ultimate torchmate cad thread?

[carslut]

i searched and didnt find any 1 mega thread that had lots of Q&A for the TM cad software, is there one? ive used autocad (auto desk software) for about 15yrs and microstation (Bentley Systems software) for 5-6yrs off and on...... so far all i have found my tm cad good for is putting me to sleep confused. ...... i know its going to take some getting used to and have plenty of questions..... if there is an better place to ask them please point me in the right direction. im sure its like anything w/ changing software platforms, once the growing pains of new things are gone it will take off...... or so i hope.

[HardcorewannabeXJ]

Have you read through the Torchmate CAD User's guide? I would say 90% of the information you need in order to draw or scan parts can be found there, anything else feel free to ask away.

There isn't one "master" CAD question thread as of yet.

[carslut]

ive read it a few times, it makes for a good reason to not watch any of the "real house wives of......." bs shows my wife seems to be overly into as of late....... so far my biggest dislike is the lack of command line use... tool bars are so 1973......... haha.... any hoot... its just an learning curve that ill get used to.... as of now i am not so sure i should have bought the TM cad...... once i get the macehan up and running i am sure some light will shine as to why i needed to spend the money on it.

[Torchmate]

With your knowledge of Autocad, I am guessing that you will be more comfortable doing all of your drawing in that. The primary benefit in the Torchmate CAD for you will be in sequencing the cuts, toolpathing for kerf compensation, adding lead-in's/out's and nesting. Have you been to this page on our website:

http://torchmate.com/technical_suppo...rsion_7_and_8/

It has some walk throughs as to how to use the above features. Also, don't be afraid to call in and have these guys takeover your screen at home and show you what it can do to help your processes. Right now there are four of them logged in downstairs waiting for a phone call.

Bill

[wendleburger]

I have a similar AutoCAD background to you and found straight away that the Torchmate CAD is perfect for sequencing your cuts and adding tool compensation and lead-ins.
Other than that there isn't much point trying to learn all of it's features if you are already proficient in AutoCAD.

I do ALL of my drawing in AutoCAD, and basically just use the Torchmate CAD as a pre-post-processor for creating the G-Code. It is PERFECT for that.

[GMFAB]

I already own bobcad v23 will it work as well as torchmate cad ?

[HardcorewannabeXJ]

Originally Posted by GMFAB

I already own bobcad v23 will it work as well as torchmate cad ?

BobCAD does work, we have a 2d Plasma cutting post script for it, as well as a 3d routing post script for it. BobCAD gives you the toolpathing ability as the Torchmate CAD does. I don't know for sure if it will sequence all of the inside cuts before the outside cuts though.

[SoundManCO]

Some of us (I may be a minority in this) have zero CAD experience. The learning curve for TM-CAD light has been pretty steep at times.
I went through a great deal of struggling to locate the bolt holes for a set beadlocks and someone on here saved me (after I had done it by hand) and let me know about the array feature and how to use it. Pretty easy to do it that way.

A thread with tips, hints and how to's would benefit people like me to no end.

[SoundManCO]

I have been thinking about this a good bit today. A thread that has a weekly posting in it about a feature of TM-Cad in it would be pretty cool.

An example;

A how-to with a walk through on how to use the different weld features. Add a dxf that could be downloaded and whoever wants to can walk through the same steps as the how-to.



I know there are a bunch of features in TM-CAD that I would use if I knew what they are and how they worked a little better.

[MQYJ]

Originally Posted by HardcorewannabeXJ

I would say 90% of the information you need in order to draw or scan parts can be found there, anything else feel free to ask away.

I have found this to be true for the most part. While the manual will not necessarily show you exactly how to draw your particular part, it will at the very least show you the tools that you need to get there.

I'm like Soundman, I had very little to no cad experience when I bought my machine a little over a year ago. I had a real hard time stumbling through the ins and outs of TMcad. Then as I became more comfortable with its features and figured out a few work arounds, the parts that were taking me a long time to draw at the beginning are now taking me just a few minutes.

My main complaint with it lately is while in normal mode, when I zoom in, the drawing will recenter and zoom at the same time. While in node edit, it will only zoom in on the screen as it is currently centered. This gets annoying when trying to zoom in on a small cluster of nodes that aren't in the center of the screen.

[carslut]

Originally Posted by MQYJ

My main complaint with it lately is while in normal mode, when I zoom in, the drawing will recenter and zoom at the same time. While in node edit, it will only zoom in on the screen as it is currently centered. This gets annoying when trying to zoom in on a small cluster of nodes that aren't in the center of the screen.

i noticed the same thing, i was thinking maybe i had something setup screwy.... its not the end of the world but a tad annoying

[MQYJ]

Yeah, it almost seems that the zoom and recenter feature would be more useful in the node edit mode than in the normal view mode.

[MQYJ]

Originally Posted by SoundManCO

I know there are a bunch of features in TM-CAD that I would use if I knew what they are and how they worked a little better.

One of the best features that has routinely saved me from starting over on a drawing is the undo and redo navigators. You don't realize how many commands you give the cad program until you need to go back about 15 or so commands due to missing one key step in the drawing that needed to be done before moving forward.

I've also used the undo command repeatedly as a way to learn what different functions do. Just select something and give it a command, if you don't like what it did then ctrl-z and try again. This is very helpful when welding complex shapes when you aren't sure how it will actually weld them together.

