There is a new model prep tool in Mastercam 2023 called Solid Position and it is used to assemble parts in a fixture. In previous versions of Mastercam, assembling fixtures was a tedious process that required using the Transform tools to specifically position each piece of the fixture without any awareness of the neighboring solids. Now, in Mastercam 2023, you can use the new Solid Position tool to simply drag the target solid until it makes contact with the intended solid.
To use it, launch the new Solid Position tool, select the face of the clamp you wish to move, and position the gnomon in the center of the stud. Then, select the stud and workpiece as contact bodies. Once the selection is completed, you can use the gnomon to position the part.
Once you do this, you can freely rotate the clamp until it makes contact with the workpiece. The clamp will highlight and lock into position whenever it makes contact with a selected contact body, and it can freely pass through any other solids. This makes it very easy to move the clamp into the proper position on the workpiece.
You might notice that your gnomon is limited to rotation about the Z-axis. If you wish to tilt the clamp, you simply need to select a different face and select new contact bodies to achieve the desired rotation.
The real power of this tool is in the workflow. You can quickly select new bodies to move and the corresponding contact bodies and from there, you can move them into the proper position without ever leaving the Solid Position interface.
As you can see, this new tool simplifies assembling fixtures in Mastercam, and its workflow also reduces time spent so you can rapidly move on to programming your parts.
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