#Post processor powermill configuration how to
#Post processor powermill configuration software

Familiar Patterns: There’s more than one way to do things in g-code.Tool Life Management: Tracking and managing tool life can be done via custom post.Custom Drill Cycles: We mentioned custom deep hole cycles but there are many ways to optimize drill cycles in the Post.Right Angle Heads: It can often be advantageous to employ a right angle head but hard to program unless you have a Post that makes it easy.If the Post Processor is powerful enough, it can be simulated by the post. Simulated Tool Compensation: It’s often convenient for the toolpath to be programmed to the tip rather than the circumference of the cutter, but not all machines have g-code support for Tool Compensation.For example, it’s possible completely automate part zero touch offs and the like. Probing: Probes can be tremendously valuable, and the Post is a good place to enable all that power.Here are some typical kinds of customizations that go above and beyond just making a post that’ll work for your machine’s g-code dialect: Example Customizations of CNC Post Processors For example, the Post may be able to popup a custom menu allowing you to choose some options you’ve specifically designed for your shop’s needs on every Post. Depending on the CAM package and its Post capabilities, sometimes very powerful flexibility is an option. That’s a logical thing to have the Post do for you. Maybe you want the table on your mill to move as close to the enclosure door as possible at the end of a job to facilitate loading and unloading. You can even modify the Post to save your operators some time. Some examples of shop-specific customization might include your standards for safety blocks or required comments. If you frequently are making the same hand edits over and over again to your G-Code, it’s worth investigating whether a change to your Post would eliminate that hassle. While the primary role of a Post is to convert generic geometry to the particular dialect of G-Code your machine uses, the Post also gives you a lot of flexibility to tailor your CAM output to the practices your shop likes to use, so it is a handy way to customize the G-Code output of your CAM. CNC Post Processors for Shop Best Practices

#Post processor powermill configuration how to

That’s time wasted running back and forth between machine and CAM trying to figure out the cause of the alarm and how to fix it.Ī good g-code simulator does a lot more than just plot the toolpath–it will check for all sorts of alarm conditions. Perhaps the simulation looks fine but there’s something wrong in the g-code that will cause an alarm on your CNC machine so it just won’t execute.

#Post processor powermill configuration software

You must be wondering, “Is CAM software really that buggy that we can’t trust the built-in simulator?” In most cases, it isn’t a function of major bugs but rather of little issues that go undiscovered. Our customers tell us it saves them from problems that otherwise would’ve turned up on the machine. Our G-Wizard Editor software is a great example of a g-code simulator. First, let’s understand the translation role better. We’ll talk in greater length about some of these other possibilities below. Another example might be a post that automatically subsitutes a deep hole drilling cycle whenever the length to diameter ratio of the hole is too large. The Post can change the initial setup of a part program and it can change how particular operations work. It might make sense to have one Post for standard jobs and another for 4th Axis jobs. For example, you might use a 4th axis in a certain way, but you don’t use the 4th axis for every job. While translation to specific g-code dialects is the primary task of a Post Processor, they can do a lot more besides to customize your part programs to work using the Best Practices of your shop. There will be a different Post for each g-code dialect your CAM software supports. We often refer to a particular instance of a translation as a “Post”. The Post Processor is the component of your CAM software that is responsible for translating to the exact g-code dialect. Doing so obviously requires an awareness of the exact g-code dialect that is being targeted.

CAM software has to take geometry from a CAD model and convert it to g-code. We’ve seen that there are many dialects of G-Code. Note: This article is part of CNCCookbook’s G-Code Tutorial What is a CNC Post Processor? CNC Post Processors & CAM for Different G-Code Dialects