Mcam Solidwork vs draftsight

[Karl_T]

Trying to waterjet this part on my son's equipment. He uses Mcam and Solidworks plus the special Omax waterjet software.



He scanned it and converted it to a .dxf using Mcam (handle from Mcam.dxf) This file would not open on my Draftsight current version.

So he put it in Solid works and sent the second .dxf (part19 from solidworks) this file opened just fine BUT it was in millimeter units so I had to scale it by 25.4 to fit the actual part before editing to clean up the scan. I sent it back to him for waterjetting, its was 25.4 times too large.

Anyone know how to solve either issue? We need to be able to go back and forth without spending big bucks for another CAM seat.

Had to change file extension to .txt to upload, change it to .dxf if you want to open it

 

[len_1962]

What version of MasterCAM and SW?
Not sure why there was an issue with DXF from MasterCAM, DXF is so universal.
Now from SW he needs to make sure he is in inch not mm when saving.
the lower right corner of SW window shows what units the file is in.

he can save out both a DWG and DXF

I always do all my design in SW and then open it in my other CAD\CAM softwares, native SW if the others can take the SW version I am using, if they are older most cannot take current release of SW so you'll have to export\file save as, either DWG\DXF\IGS for 2D

I been using SW for CAM and Laser since 1997

You can now get a hobby\maker version of SW for $48\year

 

[spinninquin]

All good points by Len above. The other thing I'd have him look at is the "year" of the DXF he's saving. I had a very hard time saving DXF's from MasterCAM and opening them in EnRoute, our plasma cutter software, when we first got it. I had to save them out as, I think, 2013-2017 in the drop down box. As soon as I did this I was able to open and program accordingly.

 

[Karl_T]

22 mcam. Kid says option to do old .dxf no longer in there.

21 solid works, he thinks it was already set to inch. need to double check.

 

[Mtndew]

Select all
Transform/Scale
At the bottom of the window that pops up you will see 2 rulers and a calculator.
Select the ruler on the right to scale it from metric to inches. This will make it smaller by a ratio of 25.4:1

 

[spinninquin]

22 mcam. Kid says option to do old .dxf no longer in there.

It's definitely still there in 2022. I'm on 2023 and I've been using that feature since before 2019. Have him hit the "options" button next to save and it'll give you the years to save out as. I'm not guaranteeing this is a fix, but it was 100% the reason my plasma cutter cam software couldn't open certain DXF's.

 

[MikeBurgess]

We have had a few instances where SW has saved Inch DXFs that open in other software upscaled 25.4 x but if opened in SW it opens at the correct scale. If your making lots of them it's probably worth the time to figure out how to get the DXF units and scale to match, otherwise just rescale it in the Omax software and cut it

 

[Neil76]

Trying to waterjet this part on my son's equipment. He uses Mcam and Solidworks plus the special Omax waterjet software.

View attachment 434444

He scanned it and converted it to a .dxf using Mcam (handle from Mcam.dxf) This file would not open on my Draftsight current version.

So he put it in Solid works and sent the second .dxf (part19 from solidworks) this file opened just fine BUT it was in millimeter units so I had to scale it by 25.4 to fit the actual part before editing to clean up the scan. I sent it back to him for waterjetting, its was 25.4 times too large.

Anyone know how to solve either issue? We need to be able to go back and forth without spending big bucks for another CAM seat.

Had to change file extension to .txt to upload, change it to .dxf if you want to open it

Hi Karl
In your Omax software try going to file then select import from other cad, does this then import correctly, failing that go to config at the bottom off the screen, go to load save and select ask to check scale before import.