To Perform CL Data Gouge Checking
Gouge checking capabilities are provided to allow you a quick check of CL data for Milling NC sequences.
1. Click
on the tab of the NC sequence you are creating or editing.
The SELECT SRFS menu opens
2. Select the surfaces you want to check for gouging. The following options are available:
◦ Add—Select surfaces to check for gouging. You can select:
Surface—Individual surfaces.
Part—All surfaces on a part.
◦ Remove—Unselect some of the selected surfaces. You can also use the Surface and Part options described above.
◦ Remove All—Restart the surface selection process.
◦ Show—Show the surfaces selected so far. The surfaces will be highlighted in blue.
3. On the SELECT SRFS menu, click Done/Return when finished selecting surfaces.
4. On the GOUGE CHECK menu, click Run to start the gouge checking process. You can interrupt this process at any time by clicking on the STOP sign at the right end of the message window. If you press the STOP sign, the following options will be available:
◦ Continue—Continue gouge checking.
◦ Abort—Abort gouge checking.
◦ Show—Show gouges detected so far.
5. If no gouges are detected upon completing the check, the system will inform you with a message. Otherwise, the first detected gouge will be shown and the SHOW GOUGE menu will open with the following options:
◦ Show All—Show all detected gouges.
◦ Next—Show next gouge.
◦ Previous—Show previous gouge.
◦ Info—Output clearance between the tool and check surfaces, as well as information about all detected gouges, to a file. The number of decimal places output for cutter position will be defined by the configuration option mfg_xyz_num_digits (this option also defines the number of decimal places when outputting tool coordinates in CL data files). If this option is not specified, the default number of decimal places for Gouge Checking is 4.
6. You can check another NC sequence by clicking Filename on the GOUGE CHECK menu and selecting or creating another CL file. The Surfaces option on the GOUGE CHECK menu allows you to add or remove surfaces to check for gouging. You can also change the accuracy of system calculations by selecting Tolerance and entering the gouge tolerance value. The smaller the tolerance value, the greater the accuracy.
|  The tolerance value specified for Gouge Checking should not be less than the TOLERANCE value used when creating the NC sequence. A good "rule of thumb" is to set the gouge check tolerance to 1.5 times the NC sequence tolerance for the tool path being checked. |
The Step option on the GOUGE CHECK menu allows you to change the step size for gouge checking (that is, the tool positions where gouge checking is performed). You can either enter a value for step size, or let the system automatically calculate the value to maximize the speed of display. Entering a smaller step size will increase the number of gouge check positions.
7. On the GOUGE CHECK menu, click Done/Return when finished.