Greetings,
My name is Hein and have only made a few posts here. I've modeled a few molds in Pro/E. I'm running ProE 2001 if that's any indication, Lately, I've been modeling molds for composite parts. Fun stuff. The molder uses SW2010 so I export Pro/E surface models (created at a high accuracy setting) via IGES to SW where I check and save files for him to verify my work.
He then sends those files (or occasionally STEP files created from them) out to a few different machine shops who then make the molds mostly using MasterCam (I believe). Most molds come out great but occasionally he gets faceted surfaces in his molds. I haven't seen all cases of this but it seems to be on larger radius surfaces that are more-or-less normal to the Z machining axis. below is a picture. This mold has been sanded slightly but you can clearly see the faceting. I actually feels smoother than it looks.
There isn't any finger pointing going on and the parts are coming out great! I just want to help him solve this.
As a side note: I am looking for a used horizontal or vertical machining center (~$15K) so I can start making a few molds. I currently have a large Multicam CNC router and I have not seen this when cutting large molds which I have modeled and programmed completely in Pro. I would like to say that this will not be a problem when I make molds but don't want to eat my words.
Any ideas?
Thank you.
Hein van Swaay
Impact, Inc
54I 49O 5O9B
Edited by: Hein_
My name is Hein and have only made a few posts here. I've modeled a few molds in Pro/E. I'm running ProE 2001 if that's any indication, Lately, I've been modeling molds for composite parts. Fun stuff. The molder uses SW2010 so I export Pro/E surface models (created at a high accuracy setting) via IGES to SW where I check and save files for him to verify my work.
He then sends those files (or occasionally STEP files created from them) out to a few different machine shops who then make the molds mostly using MasterCam (I believe). Most molds come out great but occasionally he gets faceted surfaces in his molds. I haven't seen all cases of this but it seems to be on larger radius surfaces that are more-or-less normal to the Z machining axis. below is a picture. This mold has been sanded slightly but you can clearly see the faceting. I actually feels smoother than it looks.
There isn't any finger pointing going on and the parts are coming out great! I just want to help him solve this.
As a side note: I am looking for a used horizontal or vertical machining center (~$15K) so I can start making a few molds. I currently have a large Multicam CNC router and I have not seen this when cutting large molds which I have modeled and programmed completely in Pro. I would like to say that this will not be a problem when I make molds but don't want to eat my words.
Any ideas?
Thank you.
Hein van Swaay
Impact, Inc
54I 49O 5O9B
Edited by: Hein_