I have a question regarding the use of tool libraries and the cutting conditions feature in SolidCAM.

For many years I have just machined Aluminium on our 5 axis machines, but a couple of years ago our business changed direction a little and increasingly I call upon to machine Cast Iron, SG Iron and Steel in addition to my 'normal' 7075 or 2618. In the beginning I just had separate tool libraries for each material, but now that solution is getting messy, especially with drills, taps, reamers and other tools of a general purpose nature, so I have begun to think about one "master" tool library with each tool having multiple cutting conditions (or only one as the case may be).

The trouble is the SolidCAM help on this issue is as clear as mud, so I thought I would ask here to see if anyone else has been done this road and whether it is a dead end.

From what I can see of the 'Cutting Conditions' page in the Help, you can only set generic condition and then import them, which to my mind is a complete waste of time. What I want to do is set for each individual tool the speed & feed for Aluminium, Cast Iron, SG Iron and Steel, but I am not sure if this is possible. I think it may be possible as when you export a tool library out to Excel, you get a worksheet called "Cutting Conditions" and some garbage data purporting to be for Steel, Cast Iron, Aluminium and Titanium. I have tried editing this but once edited the data will not import back into SolidCAM.

I hope it can be done through Excel, as using a spreadsheet makes mass editing so much easier, especially when you are trying to combine multiple databases.

If anyone from SolidCAM is reading this (and I know they lurk on this forum from time to time), how about a really in-depth tutorial on getting the best out of your tool libraries with examples of best practice and some better resources such as what SolidCAM demands from a tool library held in Excel in the way of formatting, use of formulae etc.