Cutting list for CNC

[Jacob]

Grandson wants to know if I can produce a cutting list for a CNC project.
Presumably this could only be in-put from an appropriate CAD programme? Am I right?

 

[Yojevol]

Grandson wants to know if I can produce a cutting list for a CNC project.
Presumably this could only be in-put from an appropriate CAD programme? Am I right?

Who knows? I suggest you TALK to your grandson to get an understanding of his requirements. It'll probably be beneficial to him to make clear what he is after.
Brian

 

[Sachakins]

Using Fusion 360 from design would give a cutting list!

 

[ChaiLatte]

...cutting list for a CNC project. ...in-put from an appropriate CAD programme...

As above, you might have to ask him what he wants, what he wants to do with it and in what format he expects it.

You would normally model your object (let us say for simplicity it is a six-faced rectangular box with all three dimensions differing). The modelling (CAD) program itself would produce a cut list from the six individual parts.

The list might be as simple as a table with three line items: part number (1, 2, 3), number off (2 of each line number), dimensions (l x w x t).

What we are calling a cut list here is very closely associated with a Bill of Materials in a mechanical assembly. The above is very simple, but a BoM can be as complicated as the situation requires (e.g. include relevant British Standard requirements, testing requirements, specific suppliers or part number cross-references). Many programs will offer the ability to export the BoM in a spreadsheet format.

You would not really model the object within one CAD program and then send it to another program to produce the cut list/BoM.

Nor do I think you can take a simple tabular cut list and send it to another machine for manufacture. For manufacture (on a CNC router), you would need a dxf file of each part to be cut.

Kind of related to the cut list question, there are cut list optimiser programs available (you input the cut list, and the length of each piece of stock material you have. The program tells you the most efficient way to get your result with least waste). The 2D equivalent of a cut list optimiser is a nesting program, where you input your shapes and your sheet size and the computer arranges the pieces on the sheet for least waste.

Really, he needs to supply more details. What is he cutting, on what machine, and how does the item exist (e.g. Fusion 360 model)?

 

[Jacob]

As above, you might have to ask him what he wants, what he wants to do with it and in what format he expects it.

You would normally model your object (let us say for simplicity it is a six-faced rectangular box with all three dimensions differing). The modelling (CAD) program itself would produce a cut list from the six individual parts.

The list might be as simple as a table with three line items: part number (1, 2, 3), number off (2 of each line number), dimensions (l x w x t).

What we are calling a cut list here is very closely associated with a Bill of Materials in a mechanical assembly. The above is very simple, but a BoM can be as complicated as the situation requires (e.g. include relevant British Standard requirements, testing requirements, specific suppliers or part number cross-references). Many programs will offer the ability to export the BoM in a spreadsheet format.

You would not really model the object within one CAD program and then send it to another program to produce the cut list/BoM.

Nor do I think you can take a simple tabular cut list and send it to another machine for manufacture. For manufacture (on a CNC router), you would need a dxf file of each part to be cut.

Kind of related to the cut list question, there are cut list optimiser programs available (you input the cut list, and the length of each piece of stock material you have. The program tells you the most efficient way to get your result with least waste). The 2D equivalent of a cut list optimiser is a nesting program, where you input your shapes and your sheet size and the computer arranges the pieces on the sheet for least waste.

Really, he needs to supply more details. What is he cutting, on what machine, and how does the item exist (e.g. Fusion 360 model)?

Thanks for that.
He's supplied details from a book. It's for two speaker cabinets "Folding horn w bin enclosure" which are very complicated with lots of partitions, cut-outs etc. It's not for me - I'll refer him to your post!

 

[ChaiLatte]

He's supplied details from a book. It's for two speaker cabinets "Folding horn w bin enclosure" which are very complicated with lots of partitions, cut-outs etc.

Thanks for the info. If it is dimensioned paper drawings that he has, he or someone else would need to draw them up in a CAD program.

The standard way to go from the CAD prgram to a nicely cut piece of plywood is to make each piece a dxf file, which is then used by the cutting machine.

Aside: if anyone is looking at this, it seems to be called a "W-bin", where "W" is doing the same work as "P" in P-trap or "Z" in Z-purlin.

 

[Jake]

Kind of related to the cut list question, there are cut list optimiser programs available (you input the cut list, and the length of each piece of stock material you have. The program tells you the most efficient way to get your result with least waste).

Off topic, but in looking at quotes for ready cut panels for a project to see if it would save time at not too much cost (in this case the answer was no), I found one of the online CNC panel cutters shows their optimised layout of the sheets as part of the quote (to allow you to select which off cuts you want etc). Handy...

 

[sploo]

Thanks for that.
He's supplied details from a book. It's for two speaker cabinets "Folding horn w bin enclosure" which are very complicated with lots of partitions, cut-outs etc. It's not for me - I'll refer him to your post!

If it's a set of drawings from a book then you/he/someone would need to put them into a CAD package. The drawings would then go into a CAM package that turns the drawings into instructions for the specific CNC machine (gcode).

Modern packages will do CAD->CAM with 3D complex models (translating all the pockets, rebates, dados etc into appropriate cuts). Older/simpler CAM packages will take 2D drawings (e.g. in DXF), and you have to select the contours and tell the package that you want that to be a cut outside/inside the line, and to what depth etc.

As noted by others "cutting list for a CNC project" isn't enough information to proceed with. Does said grandson have a CNC machine, or is he going to use a 3rd party service?

If the parts (individually) are smaller than 900x600mm then I could probably cut them on my CNC machine for you/him.

 

[Jacob]

Off topic, but in looking at quotes for ready cut panels for a project to see if it would save time at not too much cost (in this case the answer was no), I found one of the online CNC panel cutters shows their optimised layout of the sheets as part of the quote (to allow you to select which off cuts you want etc). Handy...

Simpler to do it the old way, using the old brain.
Gather your cutting list and material stock, then work through your cutting list from largest pieces first, taken from smallest pieces of stock possible.
"Smallest pieces" varies as you produce offcuts in the process, but it still works and is self correcting as you go.
Very reliable with timber, sheet takes more thought about orientation.

 

[Ollie78]

There are plugins for Fusion 360 and sketchup that will do this. Can't remember the names. Vcarve pro does nesting for optimisation.

Ollie