The Winged Victory or Nike of Samothrace is a statue prominently featured in The Louvre Museum in Paris, France. Mastercam recently teamed up with YASDA Precision, Mitsubishi Materials, and Methods Machine Tools to create an 11-inch replication of the famed 18-foot statue. Within Mastercam, the statue is a mesh file with over five million facets and was 10 gigabytes in size. Mastercam took the part from a raw piece of stock all the way to [...]
In part one of this blog series, we discussed what Mastercam Add-Ons are (specialized aftermarket software kits that work within the Mastercam interface) and covered four of the most commonly used Add-Ons: Multiaxis, Productivity+, Port Expert, and Mastercam Art. This second blog in the series will cover five more popular Add-Ons and how to use them. 5-Axis Curve Machining This particular Add-On is considered a great starting point for entering into the multiaxis world. It [...]
Your shop’s intellectual labor is valuable. Protect it. By saving your best practices in a digital database, you streamline your production process and ensure that your hard work won’t be forgotten or lost. One of the best ways to do this is by employing your CAD/CAM software’s operations library. Mastercam’s Operations Library is a virtual catalog of your previously defined machining strategies: combinations of your toolpaths, tooling, and related parameters. Every strategy within the library [...]
Mastercam OptiRough: The Roughing Solution You Might Be Overlooking Mastercam OptiRough is an advanced roughing strategy powered by Dynamic Motion technology, which is designed to optimize cutting approaches. The way Dynamic Toolpaths works is by monitoring every aspect of machining in real-time; it is constantly calculating the best feeds and angles to run parts the fastest and safest way possible. The only downside to OptiRough is that not every programmer knows about it, and some [...]
Cimquest is happy to offer a new Mastercam 2024 2D Router class covering the key points of programming your CNC Router. This is a foundational class in 2D router toolpaths that includes the topics of nesting, block drilling, patterns, tabbing, and aggregate heads. We are offering this open enrollment class remotely and as a dedicated class at your facility/one of our offices. Our Mill 3D and 5-Axis classes are directly applicable if you have a [...]
Mastercam CAD/CAM software is a self-contained, fully capable NC-coding program for manufacturing applications. Within its main solution products, like Mill and Lathe, most users can program any part that comes across their desk. In some cases, however, processes can be streamlined or precision boosted with outside help. That’s where Mastercam Add-Ons come into play. Mastercam Add-Ons are software extensions that deliver additional Mastercam functions. Each has its own specialized function and is designed to help [...]
In most cases – and especially when a customer has provided only a description or 2D drawing of a part – the first step in the machining process is to build a digital model of the desired part. This model will be a precise, virtual 3D representation of the part’s dimensions, planes, and contours. In CAD (computer-aided design) programming, there are three main types of models: wireframe, surface, and solid. Each has its own strengths [...]
This blog post will explore how to use the Mastercam 2023 Drill toolpath. This new toolpath will allow you to edit toolpath motion for any single selected entity in that operation. Typically, when using Drill and working with a solid, you can use the Calculate incremental values from holes or line option. This allows you to have multiple depths in a single operation. When you only have wireframe geometry this can be a little trickier [...]
