Fundamentals of CNC Machining
Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008Tooling Offset
I thought this would be a great place to do a quick talk on Tooling Offset. Tooling Offset is the amount you must “Offset” the tool while machining. For example, the tool paths that we created in CAM Software are located in the dead center of the tool unless you do something about it. Most times you set the tool offset in your CAM program, but sometimes you might have to do it during the machining phase, depending on your machine.
What if you had a one-inch diameter tool, we will use an end mill in this example, and you needed to take off .25” around the perimeter of a 5” by 5” block of aluminum? Without tool offset, the tool path would be around the perimeter of the block. The end mill would take off half of its diameter or .5” inches. You need to offset the tool so this does not happen. In this case you would offset the tool outside of the block by .25”, then the end mill would take off .25” of material.
Zeroing the machine out
When beginning your machining, you always need to zero out the machine.You need to let the cnc control software know where the starting point for the project is.When zeroing out a machine, you will use an edge finder. Most times in CNC Plasma Cutting, you will just pick your starting point on the steel and begin the program there.