Hey everybody.  Hope this winter is treating you well.  Now that I've been frozen out of my shop for a while I've been nosing around the net for some new ideas and came across what was probably a more popular art form in the 70s, but is still quite captivating....parametric wall art design (pic below)...which of course led quickly to studying the gorgeous CNC machines that produce these designs and their associated software.

 

I like the tiling feature the X Carve Pro offers but I haven't read about it being offered on any other CNC machine.  What Inventables calls 'tiling' is where you can cut pieces larger than your CNC table by sliding your wood/material through and let it do one section at a time.

 

1) Is there any way to make the AVID PRO 510 do this tiling function or is this something only Xcarve has right now?

 

2) V Carve Pro is SO expensive!  Is there ANY way to get it cheaper than it's retail price?  I've seen where you can get an activation code if you're part of an educational group, so wonder if that could be cheaper.  Also, would be nice to be able to split a subscription with someone.

 

3) I believe I've seen where Fusion 360 was suggested as a good program to use if you're working with parametric designs.  Any opinions on this?

 

4) And last, I'm still searching for the best forum to ask these kinds of CNC and software questions.  If there's a more appropriate place than here please do let me know.

Thanks

 

 

Pretty cool Brad.  I know there are some very knowledgeable CNC folks on here, but I ain't one of them.

Good luck with it.  Do you have a makers organization or tech school in the area that may have classes?

We use both V Carv and F360. They both have their advantages and disadvantages. My son handles the CNC table out of his shop and uses V Carv Pro for most of his operations. He is our guru for all things CNC. I use the Shaper Origin in my shop which is more 2D than 3D but more suited to the work I do. I use F360 and really like it. The learning curve for F360 is way longer than V Carv but once you get it down it really has no limitations. It is also easier on the collaborative level which was important for me in the beginning because he was guiding me through the process. There are tons of YouTube videos for both which are great for guiding you through the learning for both. F360 is free for non professionals which makes it great for starting out. 
Paul

I was fortunate to have V-Carve come with my original CNC Shark as it is nearly intuitive to use and they have several free educational videos available on Vectric's web site. F360, even if you are a hobbyist and not a professional now limits how many times you can use it before you have to pay for it. 

The latest versions of Vectric's software have great drafting features as well, and as such that's all I use any more even though I've had access to Rhino and AutoCAD and a few other CAD programs over the last 4 decades. 

 

I haven't upgraded to the latest version (11) yet, but believe it does include some parametric features. Version 10.5 does not.  You can download a trial version to play with as you watch their videos, although you can't actually use the trial version to make toolpaths you can use other than for the sample files they provide.  

F360 no longer has those restrictions. The only limitation to the free version is that you can only have 5 active projects open at a time, which is no issue for us since we rarely have more that one active at a time anyway. You can go back and make any project active as long there is no more than five files in editable mode at any given time. They tried putting time restrictions on maybe 2 yrs ago but there was such an uproar they backed down. 
Paul