I rarely use Carbide Create, but today I used it to build a toolpath for surfacing my spoilboard. I have a Shapeoko Pro (4) Standard, so the BitSetter is mounted front right and could get accidentally surfaced if you’re not careful.
I decided to build the area to be surfaced with two rectangles. I created one from lower left, sized to stop horizontally just before the BitSetter, but reaching all the way back. I created a second one just “above” the BitSetter, reaching to the back and right. Here they are:
You’ll notice the area extends beyond the travel of the router, that’s because I’m going to be using a large diameter Fly bit.
Now, to get the second rectangle positioned just right, I used the Move button, kept the lower left selected and moved it into position. Then I create a pocket toolpath with both rect selected. So far, so good.
OK, so I bring the file into my Shapeoko, and I’m 0.8mm too bit in X and Y. OK, I’ll just change the Width/Height of the rectangles by 0.8mm as appropriate.
Well, when I do this, the lower left corner of the rectangles move! Ugh.
So, now after every change in Width or Height I have to go back and re-Move the rectangles into position.
Is this the way CC is supposed to work? Seems odd/unintuitive, especially since I created the rectangles from the lower left up (not centered or any other direction).
When resizing or scaling, the object size always changes about the center of the object.
No matter what point you pick, it will work for some scenarios and not others. Center is at least easy to explain and makes the most sense for circles, at least.
Seems that it should scale around whatever you started the construct. That is, if you created a center rectangle, then sure, scale from the center. But if you clicked from a corner, then scale around that.
Two identically-sized rectangles. When you change the dimensions (NOT scale), you see what stays put. And the nice thing is you can dimension whatever you want and whatever you dimension stays dimensioned. So you can even fix the lower left of the center-created rectangle, if that’s what you want. But, with CC, I’m stuck with center definition even when I don’t actually know where the center is, and especially don’t want that maintained when resized.
At any rate, I thought I’d be saving time using the “simpler” program to create a simple spoilboard flattening toolpath, but it turned out to take me longer and be more frustrating.
Different programs work differently, and if one expects one to work like another, one is unlikely to find that to be the case.
Usually it’s better if one starts learning a program without preconceptions beyond the basics of principles — those usually transfer — specifics of behaviour rarely do.
I don’t disagree that different programs can work differently.
But, it just doesn’t seem intuitive to me that changing the dimensions of a rectangle should keep the center fixed when the standard method of creation (no modifier keys being used) is to create it from a corner, not the center.
And, maybe my use cases are different, but resizing about the center is not what I’d want most of the time. Like if I were creating a flag, would I really want resizing of the stripes to keep the center point fixed?
Carbide Create started out with everything being done from the center and this apparently is a legacy of that — it may be that it will change in a future version — if you want that, put it in as a suggestion at:
