I am currently designing and programming a user interface for a CNC machine that cuts panels and rails with arches for cabinets. I need to be able to take an AutoCad drawing file of the part to be cut and convert it to tool cutting path data. Has anyone developed a vi for this operation? If so, you can reply to my email address. Just take out the obvious part (NOSPAM).
Hi Mike, I haven't looked a t this for a while, but I visited this issue a few years back and seem to recall that there was C code and DLLs available (free and $$$ versions) with a modest amount of searching on the web. These would convert AutoCAD to CNC. Getting one of these andputting wrapper VIs around the DLL calls would probably be a faster way to go than coding VIs up from scratch. Cheers, Mike Ashe
"Mike" wrote in message news:v25q2khiqnp90f@corp.supernews.com... > I am currently designing and programming a user interface for a CNC machine > that cuts panels and rails with arches for cabinets. I need to be able to > take an AutoCad drawing file of the part to be cut and convert it to tool > cutting path data. Has anyone developed a vi for this operation? If so, > you can reply to my email address. Just take out the obvious part (NOSPAM). > > Thanks for any information. > > -Mike > >
AutoCAD did sell a software library called ObjectDBX giving programmers access to the DWG format. If you have more money to spend than time to program, you may want to look at that. If you're programming from scratch, DXF may be the easier way to go. It's in ASCII so you can read the file in any editor or word processor. An easy way to get started is to use AutoCAD to create a very simple drawing, e.g. a square with corners at known locations, generate a DXF file, read that DXF file and look for the coordinates of the squares corners. Each corner is a VERTEX in DXF. Than add a circle to your drawing and look for that. The drawings for the pieces you want to CNC will be much more complicated, but it's best to start with simple examples. Another benefit of using D XF is that it is a published format. DWG is a proprietary format and AutoCAD could theoretically change it with the release of a new version of AutoCAD. Then you're back to trying to crack the DWG code again. If you use Google to search for DXF format specification, you'll find a wealth of material.
I actually have develoed this app it was my final project from my speciality in mechatronics, are you still interested? if you are send me a private message
This thread is 10 years old and two of the people who posted have not been on the Forums since 2003.
This is a topic which pops up occasionally, so if you have code you are willing to share, you should start a new thread where you describe the capabilities and limitions of your code.
