feel that there's a few things that could be simpler. The company Im with right now has given me the opportunity to learn it, and Im relishing the challenge. Im designing molds(also learning how, even though that's my machining background), and its funny because some of the operations I have to perform are beyond even some of the most experienced engineers here.

It's not that they are necessarily stupid, just a little arrogant. The great "boot" of the machine shop arriving from on high to visit the fool with his manhood reeled out beyond his control usually gets the arrogance under control, very suddenly.

I have been programming in mastercam for years now and my question is. I always draw my parts in autocad and then import them into mastercam, as I am much faster this way. I have had this debate with people that draw all there stuff in mastercam. And I yet to come across a person who can draw faster in mastercam then I can in autocad and bring it in. Now I am not saying there aint people than cant. What I am trying to figure out is there a benifiet from drawining in mastercam than autocad? I am in no way saying my method is better just havent heard any good reason why. The reason I bring this up is I am finding programmers are spending so much time drawing more complex parts im mastercam. Just looking for some advice, by no means bashing people for drawing in mastercam. Just trying to figure out if maybe there is a better way of doing my job. I am an certified in autocad so I can draw really fast im autocad. But I am wondering if I am limiting what mastercam can do but my methods. Thank in advance for advice.

I have never used anything but Mastercam to draw so I really can't compare it to autocad. However I think drawing in mastercam has made me better at Mastercam in general. If import a file and need to create any extra geometry to program it for toolpaths etc. I can do it rather quickly no matter how complex it may be because I am very used to creating geometry in mastercam. That being said if I create a solid in Mastercam I always do it in design, save the part with history in case I need to make a change, then resave it as a parasolid or run the nohist.c-hook before I bring it into mill to program it. I think that all the solid history geometry just makes things confusing when I go to program a part. I not saying my way is best but It works for me. I am interested in learning a cad system so I can compare.

I was doing it that way for a while but I rarely have to make changes. Saving the solid in design with all the history at least gives me somethng to revert back to if I need to make a minor change. Sometimes I end up with a lot of 2d geometry when creating a solid depending on how complex it is. I don't know if this is normal because I kinda learned solids on my own and I don't know if I do things in the most efficient manner when it comes to creating solids. I may already have 2d geometry on twenty or thirty levels by the time I get done making the solid. Like I said I have no other cad system to compare it to. I will keep what you said in mind, I always appreciate what you have to say in this forum.

I do just about all of my geometry creation in ProE. All of our design engineers use ProE, so that's what all of the models I get are. It's just easier to create fixtures and machining models from the original solids, plus then my tool/fixture design remain associative to the original design model. I just wish ProE-Mastercam had a plugin like SolidWorks.