I am new to Shapeoko and carbide create. I have a Shapeoko 5 pro 4x4 and I’m using Carbide Create to program everything.
I am a guitar builder and I’m using the 5 Pro to cut logos for my headstock face. I am trying to cut a pocket for the logo abalone inlay. How do I program a roughing tool of .046, then a finish pass with a .020 tool?
There are several ways. How much rough stock do you want to leave for the finish cut?
One way is to offset the geometry for the rough path by the amount you want to leave, and use that offset vector for the rough path.
Another way is to create a roughing tool and add the rough stock to the tool radius. So if you want 0.002" stock, and your tool is 0.046, you make a 0.050 tool to create the program, but load the 0.046 tool in the machine.
1 Like
Thanks for the quick response!
This is a traced image of my logo, so I don’t know that I can offset the geometry.
Pardon my Ignorance, but I’m new to the terminology also.
The .046 tool is cutting good enough that I don’t really need to leave stock for a finish pass, but the logo is intricate enough that I need the .020 tool to go where the .046 tool can’t. As you can image, If I use the .020 to cut the entire logo, it breaks the tool. Therefore, I need to cut the majority with the .046 then do a tool change to .020 to finish it. I was thinking if I could rough then do a finish pass, the .020 would only have minimal run time.
I have absolutely no Idea of how to begin. Is this programed in tool path with 3D Rough and 3D Finish?
Ah, OK. Then you are not really “roughing”, you are cutting a finish pass with the larger tool, and another finish pass with the smaller tool.
If the widest area in your logo is 0.092" or less, then you can contour the first pass. If it’s wider you would want to pocket so you remove all of the material.
If you have PRO, you can “Rest Mill” a pocket for the smaller tool, and it will just pick out what the larger tool missed. If you don’t have PRO, then contour the whole thing with the smaller tool. You’ll be cutting some walls that are already cut to finish size, but it’s a single pass & shouldn’t be horribly long.
And if there was even a small amount of deflection on the first tool, the full contour might remove a little bit of material in those areas anyways.
2 Likes
I SEE!!!
So, I use the .046 then, when I use the .020 bit I check “Rest Machining” and tell it the previous diameter was .046. Right?
2 Likes
Roughing and finishing passes are part of the 3d cutting. So if your logo is only a 2d cut then as Tod said simply make a tool path to go down as far as you want the finishing pass to get. So for example if you want a .2" deep logo then make one tool path that goes down to .188" that had a .12" inside offset. Then create another tool path that starts at .118" and goes to .2" without the offset so the bit goes around the outside of your object and cuts from .112" to .2".
Rest machining is for roughing out a pocket say with a 1/4" bit. That leaves a round corner for an inside cut the diameter of a 1/4" bit. Then you tell the new toolpath the last tool used and only the 4 corners are cut and not the whole pocket. That saves a lot of time air cutting the same pocket from the surface to the maximum depth. The rest machining only cuts what was left in the corners. Because of an inside cut you never eliminate the rounded corners but you do get the rounded corner smaller and smaller.
This topic was automatically closed after 30 days. New replies are no longer allowed.