After the design of the electrodes, the data must be passed on to the production. If the NC programming is done in a third party CAM system the CAD-data must be saved in an exchange format if no direct interface is available. In this case established formats like IGES or STEP are commonly used. However, it's a tedious and time consuming process for large assemblies with many individual electrodes.
SMARTElectrode provides a simple dialog that can be used for exporting data for EDM programming but can be used for data backup and conversion also.
Execute following steps for the ouput:
| 1. | Open electrode assembly |  |
| 2. | Open Output UI |  |
| 3. |
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| 4. |
All electrode models will be saved as STEP-file to selected directory. SMARTElectrode will use the csys defined in configuration as reference for the export. |
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How to customize the export?
How to ouput data to a data exchange directory with a mapped drive letter?
Open export options file export.cfg in configuration\export\STEP and edit the value for SE_EXPORT_DEFAULT_DIR.
SMARTElectrode will now save all step-files to the new directory.
What to do if my electrode models use their own special csys for CAM?
For example all models have a csys CAM_CSYS in the electrode center on the bottom of the frame. Open export options file export.cfg in configuration\export\STEP and add option SE_EDM_BACKUP_CSYS and add the value CAM_CSYS.
SMARTElectrode will now use defined CAM_CSYS as reference for the STEP-export.
Related configuration options
- Use option default_export to define pre-selected type in Output UI.
- Use option edm_origin_pos to define electrode csys position which will be used for the export by default.
- Use option edm_origin_name to define the feature name for the electrode csys.
Preview
Stay tuned to learn how to create a custom color format for electrodes and CAM in one of the next posts.
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