[danielcoyle]

hello - slowly learning how to engrave in rhino but have been stumped for a couple hours now. trying to engrave a word onto a wood sheet but the parameters given, "on condition" and "to condition" along with the other engraving parameters only will outline engrave the region selected (which is a text object that i created as a curve and extruded to make it as thick as the sheet it is aligned/centered with/on). i want the full body of the lettering engraved. sorry for what i am sure is a very simple question but i am just wasting time at this point not knowing how to proceed.

thanks!

[awerby]

The "engraving" function of RhinoCAM involves cutting a single line, "on condition" means it will put it in the middle of whatever line you're using to drive the engraving; "to condition" is on one side of it. What it sounds like you're trying to do would best be done with a "Pocketing" routine, which is used for cutting wider areas of various shapes to a certain depth. You can do them with Horizontal Roughing first, and then a Horizontal Finishing operation with a smaller tool to clean up. Define the outside of each letter as a machining region (with "islands" as necessary to avoid filling them in) and invoke the Pocketing machine operation with a fairly shallow depth to remove all material inside the bounds of your letters.

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

[danielcoyle]

Thanks! Will try this out tonight. Makes sense.

[unexpectedly]

danielcoyle: what machine are you running? I'm trying to learn more about CNC and lettering, etc. I do not have any NC machining equipment yet; not sure what I want to get / do.

[danielcoyle]

I have a chinese machine. JCUT. you can see them on ebay. looked around a lot. uses a dsp controller.

[Melkiades]

The best strategy to engrave letters is V-carving.
Tool path going between sign borders and goes deeper if it goes wide.
Engraving means tool path going over vector.