The Mastercam Forum is a valuable place to visit, so don’t forget to utilize it! This Forum is a place where users interested in CNC machining and Mastercam experts voice their opinions, collaborate, get ideas, and ask and answer questions.
And because the Forum has members from all around the world, you can usually get answers to your questions day or night, from experienced, knowledgeable Mastercam users.
To visit the Mastercam Forum, please click ‘here.’
CNC Software is currently conducting a survey to understand your opinion of the amount of material you receive with a major Mastercam release (for example, Mastercam X2). The survey should take only a couple minutes to complete.
In appreciation of your time, you will be included in a drawing to win one of several Mastercam sweatshirts. The survey closes on October 31, 2007.
To participate in the survey, please visit: https://vovici.com/wsb.dll/s/a667g2cc35
Mastercam has been helping shops stay at the top of their game for nearly 25 years. In that time, we’ve heard of a few common misconceptions from people who aren’t yet using Mastercam.
1. Mastercam is great for low-end work, but highly complex models and multiaxis work isn’t their strength. Mastercam continues to have one of the most powerful 3D toolpath sets on the market, and our multiaxis machining continues to prove itself in such high-precision industries as racing engine head ports and medical applications. Interestingly, this is the flipside of misconception #2, below.
2. Mastercam has way more than I need. The truth is that Mastercam is structured in “levels,” so that you buy only what you need. For example, if you just want to do basic 2D milling, Mastercam Mill Level 1 is perfect – and it protects your investment if you want to upgrade to more complex machining later.
3. Mastercam is “old” technology. This misconception comes from the look of our previous interface. We maintained that interface for as long as possible to help ease the eventual transition for our large user base. Even then, Mastercam was consistently on the forefront of core CAM advancements. With Mastercam X, however, the entire system was rebuilt from the ground up, taking advantage of the latest technology and setting the groundwork for advancements to come.
4. Making the switch to Mastercam X will be too hard and take too long. In fact, making the switch to Mastercam X doesn’t have to be hard. Many materials are available to help you get used to the new look and feel of Mastercam X and teach you the new enhancements that come with Mastercam X. For example, there are tutorials, streaming video courseware, CDs, a Mastercam Forum, and much more. One customer recently told us that his shop made the transition a little bit at a time. He made his programmers use Mastercam X one hour per day the first week, then 2 hours a day the 2nd week. After two weeks, his engineers had switched completely to Mastercam X and were showing an immediate boost in productivity. See the video testimonial here.
5. Mastercam is only good for milling. Mastercam has a wide range of products to run not only milling machines, but also CNC lathes, mill/turn machines, wire EDMs, plasma, laser and waterjet machines, as well as CNC routers.
Stay tuned for future blog postings to read part 2 of Mastercam’s Common Misconceptions.
Patch 1 for Mastercam X2 MR2 is now available on X2 Downloads section of Mastercam.com.
This patch is a translator update for X2 MR2. The initial release of Mastercam X2 MR2 was unable to import SolidWorks 2008 or SolidEdge V20 part files. The patch will update the Mastercam translators, which will allow these files to be opened. These translators will NOT function on a Windows 2000 machine. The same executable is also available via the Update Manager. The title bar and Mastercam version will NOT change after the patch is installed.
Download "mastercamx2-mr2-patch001.exe" and double-click on it to run the installation. Make sure Mastercam is closed before running the installation.
See the chart below to determine if the correct files were installed on your system:
