Tech Tuesday: Remove Hard Material with Plunge Roughing in BobCAD’s V31 CAM Software

Tech Tuesday is a weekly blog that addresses some of the most common questions and concerns that I hear throughout the previous week from users of BobCAD-CAM software. Both customers and future customers are more than welcome to leave a comment on what they would like to see covered for the following Tech Tuesday. Enjoy!

 
A very popular way to quickly rough hard material is Plunge Roughing. There are many benefits to this approach and BobCAD offers multiple ways to accomplish the job for 2-5 axis part programming.
 
When programming deep pockets or angle surfaces, Plunge Roughing can be a fast & efficient way to remove material.
 
One toolpath option you can use with BobCAD’s CAM software to tackle this programming challenge is 2D Plunge Roughing. This toolpath option comes with our Mill Standard programming package and uses 2D closed boundaries to contain a series of plunge moves.
 
Utilize ‘control stepover increment’ and use a wireframe boundary to control where the toolpath is created.
 

 
 

 
2D Plunge Roughing is very similar to a pocket toolpath where the boundary controls where the toolpath is created.
 

 
 

If your part geometry has tapered walls or angled surfaces, your next option is to use 3D Plunge Roughing.
 

 
 

 
3D plunge roughing uses a similar workflow as 2D plunge roughing, but instead of using a 2D boundary, users select 3D models to drive the 3 axis Plunge Roughing routine. User-defined direction of cut and stepover amounts just like a 2D Plunge Rough, the difference being the model is used to define where the plunge moves are made versus a 2D boundary that controls where the toolpath is created.
 

 
Again, this is a very popular toolpath for hard milling where users want to keep the tool pressure up and into the simple versus the side pressure that’s created when using a pocket cycle.
 
Looking for more control & options over your plunge roughing routines? Using BobCAD’s surface-based toolpaths, you’ll have the option to convert any path into a Plunge Rough routine.
 
Mill Premium or Multiaxis customers have the option to convert their surface-based toolpaths into a Plunge Roughing routine using the roughing tab.
 

 
This is where you see the option for plunge and the options users have to convert a surface-based toolpath into a Plunge Roughing toolpath. Thank you so much for reading yet another Tech Tuesday; see you next week!

 
 

 

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