[HardcorewannabeXJ]

Originally Posted by MQYJ

One of the best features that has routinely saved me from starting over on a drawing is the undo and redo navigators. You don't realize how many commands you give the cad program until you need to go back about 15 or so commands due to missing one key step in the drawing that needed to be done before moving forward.

I've also used the undo command repeatedly as a way to learn what different functions do. Just select something and give it a command, if you don't like what it did then ctrl-z and try again. This is very helpful when welding complex shapes when you aren't sure how it will actually weld them together.

It's very reassuring to know that if you try something and it doesn't work, a short key stroke or menu command will fix everything!

[carslut]

are there any demo or short lesson videos hidden on the web somewhere showing the masters of TM Cad at work that us new guys could check out? i searched and didnt come up w/ anything useful.

thanks

[Dnmeistr]

Originally Posted by MQYJ

While in node edit, it will only zoom in on the screen as it is currently centered. This gets annoying when trying to zoom in on a small cluster of nodes that aren't in the center of the screen.

If you want to zoom in on a small cluster an easy way to do that is to hit F5 and draw a selection box around the nodes you want to zoom in on and F6 will zoom out in steps.

[BESRK]

Originally Posted by Dnmeistr

If you want to zoom in on a small cluster an easy way to do that is to hit F5 and draw a selection box around the nodes you want to zoom in on and F6 will zoom out in steps.

Nice.. I'm gonna have to mess around with that.

[Tuffjarhed]

Originally Posted by Torchmate

With your knowledge of Autocad, I am guessing that you will be more comfortable doing all of your drawing in that. The primary benefit in the Torchmate CAD for you will be in sequencing the cuts, toolpathing for kerf compensation, adding lead-in's/out's and nesting. Have you been to this page on our website:

http://torchmate.com/technical_suppo...rsion_7_and_8/

It has some walk throughs as to how to use the above features. Also, don't be afraid to call in and have these guys takeover your screen at home and show you what it can do to help your processes. Right now there are four of them logged in downstairs waiting for a phone call.

Bill

Added to favorites, thank you.

[SomeGuyFromOlympia]

I'd like to wake this thread up.

I'm sure that I'm not the only guy that finds himself looking at the older posts trying to find something useful

Here is one for someone that has the time to answer

Node editing.
After you use your shape tool and make for example a square, then take said square, weld it to a rectangle.....
now when I double click on it to get into the node editing....I'm missing three functions in the node tools (if they are called that).
The convert to sharp node
Convert to Round Node
and Convert to tangent node to be specific

I have read the CAD users giude....several times.

anyone have any thoughts on this?

Thanks

[MQYJ]

I think you can either do a convert to curves or convert to polyarc, can't remember which one off hand, and it will create sharp nodes at all of the "points" in the drawing. This has left me perplexed before as well but I did find a work around for it, just can't remember which "convert" function it is.

[MQYJ]

Since Soundman brought this back up I have another one I've been stumped on several times and have yet to figure it out.

Sometimes on more complex drawings, when I create a toolpath, some of the lead-ins need to just have the angle adjusted and some need to be completely relocated. If I make a bunch of angle adjustments and then relocate any one lead-in, the entire drawing reverts back to the original toolpath. You can magine the frustration with going through a drawing and then having every little detail you just adjusted suddenly disappear.

[TPIJeep]

I think the toolpath logic is a bit off at times. I was cutting a part with the letter M in it. I set the lead in to .12 and angle at 90. It created the start point way up inside the sharp angle of the letter. It did not "connect" the tool paths but it was so close when it cut the M fell out before the cut was complete the torch dipped below the plate level and got hung up. If I was one second later on the space bar and I would have broken yet another torch.

Is there a setting to adjust how close it creates lead in's to other cut lines, because its a PITA to go thru and adjust start points and if you miss one like I did yesterday you get a paper weight.

[Dnmeistr]

Originally Posted by MQYJ

Sometimes on more complex drawings, when I create a toolpath, some of the lead-ins need to just have the angle adjusted and some need to be completely relocated. If I make a bunch of angle adjustments and then relocate any one lead-in, the entire drawing reverts back to the original toolpath.

Originally Posted by TPIJeep

Is there a setting to adjust how close it creates lead in's to other cut lines,

There is an option when creating the tool path on the Lean In Tab you can check Adjust Start Point and below that you can check Place Lead in on longest segment, so it does not place a lead in on a corner.
After lead-ins are created if you change the location of a lead in it will revert all your lead-ins to the defined angle when the tool path was first created. So before changing an angle of a lead in first change any locations that need to be moved then change any angles and click Apply.

[SomeGuyFromOlympia]

Originally Posted by MQYJ

I think you can either do a convert to curves or convert to polyarc, can't remember which one off hand, and it will create sharp nodes at all of the "points" in the drawing. This has left me perplexed before as well but I did find a work around for it, just can't remember which "convert" function it is.

See,
I'm pretty sure that I did it once, but it would have been on accident and can't for the life of me figure out how to get those last three node func
tions back in there.....again

[Dnmeistr]

If your object is a polyarc than you wont get the option to change to a sharp, radius or tangent node. To switch back and forth between polyarc and polygon click on Arrange then Conver To.