Any Fusion 360 CAM users here?

If so, does anyone know how to set up their X Carve waste board/cutting area as a fixture in Fusion? I have a model of my waste board in Fusion now as a .f3d file, and I’d like to map out my flip milling pin positions and centre line on it, and use it every time I run CAM in Fusion.

drag the file from a stock fixtures project into another project

I use F360 a lot but don’t have a work flow like the one you describe, but as Shane mention you can from the project meny “Insert design into current model”.

  • Draw your part
  • Right-click the wasteboard model from the meny and choose “Insert…” and it will be inserted to your part drawing.
  • Align them as you wish and go to CAM

How do you intend to keep your machine in sync with the waste board over time?

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I’m upgrading to lead screws in a couple of months, so hopefully that will hold things together. If not I can just update the file after recalibration and post the G Code back to Easel again I guess.

I’m a Fusion 360 to easel user. It sounds to me like you want to use a model of your spoil board to make holes for a bump stop location pin then us that as a starting point for all your future carves? If I’m understanding that I can help.

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That is what I belive to be the case too.

The potensial issue with that is the accuracy / repeatability of the homing switched which depending on the job have some “wiggle room”. Or say one need to replace a switch, will it latch at the exact same point?
Or something change on the machine causing homing switches to latch on a different position.

Any deviation on an axis will will be offset 2x when flipping the piece over. For general wood work the tolerance may be acceptable, for precise work it may not.

Just something to be aware of :slight_smile:

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Almost- I don’t want to use a bump stop.

In all of my Rhino models I include a centreline at a specific point across the X axis, and two 6mm pins reflected on either side of it, for flip milling.

Yesterday I had some luck in doing the same thing in Fusion, by simply not selecting the waste board/centre line/pin positions as a model when running setup. After importing them into Easel, they looked like they were situated exactly where I wanted them. It seems like they is is positioning the triad at the X Y home position, and ensuring the Z axis is set above the height of the work piece.

I am in hospital for the next week, so I can’t run a test on the machine, but I hope to do so early next week. Thank you for your offer of assistance, if anything comes up, I’ll send you a message and see if you can give me some guidance.

Thanks for the heads up. I have set up positioning guides against my limit switches after I last changed them, so if I change them again in future they will sit snug up against the guides. Hopefully that will be enough, but in case it isn’t, if I change out a limit switch, I’d do a full re calibration to set everything back the way I want it.

Is there anything else you can think of that I should look out for?

Not that comes to mind. I have intended to adapt a similar work flow but simply havent had the time to commit :wink:

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Well I look forward to seeing what you come up with!