Is anybody else having problems with v carve creating a toolpath in Carbide Create? It seems very random. Most of the time when doing text I have to split the text into 3 or 4 parts to make the toolpath smaller so it will create the correct paths. It’s like it gives up after the first few letters. This has happened with other shapes too but I am usually able to select one part of the shape at a time and create one toolpath at a time until all paths are filled.
Anyway Just throwing that out there to make sure it’s not a hardware conflict on my end. I have 16G ram, so I doubt I’m running out of memory.
It’s probably a software thing — please send any such problem files to support@carbide3d.com with notes on how to create the problem and we’ll assign it to a developer to look into.
Another consideration is that Carbide Create expects and works best with:
- closed paths
- which follow the PostScript left-hand fill winding rule (fill is always to the left-hand of the path direction and alternates — outermost path is counter-clockwise, next is clockwise, repeat) — there’ve been a couple of files which don’t run properly due to not following this rule which I’ve looked into recently.
If you could take a moment to look over this beginning of a tutorial which discusses V-carving in Carbide Create, I’d be grateful:
http://www.shapeoko.com/wiki/index.php/Carbide_Create_V-carving_(advanced)
I’m having pretty much the same issue. I create text, and then try to create v-carve toolpaths, and some of the letters will not generate a path. Sometimes that exact same letter is elsewhere in the same composition, with the same font, and the same size, but create will not make toolpaths, or there are sometimes issues with inner sections of letters. I have yet to find any place that explains a way to control v-carving in terms of selecting whether interior shapes within a shape are carved or not. I have tried using the text feature within Create, and I have also tried creating text in Illustrator and bringing it in as an SVG after converting it to curves. Each method creates its own unique toolpath problems, but neither way gets it right. I have also noticed that some of the words end up represented as a dotted line. That seems to be random. Or at least I have not discovered what controls that, or what the implications of it are. Anyone have any input on ways to make v-carve consistent with text?
Oh I forgot one other thing about v-carve. When I select the text, and click v-carve, at first it seems to get every letter right, but that is while it is still processing, then it always changes just before it finished out, and at least one letter is always wrong at that point.
Please send such problem files in to support@carbide3d.com
You may be able to get them to work locally by converting the text to paths w/ a Boolean operation.